Madrid's romantically ornate crystal palace has been offering shelter to plants and art for over a century.

The earliest known map to show America, discovered by accident at a Paris bookshop.

The vast, legendary catacombs hold secrets much stranger than stacked bones.

One of the oldest medical collections in Europe focusing on rare surgical instruments.

This frog-themed restaurant was frequented by Picasso, Saint-Exupéry, and more.

Back in 1952, you could get a mushroom cloud chaser with your atomic cocktail.

Centuries-old bridges grown from tangled roots.

A centuries-old lookout post still sits atop a natural stone spire.

This hilltop warren of monastic dwellings is the result of centuries worth of Mongol attacks.

The ancient water tanks remain some of the ruined city’s most beautiful architecture.

A lake with hundreds of ancient skeletons surrounding it. The surprise is what killed them.

This harsh mountain path was built as a strange attempt to improve the health of Turkmen citizens.

This famed Silk Road oasis was one of the largest cities in the world before it was destroyed by a Mongol horde.

This cavernous swimming spot doubles as a home to the largest known colony of bats in Central Asia.

Rainbow-hued in the summer and crystalline in the winter, this salty lake has inspired battles, temples, and plenty of awe.

This restaurant offers the original California cuisine.

San Francisco Bay's ghost town.

One of the largest free-standing structures ever built, this dirigible hangar is now simply a giant skeleton.

The Earth's saltiest natural body of water belches toxic gas.

An ocean in the making, in the Ethiopian desert.

An otherworldly restaurant perched on the edge of a jagged cliff next to a medieval holy city.

The hottest place on the planet.

Ethiopia's "smoking mountain" is in one of the hottest regions on the planet and is home to two lava lakes.

Home to pygmy hunter-gatherers, hundreds of animal and bird species, and the strange okapi, or forest giraffe.