The telescope that discovered Neptune.

A delightful but little-known public observatory and planetarium in Munich.

Museum on French naval history, with magnificent figureheads, a historic diving suit, and a boat used by Napoleon.

In the best of all possible worlds, everyone will get a chance to see this statue in which Voltaire's heart is interred.

A haunting collection of the vanished and disappearing natural world.

One of America's founding fathers lived in this London lodging between 1757 and 1775.

Installed at a chaotic intersection, this gave London traffic cops a place to hang their heavy woolen coats.

The gigantic skull of a long-extinct species that once roamed the forests of England and Ireland.

A toy store with a century-long history preserves the craftsmanship of playthings of the past.

Eighty million natural history specimens call this gargantuan museum home.

The only university zoological museum in London houses extinct animals, bizarre natural history specimens, and a Micrarium of microscopic creatures.

Odd stone and concrete monuments in the "Poet of the Sierras" eclectic folly garden.

An art collective teaching the more fiery, metal-y art forms.

International delicatessen has been owned and operated by the same family for more than 110 years.

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

San Francisco's oldest operating hotel, with a Victorian atmosphere and a "haunted" fourth floor.

A modern mechanical planetary system, part of a 10,000 year clock.

A monthly street "service" of handmade puppets and live original puppets, whose devotees profess has the power to change lives.

The space-age building is home to one of the few remaining rotating restaurants in America, and the only one that inspired a 1980s sitcom.

This symbol of peace is appropriately positioned overlooking the Pacific Ocean.

This Los Angeles animation studio is keeping the wonder of stop motion puppetry alive.