Our readers share their stunning summer vacation photos. Take a look to inspire your next trip

You continue to surprise us, Travel section readers.

We weren’t expecting the volume of photos from your summer vacations. By one calculation, you shared more than 1,700 photographs with us. That’s a lot of pixels.

We also weren’t expecting how far you would go to get these photos. You appear to have been everywhere, from Bali to Italy, from Greece to the Golden State. You were in South America and Northern Europe, Southeast Asia and the northeastern United States.

As you look through the section — and we think you’ll enjoy the photography and the care that went into making these photos — remember this isn’t a contest. It’s a compendium of photos that spoke to us. Some yelled in our faces; some whispered in our ears.

We also tried to balance the collection aesthetically (Too subtle! Colors too bold!) and by subject (Not enough flora! Too much fauna!).

And yes, we do speak in exclamation points when we are evaluating your photographs. After all, you put your heart and soul into these pictures, so why would we be any less passionate?

Christopher Reynolds, Anne Harnagel, Kathy Pyon, Ricardo DeAratanha, Denise Florez, Judith Pryor, Paul Gonzales and I — many of the people who bring you the Travel section in print and online each week — put our collective heads together and our photographic differences aside to bring you our annual Summer Vacation Photo issue.

I thank them, but I thank you even more. The perseverance it took to capture the pictures displayed in print and online reminds us that the wonders of the world are always sweeter when shared.

The best of your summer photos

Image on top:

Xizhou, China | Don Drissel, Seal Beach

Drissel was in a local market in Xizhou, China, where he spotted this child through a window. Drissel waved and got the grin in return, then snapped with his Nikon D500.

Bali, Indonesia | Andrew John Marton, Los Angeles

Marton spend most of June on the island of Bali, where he found a compelling scene of praying bathers at the Tirta Empul Temple. The first time he visited, “I couldn’t get the shot I wanted,” he said. Marton returned later and was able to capture this image of a Hindu purification ritual. He used a Leica SL.

Santiago, Chile | Susan Weber, Pasadena

Weber spent two weeks in Chile on a trip that included the Atacama Desert and Easter Island, also known as Rapa Nui. She was in Santiago, the capital, on her last travel day when she took this shot of a man passing paintings on the sidewalk. She used a Sony A7ii camera.

Tel Aviv | Joanie Merrill, Carpinteria

Merrill snapped these umbrellas with her iPhone6 on a trip to Israel. She found them — and their handles in the shape of dancers’ legs — at the Suzanne Dellal Center for Dance and Theater in Tel Aviv.

Stelvio Pass, Italy | Dan Wyman, Oceanside

Wyman and his brother, Dave, took a driving-and-bicycling trip in Italy in July. Stelvio Pass was a highlight, the highest paved road in the Italian Alps and beloved by bicyclists, motorcyclists and sports car enthusiasts. “You have to make these wide turns and hope nobody is coming the other way,” Wyman said. He took this picture from the patio of Rifugio Garibaldi, a mountaintop lodge at 9,045 feet. His camera: a Sony HX90V.

Andasibe-Mantadia National Park, Madagascar | Melanie Borcover, Los Angeles

Borcover had just completed her Peace Corps service in Madagascar and was touring with her mother when they encountered this chameleon. To get this close-up, she came within a foot of the reptile with her Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ200.

Pantanal, Brazil | Adam Burnstine, La Cañada Flintridge

Burnstine, 16, in August caught this image of a capuchin monkey in Brazil’s Pantanal wetlands using a Canon 7D.

Lake Union, Seattle | Thomas Brod, Los Angeles

In August, Brod and his family were at Lake Union in Seattle, “waiting for a float plane to take us over to San Juan Island.” While they waited, he spotted a bunch of teens taking turns jumping into the lake. Brod got the shot with his iPhone X.

Tanzania | Candice Francis, Escondido

Francis was in Tanzania when she met this boy in a rural village. “His English was a little bit better than my Swahili,” Francis said. She caught this image with a Canon 6D.

Washington, D.C. | Carolyn Campbell, Los Angeles

Campbell and her sister visited Washington, D.C., in July when she found herself at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial at twilight. She used a Canon EOS 70D to photograph the sculpture of the civil rights leader.

Zimbabwe | Gary Amico, Studio City

Amico took this image of his son James, 12, and Hilda, a Zimbabwean woman who took a liking to the boy, during their July visit to Imire Lodge. Amico captured the moment with his iPhone 10.

Namid-Naukluft National Park, Namibia| Matthew Ebiner, Covina

Ebiner, a geography professor at El Camino College in Torrance, reached this Namibian desert scene after driving more than two hours in the dark, then walking for 30 minutes to catch the dunes and acacia trees in sharp, early light. He had a digital single-lens reflex camera, but got this image with his Samsung Galaxy S9 phone.

Jalisco, Mexico | John Allred, Palm Springs

Allred used his iPhone 6 in July to catch these boys struggling to recover an errant soccer ball — they succeeded — in the Jalisco town of Ajijic. Ajijic is an hour’s drive south of Guadalajara.

Iceland | Marsha Chan, La Cañada Flintridge

Chan spied this rural church on a photography tour of Iceland. As she shot with a Canon 5D Mark IV, a wedding party appeared on the road. She snapped pictures of them too, but she liked the bare building and landscape better.

Venice, Italy | Zac Reeder, Agoura Hills

Reeder and his family in July were waiting for a water taxi to the airport when this view of Venice appeared. He grabbed it with his iPhone 6 plus. The haze in the distance, he said, “gives it an old-time, painterly look to me.”

Mammoth Lakes | Ken Lee, Los Angeles

By day, Lee is a special education teacher. Off the job, he’s spent years developing his night-photography skills. He made this Lake Mamie image in the wee hours while on vacation in June. He used a Nikon D750, tripod, long exposure, high ISO and complicated night-photography techniques.

Captions by Christopher Reynolds. Produced by Denise Florez.