Guitar-Shaped Forest

-33.867886, -63.987. This huge forest-shaped guitar is a memorial to a farmer's lost love. Córdoba, Argentina. (Photo: Google Earth)

Google Earth has proved to be not just a virtual globe, but a place to feast your eyes on never-before-seen sights around the world from a bird’s-eye perspective. Some of these surprising images shownatural phenomena, others reveal fleeting moments captured in nature and some are simply a familiar view from an unfamiliar perspective.

One site onthe lush farmlands near Córdoba, Argentina,stands out as a heart-wrenching labor of love.When pilots fly over the fertile land of the Pampas region,they're often surprised to spot a huge guitar-shaped forest amidst the ordered fields. The site is more than an amazing example of land art, where forms are built into a naturallandscape. It's a touching tribute to a man's lost sweetheart.

(Google Earth)

In 1977, young Argentine farmer Pedro Martin Ureta tragically lost his wife. He planted the guitar in her honor, and now, nearly 40 years after her death, Ureta still maintains the stunning memorial.

Now in his 70s,Ureta was somewhat of a rebel in his younger years, the Wall Street Journal reported. But when the 28-year-old met 17-year-old Graciela Yraizoz in his hometown, everything changed.

The two settled down on the fertile farmlands Ureta had grown up on and raised four children.

Graciela, who oversaw work in the fields, had big plans for the farm. As Atlas Obscura reports, on a flight over Pampa, the farmer’s wife had noticed another farm that looked like a milking pail from the air. Graciela thought that family could create something even more magnificent on their own farm: A huge forest shaped as her favorite instrument – the guitar.

But like with so many plans, Ureta had to put his wife's idea on the back burner.

"My father was a young man, and very busy with his work and his own plans," Ureta's youngest child, Ezequiel, told the Wall Street Journal. "He told my mom, 'Later. We'll talk about it later.'"

Later never came. In 1977,Gracieladied suddenly of a cerebral aneurysm at the tender age of 25. To compound the tragedy,the young mother of four was pregnant with what would have been the couple’s fifth child.

Still heartbroken a few years later, Ureta decided that the best way to honor his late wifewould be to fulfill her wish and create thegiant work of art in her honor.

(MORE:Memorial to Downed Plane Visible on Google Earth)

After landscapers refused to help with the project, the savvy farmer and his children took it on themselves. One-by-one, they planted and nurtured roughly 7,000 cypress and eucalyptus trees into the shape of a guitar:Cypess for the figure-eight-shaped body and starburst sound hole and Blue eucalyptus trees to represent the six strings.

It took a few rough seasons for the trees to take root, but Ureta's dedication paid off. Watching the forest grow over the years gave Graciela's children comfort.

¨It was the closest thing possible to having my mother alive," Maria Julia, told the Wall Street Journal of watching the saplings start to grow.

Ureta'sland art isn't the only tribute to lost love you can see from above. The Telegraph tells the story of Winston Howes, who planted oak saplings in the shape of a heart in South Gloucestershire, England, in honor of his wife of 33 years.

Click through the slideshow below for more amazing Google Earth finds.

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