This subterranean spot might be the epitome of Japan's baroque, retro coffee houses.

This iconic Parisian bookstore doubles as the "Tumbleweed Hotel" for traveling writers.

Notorious artist squat renovated into legal studios.

France's most famous cemetery, with some of its most curious tombs.

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

This shop specializes in oddities and Victorian-inspired wonders.

The giant pair of sexy legs sticking out the window of this costume store have become its main draw.

This concrete tangle of square pipes has stood as a proud thorn in the city's side since the '70s.

This 19th-century church is now a popular roller rink.

Oakland's beautiful monumental cemetery.

A pair of mutilated bronze octopuses slump at the base of the monument honoring California's admission to the U.S.

San Francisco's oldest surviving monument and meeting place for 1906 survivors.

This giant head is all that remains of a once proud statue that survived an earthquake but not a fall off of a wagon.

Bring your own cardboard to the slippery slopes of concrete hidden in a neighborhood park.

This one-block alleyway is stuffed with street art that is colorful, cultural, and intensely political.

The miraculous hydrant that saved the Mission District in 1906.

A shop full of natural curiosities, carnivorous plants, and costumed taxidermied mice.

An essential stop before plundering, BYO Cutlass.

A pair of slides and a tree-lined stair corridor have been an urban oasis for nearly 40 years.

The graffiti-covered remnants of a former triangulation station are balanced precariously on this California peak.

Playable, historic pinball machines fill this Alameda museum.

A burnt orange monolithic dome structure perched on a hillside near Interstate 280.

From the sky, a kaleidoscope of color brightens the grey landscape of the San Francisco Bay.

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