Escape to the world's quietest places

Life in most places is loud. Planes flying overhead, traffic rushing through the streets, people yelling, talking, phones ringing - it all combines to make an endless racket that follows us throughout our days. If you need to get away for some (literal) peace and quiet, take a look at Forbes Traveler's list of the World's Quietest Places.

Many of these aren't the sort of places where you'll go crazy from the silence, in fact some of them are plenty noisy. But near and far, they provide places where you can get away from the aural assault of the world and revel in a quiet(er) existence.

Included on the list are destinations like the verdant Hoh Valley in Washington State and Muir Woods in California, both places that are easy to get to from major cities but seem a world away. Further from home, there's the island of Yap, near Guam, where the "culture is built on adherence to social peace". The Kalahari Desert, 350,000 square miles of sparsely populated sand and scrub, also makes the list.

Victoria Falls isn't exactly silent, but the roar of the water as it plummets 350 feet (which can be heard over a mile away) is such a natural sound and so completely shuts out everything else, that it almost feels quiet. Central Park is another unlikely addition to the list. Though it's located in the middle of what is arguably one of the world's loudest cities, it provides a quiet solitude away from the noise of daily life.

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