I plagiarize liberally. From almost everything.
LOL, so do I.
I have used many of the places I have visited all over this world as ideas for locales on my worlds. What better place to get ideas than your own backyard (meaning the Earth)?
One place in particular is the awesome karst topography one can find in some places in China.
The almost literal wall created by the Himalayas gave the idea for a range of mountains called Orgon Kreaga (Impassible Mountains), impassable because they rise to about 2.2 times the Scale Height of the atmosphere. (Here on Earth, Mount Everest barely pierces above 1 Scale Height.)
Monument Valley in southern Utah was another. The Grand Canyon in Arizona, Valles Grande and Tent Rocks in New Mexico. Ayers Rock in Australia. Of course, Venice became another Lake Town. All of Greece and its islands. I even used the rip of the Valles Marineris on Mars to create The Rupture and Isantuma on my current world of Onaviu (of course some of it has water). I even used the gigantic crater (gigantic when considering its size) on Saturn's moon Mimas (or is it Enceladus?) for the idea that later became The Citadel of the AEmureirun.
I could go on forever. As said, what better place to get ideas than your own backyard? Including the entire solar system?
Of course, nowdays, people can just use Google to search for pictures of some of these places I had to travel to to see.
rmfr