The prevalence of water in the north, however, spreads out the game: you will often find big cats perched dramatically atop red rock outcrops, the better to spot prey.

BBC: The Serengeti in the off-season

All around the stunning, perched towns of Pitigliano, Sovana, and Sorano run hidden hiking trails carved from volcanic rock by the pre-Roman Etruscans.

FORBES: The Other Tuscany

' Expanses of black rock swoop down to the shore, where lighthouses look little more than golf tees perched on the cliffs.

BBC: An Icelandic journey to the centre of the earth

There, mudslides and raging rivers swept away shantytowns perched on steep slopes of the lush Avila mountain and left tall buildings marooned in a sea of rock-hard debris.

BBC: News Online

It was perched on the slope of a minor mountain, about a third of the way up, with thick slabs of rock stuck under the front side, a new rock every year, to keep the house from tumbling forward into the fields of wild raspberries.

NEWYORKER: Reverting to a Wild State