A desert ghost town—occupied for only 12 years—was once home to more than 500 silver mines.

Ten 25-foot-tall, beehive-shaped kilns, abandoned in Death Valley.

The largest man-made crater in the U.S. marks the spot where we once tested mining with nukes.

The set location for a 1987 cult classic draws international film buffs to the middle of the Mojave Desert.

This crumbling Death Valley mining complex was known for its use of giant, 20-mule team wagons.

Millions of years of oxidation make a drive down this winding Death Valley road surprisingly colorful.

Potential high level nuclear waste storage site for the next 10,000 years and beyond.

The cluster of boulders near Fort Irwin is covered in military insignia.

The lowest point in North America is home to an undrinkable pool surrounded by fields of geometric salt flats.

This immigrant bridge once spanned the Thames but is now a fixture of an Arizona city.

One of the ghostly stops along Route 66.

This dormant volcanic crater has been converted from a roiling pit of magma to a pleasant hiking spot.

The ghost town that ended up on Ebay.

A pair of large white marble lions guard this stretch of the Mojave Desert, and it is utterly mysterious how they got there.

The remains of a boarding school designed to forcibly assimilate Native American children.

This golf ball–shaped former desert real estate office now houses a UFO museum.

Don't blink or you'll miss it.

Marta Becket's hand-painted theater in the desert.

The contents of this safe survived a 37-kiloton nuclear bomb.

The largest dune field in the Mojave offers a chance of hearing the 'singing sands.'

A memorial to the firefighters who died in an industrial disaster is housed in a small public park.

This large pile of traveler-curated rocks by the dry lakebed is a longstanding tradition on the Old Mojave Road.

A former utopian healing center created by a huckster and built by derelicts.

Water of undetermined depth has attracted rare fish and cult leaders alike.