Over 315,000 preserved amphibians and reptiles in jars.

A century and a half of research in the sciences and natural history, still going strong.

Faceless white figures loom over the city from the rooftop.

Nestled in the heart of San Francisco’s bustling Financial District stands a unique homage to the Mayan and Beaux Arts.

Staircase winds down the side of Telegraph Hill through gardens, wild parrots flying overhead.

Floating man-made island and upscale restaurant.

This tiny little island has, as the name says, just enough room for its single house.

The private island of Yale's elite Skull & Bones society is kind of a dump.

A castle built for love, and abandoned due to heartbreak.

The purported world's shortest international bridge connects a homeowner in Canada to his backyard in New York.

Dedicated to the art and science of glass in equal measure, this space is as much laboratory as museum.

A massive ultra-modern church presents a science-fiction view of Catholicism's inclusive future.

The Flatiron Building's storied West Coast cousin is a lot more into religion.

Condemned US Navy seaplane control tower turned officers’ club sits atop Yerba Buena Island.

A creepy steel gremlin has protected the Bay Bridge since 1989.

This mountaintop beacon is only lit three times a year but shines like some kind of all-seeing eye.

A Roman-inspired temple once controlled half of San Francisco's waters.

This historic Chinese tower was said to have been haunted by fox spirits but is now haunted by a grisly murder.

The oldest experimental corn field in America is still creating better ways to grow crops.

This Tang Dynasty behemoth is the biggest Buddha in the world.

Teeming with illegal goods and services, this towering maze of vice is also a popular tourist accommodation.

An extraordinary natural landscape of mountains, waterfalls, and rocky cliffs riddled with tunnels.

A waterfall runs right through the middle of this Taiwanese shrine to the hundreds of workers killed while building a nearby highway.

Memorial to the father of the Republic of China.