This lighthouse was crafted as penitence for the theft of wine bound for a monastery.

You may recognize this beautiful grove within Kaitoke Regional Park as location of the house of Elrond.

New Zealand's oldest prison holds a dark history and the scars of a deadly earthquake.

Inside this faux cave, visitors can learn how some of their favorite fantasy characters were created.

This preserved village shows the modest lifestyles of the area's 19th-century Chinese gold miners.

This quirky collection is an interactive exhibit crammed with creative contraptions and tinkered-with toys.

Anyone wanting to know what a dwarven mine sounds like need only visit the tunnels of this New Zealand artillery compound.

A lakeside garden in the Southern Alps full of whimsical artwork and thousands of beautiful flowers.

The premier place to experience the Victorian imagining of the steam-powered future.

One of the world's steepest streets seems to have houses sliding down it.

A galaxy of glowworms—larvae of a gnat—hides deep in the belly of these caves.

A Maori village obliterated by an 1886 volcanic eruption.

Some of the clearest water anywhere in the world.

One man's dream has turned into this naturally growing chapel made of almost nothing but trees.

A solitary tree has grown up all alone on Lake Wānaka, backdropped by the beautiful Southern Alps.

The Dalai Lama named this New Zealand landscape the "Spiritual Center of the Universe."

Dolphins, ancient clams and hundreds of waterfalls make this one of the world's top tourist destinations.

Tubing through a cave lit with glowworms is a magical underground experience.

The real life Hobbiton, this sheep farm has been forever transformed since being built for The Hobbit film series.

Fluffy and friendly alpacas nestled against the border of the beautiful Connemara region.

This small Irish village suffered the greatest loss of life when the Titanic sank.

A restaurant with an extensive Irish whiskey bar also has several first editions of famous works by Irish authors.

An ancient holy well said to be used by the patron saint of sailors and travelers, lost in the boggy west of Valentia Island.

The house where the writer spent his formative years.