Eastern zen meets Western grit in these four little trees growing out of a rock on Lake Tahoe’s Nevada shore.

This historic estate on the east shore of Lake Tahoe was home to an eccentric millionaire (and his pet elephant, Mingo).

Canyon walls shrouded in ferns.

San Francisco Bay's ghost town.

From the Difference Engine to the Cray-1, all under one roof.

Gold Rush-era tombstones line the park's paths.

This shop specializes in oddities and Victorian-inspired wonders.

California's most comprehensive horticultural library.

A museum befitting the city responsible for supplying the majority of the world's LSD.

Amazing meticulous gardens of personal wood carvings, Hydrangea, Canna, and many other flowers.

A tiny theater hidden in an alley plays a constant stream of short silent films for anyone willing to peer through the peephole.

Outside San Francisco lies a small clown cemetery and memorial.

An essential stop before plundering, BYO Cutlass.

Art in the form of a winding, man made crack in stone.

San Francisco’s condensed garden of incredible plant growth.

San Francisco's first World's Fair, dedicated to the wonders of California.

The stones that traveled from Spain to eventually become a holy place for San Francisco's nature worshippers.

A hidden subterranean installation offers a view of the sky.

Barely visible foundations remain where Stow Lake’s “observatory” once welcomed visitors.

Approximately 250,000 people left homeless by the great earthquake and fires found shelter in Golden Gate Park.

Once the largest windmill outside of Holland, with enormous 114 foot sails.

A promotional sun clock on the site of San Francisco's great raceway.

One of the oldest producers of hand-folded fortune cookies still uses its original secret recipe.

The grand, column-fronted, sculpture-adorned home of the ambitious digital library.