Nothing quenches a thrill seeker’s thirst quite like an amusement park. While Ferris wheels are popular, as are bumper cars and the like, roller coasters usually draw the largest crowd, and for good reason.

These rides have height, drops, speed, and more—though not all are equal in these factors. So let’s take a look at the tallest and fastest among the world’s coasters, in search of the ultimate thrill.

View Roller coaster rankings in a full screen map

The Tallest Roller Coasters: From Height to Drop Length

All of the tallest coasters are made of steel. In fact, the tallest steel coaster (456 ft.) is three times the height of the tallest wooden coaster (127 ft.)! That’s a huge height discrepancy, and there are many other coasters beyond the wooden leader.

Here are the very tallest of the tall:

• Kingda Ka – 456 ft. tall
• Top Thrill Dragster – 420
• Superman: Escape from Krypton – 415
• Red Force – 367.3
• Fury 325 – 325
• Steel Dragon 2000 – 318.3
• Millennium Force – 310
• Leviathan – 306
• Intimidator 305 – 305
• Orion – 287

Kingda Ka is the tallest among these rides, towering at an impressive height of 456 feet or 139 meters. It’s closely followed by Top Thrill Dragster at 420 feet (130 meters) and Superman: Escape from Krypton at 415 feet (126 meters). All three of these roller coasters are located in the United States, though at different parks: Six Flags Great Adventure in New Jersey, Cedar Point in Ohio, and Six Flags Magic Mountain in California, respectively.

The majority (7) of the tallest roller coasters in the world are located in the U.S. In addition to those already mentioned, Fury 325, Millennium Force, Intimidator 305, and Orion are scattered throughout the nation. However, it’s far from the only country. Spain, Japan, and Canada are also represented by one coaster each: Red Force, Steel Dragon 2000, and Leviathan, respectively.

The 10 tallest of these rides are all made of steel. Wooden coasters, on the other hand, are all much shorter, as you’ll find on the map when you group the map by “Type.” However, the overall height isn’t necessarily the most important factor among these coasters, even related to height.

Drop Lengths of These Rides

Drop length is another height-related roller coaster factor. The steepest drops range from 418 to 141 feet, the lengthiest of which is, once again, Kingda Ka.

Name	Drop length (ft)	Drop length (m)
Kingda Ka	418	127
Top Thrill Dragster	400	120
Red Force	345	105
Superman: Escape from Krypton	328.1	100
Fury 325	320	98
Steel Dragon 2000	306.8	93.5
Leviathan	306	93
Millennium Force	300	91
Intimidator 305	300	91
Orion	300	91

While the table consists of the same roller coasts as the list of the tallest, several are in a different order. Red Force, for example, ranks at #3 in drop length as opposed to #4 in height. Others with shifting positions include Superman: Escape from Krypton, Leviathan, and Millennium Force.

Of course, beyond height and drop length, there’s also overall length, which you can find on the map when you group by “Length (ft).” And—not to mention—speed.

The Fastest Roller Coaster Is Over 149 Mph

Height and drop length are key to a roller coaster’s experience. However, speed just might be the most important factor for thrill seekers. The fastest of these rides flies along its track at a speed of 149.1 mph, though the rest of the fastest coasters aren’t too far behind, as you’ll see on the list below.

• Formula Rossa – 149.1mph
• Kingda Ka – 128
• Top Thrill Dragster – 120
• Red Force – 111.8
• Do-Dodonpa – 111.8
• Superman: Escape from Krypton – 100
• Ring Racer – 99.4
• Fury 325 – 95
• Steel Dragon 2000 – 95
• Millennium Force – 93

Kingda Ka is no longer king. The tallest coaster with the lengthiest drop has dropped to second place when it comes to speed. The #1 spot goes to a coaster that doesn’t even rank among the top 10 in height at 170.6 ft. tall. However, that is for safety reasons. Formula Rossa has a height restriction in place, and riders are required to wear goggles—also for their safety. If you’re still interested, you can ride Formula Rossa yourself, goggles and all, when you visit Ferrari World Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates.

Or check it out from the front rider’s point of view:

Another thing that rolls—though perhaps not as fast as these roller coasters—is the world’s largest rollerskate. You can read more about that on the World’s Largest Map of the World’s Largest Roadside Attractions.

What do you consider a “tool?” Certainly, a hammer or a screwdriver counts—but so does a pencil or even a how-to blog post.

If you’re a runner or even a biker, you may rely on a lot of tools: running shoes, a water bottle, a stopwatch, etc. You may also use a tool such as an app to track your routes. Thousands of these exist, from Komoot, Strava, and O.S. Maps.

While these apps often include a map, there may be times that you want to visualize your route in other formats—and perhaps you wish to share it with others. So let’s go over the two ways to map your running route, starting with track points.

#1 Map Your Track Points

The first way to map your running route involves exporting or downloading a GPX file of your entire tracked route (called track points in GPX terms) from your route-tracking app.

Once you have that file, you’ll need to export the coordinates into a list format to make your route usable. You can do this by diving into the XML yourself, or by finding a tool like this to convert to an Excel format. The result you’re looking for is a spreadsheet with separate columns for latitude and longitude, like this:

You can remove certain columns from your spreadsheet, such as the “track_fid,” “track_seg_id,” and “track_seg_point_id” in the above example. We also recommend splitting dates and times into individual columns.

Then, follow these steps to map this spreadsheet data:

1. Select (Ctrl+A or Cmd+A) and copy (Ctrl+C or Cmd+C) your data (including the headers)
2. Open your web browser and navigate to batchgeo.com
3. Click on the location data box with the example data in it, then paste (Ctrl+V or Cmd+V) your own data
4. Check to make sure you have the proper location data columns available by clicking “Validate and Set Options”
5. Select the proper location column from each drop-down
6. Click “Make Map” and watch as the geocoder performs its process

Now you can see your route with a marker for every latitude/longitude pair in your GPX data:

View Your Running Route Trackpoints in a full screen map

However, if you’d prefer fewer markers on your map, the second method of mapping your running route may be for you.

#2 Only Map Your Waypoints or POIs

Depending on how many miles you run, a marker for every track point might be overwhelming on your map. So how can you narrow down your route? You can refer to waypoints or points of interest (POI), a feature of some GPS units or mobile location self-tracking apps that are shown separately from routes and tracks. These can be landmarks, fields, or even businesses you pass on your run.

If your app allows you to add and track these as you run, you can export or download this data and put it into spreadsheet form.

Then, you can follow the same steps noted above to copy and paste your spreadsheet data into batchgeo.com.

This way, you can plot your run by using the milestones you note along the way.

Label Your Route with Letters or Numbers

View Your Running Route Trackpoints, Labeled in a full screen map

Regardless of whether you prefer to highlight your track points or just points of interest, you can make your route map even easier to follow by giving each marker an alphabetical or numerical label.

Labels are best suited for maps with fewer locations (26 for alphabetical labels and 99 for numerical labels), which makes them perfect for your route—unless you’re running multi-day marathons.

By default, there are no labels for your markers, so we’ll need to indicate we want them. To do so in BatchGeo:

• Right-click your map and select Edit Map
• Scroll down to Set Options, then Show Advanced Options
• Locate the “Label each marker” dropdown and select letters or numbers for your labels

Now you’re ready to share your easy-to-follow running route map with your friends and family. You can always copy and send the URL of your map—or even embed it seamlessly in your website or blog.

Happy running (and mapping!)

Countries often choose national foods, drinks, animals, sports, and other symbols to celebrate and promote their unique identity and culture.

Then, there are plants, specifically flowers and trees. Yes, some countries have declared national flowers, like rhododendrons, roses, and orchids. Even more common are national trees, of which one stands alone, strong and powerful… kind of like an oak tree.

Let’s explore the 31 national flowers and 92 national trees of various nations.

View National flowers and trees in a full screen map

Rhododendrons, Roses, the Other 26 National Flowers

Flowers have long been used as symbols of a country’s identity and culture. When the 31 countries with national flowers made their decisions, they considered history, culture, and, of course, what was native to the nation.

Of 195 countries in the world, only 15% have declared a national flower. Yet, even still, we saw overlap in their choices: rhododendrons (3), roses (2), Lillies (2), poppies (2), and orchids (2) all were chosen by more than one country.

Rhododendrons are a symbol of resilience and strength, which may be why three countries selected them as their national flower. Nepal’s the Rhododendron arboreum, while both the Emirate of Caucasus and Kashmiristan choose the Rhododendron ponticum to represent them.

Roses are another popular choice for national flowers. Both England and the Maldives have selected types of roses for their national flower: the Tudor rose (an emblem) and Pink rose, respectively. Despite their names, neither South Korea’s Rose of Sharon nor Chile’s Lapageria rosea are roses. Like the rose, orchids are the national flower of two nations: Sikkim (Noble orchid) and Singapore (Orchid).

Meanwhile, lilies symbolize purity, innocence, and tranquility. You might think this makes them a popular national flower choice. While Sri Lanka’s Water Lily and Finland’s Lily of the Valley suggest this, the Lily of the Valley is a bit of a misnomer—it’s actually part of the asparagus family. Only Sri Lanka is truly represented by this particular type of flower.

Check out the rest of the national flowers on the map. Enjoy the simplicity of the Tiaré Flower (Cook Islands) or the bright bloom of Samoa’s Red ginger before moving on to national trees…

National Trees Are Overwhelmingly Oak

Far more nations have designated national trees (92) than flowers (31). Also unlike national flowers, there’s a very common national tree: Oaks (18). Even so, there’s more than one Oak variety for nations to choose as their national tree.

National tree common name	#	Countries
Oak, Pedunculate oak	12	Belarus*, Croatia, Denmark, England, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Poland, Romania, Serbia, United Kingdom
Oak	2	Germany, United States
Sessile oak	2	Ireland, Wales
Cork oak	1	Portugal
Golden oak	1	Cyprus

The Pedunculate oak is the national tree of 11 countries—12 if you count Belarus, for which it is unofficial. All 12 are located throughout Europe, where this type of oak is native (it’s often referred to as the English oak or European oak).

However, not every European country is represented by the Pedunculate oak. Ireland and Wales’ national tree is the Sessile oak. Portugal has its Cork oak and geographically-Western-Asia yet culturally Southeastern European Cyprus chose the Golden oak. Meanwhile, Germany (and the U.S., though it’s decidedly not a European country) selected plain old oaks.

Palms, pines, and olive trees are also popular trees, as you can see in the table. You’ll find them all on the map… along with photos of each national flower or tree.

Display Images on Your Map

You may have noticed the thumbnail images we’ve included in this map, something you can do with your own BatchGeo custom map.

An image is worth a thousand words. That’s why we made it easy to include logos, icons, photos, or other imagery in your map itself.

Here’s how to do it:

1. First, you’ll want to check that your images are small, not more than 150 pixels in either direction.
2. Next, you’ll need to either upload your images somewhere, such as a blog or image provider, or pull in images that are already hosted online, like from Wikipedia (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/ca/Phoenix_dactylifera100_4209.JPG/90px-Phoenix_dactylifera100_4209.JPG).
3. In your spreadsheet, create a separate column for your images, with a heading like “Images.” You can include a single image for every location.
4. Add the URL for every image you want to include in that column.

Then, map your data, as usual, using our free mapping tool. You’ll be able to select the spreadsheet’s “Image” column when you “Show Advanced Options,” if BatchGeo doesn’t discover it automatically.

One note on hosted images: Sometimes Wikipedia or other sites will remove an image or restrict its access. To avoid this, you’ll want to host map images on Dropbox or a similar cloud image service.