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(CNN) - Who needs something new and improved when you can delight in the old and perfect?
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Hikers looking for adventures could get up close to these 10 living ambassadors who embody the past, including a bird that accumulates millions of kilometers of flight, a rose that survived an aerial bombardment, a tree linked to the Buddha, some green plants in the Andes and huge porifers in Antarctica.
These and other incredible ancient pilgrimages await the most curious traveler.
Wild animal: approximately 68 years
(Credit: Daniel W. Clark / USFWS)
Wisdom, the wild bird that has been confirmed is the oldest in the world, turned 68 in 2019. Since it was ringed in 1956, the Laysan albatross has recorded about 4,828,032 kilometers of flight, more than six times the round trip distance to the moon!
Among ocean migrations, Wisdom returns in the fall to the Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge to raise its chicks. The bird survived a tsunami and hatched between 30 and 40 eggs on the island.
With perseverance and permits, you can see Wisdom and his fellow Phoebastria immutabilis in their paradise in the Pacific. Midway Atoll is located at the northern end of the Hawaiian archipelago.
Land animal: approximately 187 years
Jonathan's exact age is uncertain, but he is believed to be about 187 years old. (Credit: Gianluigi Guercia / AFP / Getty Images)
Jonathan, the most beloved resident of Santa Elena, a small island in the South Atlantic, was born around 1832, five years before the coronation of Queen Victoria. Since then, the giant tortoise has lived as long as the periods of 39 US presidents.
He never met the other famous man who lived on the island, Napoleon Bonaparte, since the French emperor died exiled there in 1821. The giant reptile was born in the Seychelles, in the Indian Ocean, but moved to the Atlantic as a gift for the then governor of Santa Elena in 1882.
Since then, he roams the property of the governor of the island, where he enjoys the company of three other giant turtles and frequent human guests.
Rosa: approximately 1,200 years
(Credit: Julian Stratenschulte / picture-alliance / dpa / AP)
Known as the "Rose of the Thousand Years," it is believed that this imposing rose bush in Germany was created by King Louis the Pious in 815.
The bush grows next to a Catholic cathedral dedicated to Saint Mary in Hildesheim, a beautiful medieval town known for its ancient churches.
In addition to its beauty and age, the plant exhibits a remarkable strength. The bombings of the allies during World War II left the cathedral in ruins, but the rose, a canine rose, survived, flourished and now grows more than 9 meters high next to the apse of the restored church.
Planted tree: About 2,300 years
The sacred Bodhi tree in the Jaya Sri Maha Bodhi Temple in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka. (Credit: Shutterstock)
The fig tree under which Siddhartha Gautama experienced enlightenment in India disappeared long ago, but a cut of that tree, carried by a royal devotee to Sri Lanka around 250 BC. C., has become one of the most revered trees in the Buddhist world, and the oldest to be planted of which is recorded in history.
The fig tree Jaya Sri Maha Bodhi, a religious ficus, has welcomed the religious, the curious and the wicked for centuries since then.
The writer HGWells was amazed at the tree. The elephants damaged him. Tamil separatists besieged him.
Now, pilgrims of all kinds pay tribute, especially on full moon days (poya), to the tree between elaborate gardens, canals, golden fences, religious stupas and younger Bodhi trees in the Mahamewna Gardens in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka .
Fruit tree: approximately 2,500 years
(Credit: Shutterstock)
Whether man or nature has planted it, between 2,000 and 3,000 years ago, before the emergence of classical Greece, a seed sprouted on the Mediterranean island of Crete that continues to produce an annual harvest of olives to this day.
But the monumental tree in Vouves, a town in the region of the island controlled by the Greeks, does more than produce drupa fruit. This and other nearby nearby Olea Europaea plants, similar in age and aged appearance, attract artists, religious leaders, Olympians and heads of state, who are inspired by their surprisingly twisted trunks and limbs.
The Vouves tree now has a museum that highlights the traditional techniques of harvesting olives from Crete, once home to the Minoan civilization, which flourished in ancient times from its olive oil trade.
Wild grass: about 3,000 years
These striking giant green drops are Andean shrubs that date back thousands of years. (Credit: Shutterstock)
Yareta or llareta, bright green globules that resemble mossy rocks, are actually flowering shrubs perfectly designed to withstand the high altitude conditions of the Andes Mountains in Peru, Bolivia, northern Chile and the West of Argentina
Wind, freezing temperatures and drought are not problems for the Azorella compact , a wild and inedible relative of parsley and fennel, which slowly and methodically become extinct, growing as little as a meter every century.
Due to their slow growth rate, it is believed that the largest shrubs are approximately 3,000 years old.
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Given its density - a bush can easily support the weight of a human being - the yareta has been used as a peat of traditional fuel. Fortunately, South American governments have come together to protect endangered species.
Individual tree: approximately 5,000 years
(Credit: Shutterstock)
Methuselah, a pine in the White Mountains of California, is about 5,000 years old, which makes it the oldest known cloned organism on Earth.
Named for a character from the Old Testament who lived 969 years, the exact whereabouts of this Pinus longaeva continues to be a well-kept scientific secret, but you can walk around his former companions and perhaps through the same tree on a 7-day hiking circuit , 2 kilometers through the Bristlecone pine forest within the Inyo National Forest.
Whether you encounter the oldest tree or not, this forest of knotty and gray-haired pines - many of them older than the Egyptian pyramids - that cling to the arid and rugged mountains protruding from the desert floor, is just as inspiring
Live animal: about 15,000 years
(Credit: Rob Robbins / EarthRef.org)
Antarctic volcano sponges, Anoxycalyx joubini , are whitish beings that resemble giant beer barrels or miniature volcanoes. They cool the cold waters around the McMurdo Strait and their estimated age is based on the size of the sponges, which only grow a little each year.
They thrive in depths of 15 to 152 meters, like sentinels of a deep kingdom that they share with other strange creatures, such as small crustaceans and undulating worms that live inside the sponges, and packages of quilted starfish that dine on the two-meter monsters High.
Only the most dedicated divers can explore this kingdom. Thanks to extreme ocean equipment, such as Polar Trec, you can enjoy, after drilling through the ice, the best underwater visibility in the world.
Terrestrial forest: approximately 80,000 years
(Credit: Alamy)
The Utah Giant Tremor consists of almost 5,000 aspen trees, but the entire forest of this species, the Populus tremuloides , is genetically identical and shares a single root system, which makes it technically a single organism.
This clonal colony of a male aspen poplar is also known as Pando, a word that comes from Latin, and covers more than 40 hectares.
The leaves of an aspen make a great flutter before the softer wind. Listen to the melodious effect multiplied by tens of thousands as you spend the night, right in the heart of Pando, at a camp in the Fishlake National Forest.
Marine forest: approximately 200,000 years
(Credit: Shutterstock)
According to geneticists, an extensive seagrass meadow 16 kilometers long near Spain is the only known organism on Earth so far.
Posidonia oceanica , known as Neptune grass, is endemic to the Mediterranean Sea. But a patch near the island of Formentera, auto-cloned as Pando, stands out for its age, estimated at 200,000 years.
Fortunately, the island, the smallest of the Balearic Islands in Spain, does not have the crowds of nearby Ibiza, from where you take the ferry to Formentera. In addition to a diving or snorkeling adventure in the old marine forest, you can explore the picturesque lighthouse and caves of the island.
* Richard Stenger, a senior science and technology editor at CNN.com, currently travels the physical and virtual worlds from his base of operations in Northern California, where he serves as chief marketing officer for RedwoodCoastParks.com.
