A modern mechanical planetary system, part of a 10,000 year clock.

The randomness of this wall of lava lamps helps encrypt up to 10 percent of the internet.

The tea room that pushed the boundaries of adorable straight into...we can't find the words.

The last remaining relic of San Francisco's glittering 1915 Panama Pacific Exposition.

A nondescript building that's been functioning as a speakeasy for nearly a century and a half.

An essential stop before plundering, BYO Cutlass.

A collection of 20th-century automata, penny arcade games, and musical contraptions.

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

Staircase winds down the side of Telegraph Hill through gardens, wild parrots flying overhead.

The one-time watch house for incoming ships at the Golden Gate now stands abandoned and hidden in trees.

Tiki luxury on Nob Hill.

The seawater playground of gilded-era San Francisco burned to the ground in 1966.

A walk-in working camera obscura produces 360-degree live images of the San Francisco coast.

A favorite haunt of dinosaur loving children and hallucinogen loving hippies alike.

A tiny theater hidden in an alley plays a constant stream of short silent films for anyone willing to peer through the peephole.

A winding path built in secret on the edge of the continent.

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

An artsy hidden staircase leads to breathtaking views of San Francisco.

A psychedelic labyrinth on the San Francisco bay.

A huge musical instrument played by the ocean.