A firefighting museum housed in a historic station whose Lookout Tower watches over Melbourne.

A remarkable lifelong collection of antiques and art preserved in a historic Melbourne townhouse.

Australia's largest medical museum featuring a 19th-century pharmacy.

A cramped wooden attic that once housed one of the world's first movie studios.

A beautiful 1920s tower filled with local hidden gems.

This Melbourne bank has unique Gothic-style architectural features and is one of the most majestic operating bank branches in the world.

Tiny artwork tucked within glass letterboxes form this hidden gem of an art gallery.

Japan's largest area of "pink moss" turns the hillside bright pink every spring.

This giant seated Bhudda of Healing dates to the 1780s.

This sawtooth mountain range still bears the strangely lovely marks of its history as a medieval quarry.

A Japanese cat island also populated by the descendants of a band of banished samurai.

A rare festival blending religion, blacksmiths, vagina dentata, sex workers, and the straight-up facts of life.

A steaming, boiling hellscape sources Hokkaido's thermal baths.

Unusual hexagonal rocks formed by cooling lava named for their resemblance to traditional Japanese tatami mats.

The world's largest drain sits below the city of Kasukabe, Japan.

A disconnected rotary phone for "calling" lost loved ones offered a unique way of dealing with grief in disaster-stricken Japan.

The tallest bronze seated statue of the Buddha in Japan.

Coast along one of Japan’s mountain railways for coveted views of magnificent hydrangeas.

A real-life replica of a home from Hayao Miyazaki's beloved movie "My Neighbor Totoro."

This ancient temple is set up to take you on a pilgrimage of self.

A Catholicism-themed restaurant where sacrilege is on the menu.

Shells collected from over a hundred different countries line the walls, floors and ceilings of this fantasy museum.

This pair of small sea rocks has been "wed" using rope and ancient Shinto tradition.

The 43-mile route crosses through six islands with gorgeous views of the Seto Inland Sea.