Room 32 of the Alta Cienega Motel has grown into a shrine to the Lizard King.

One of the last free public hot springs is decorated with hippie art.

A meditative space out of a fantasy story.

Tiki luxury on Nob Hill.

Carved by a waterfall in a hard-to-reach rock formation, this heart-shaped rock has inspired romantics for decades.

A legendary boxing venue and ring featured in Rocky V.

Mural made of 100,000 pieces of hand blown glass, and until recently, the largest glass mural in the US.

This charming colonial alleyway is one of the oldest continuously used residential streets in the U.S.

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

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

A gap in the concrete has been transformed into a miniature playground for the mind.

The newsstand that never closes its doors—well, almost never.

A restored 1920s cascade stairway provides one of the best views of Oakland's Lake Merritt.

A hardware store Buddha statue installed to deter vandalism wound up attracting Vietnamese immigrants who came to pray.

A crumbling Beaux Arts monument to the Bay Area's age of rail.

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

This Oakland fairytale kingdom, fiercely devoted to childlike whimsy, was an early inspiration for Disneyland.

This small oasis of flora and art was created in remembrance of a local auto business owner.

Remains of a Greek freighter trapped off of Rocky Point in 1961.

A self-built castle made by a mysterious man.

The installation’s official name, “You Who Are Getting Obliterated in the Dancing Swarm of Fireflies,” says it all.

These free-roaming horses were once destined to disappear from the land.

Rippling sand dunes frozen in the Arizona rock.

The oldest surviving botanic garden in the United States.