The oldest family-run luncheonette in New York, last renovated in 1948, still serves food and drinks the old-fashioned way.

Try not to get slimed in Tribeca.

Elevated freight railway turned wildly successful urban park.

A crumbling hospital from the 1850s on Roosevelt Island.

A tiny museum housed in a New York freight elevator specializes in the "overlooked, dismissed, or ignored."

La Monte Young and Marian Zazeela's "Dream House" will immerse you in an ever changing world of sound and light.

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

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

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

Historic funicular railway, believed to be the shortest railroad in the world.

The final resting place of a space program monolith.

In a city filled with Frank Gehry buildings, one stands out as one of the architect's weirder works.

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

A working miniature city designed to teach kids about safety and presumably city planning.

A sign at the end of the Santa Monica Pier marks the traditional end of the legendary American highway.

Aqueducts have dramatically changed this old lake, now home to tufa towers and its very own species of tiny brine shrimp.

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

After starting as a whimsical tourist attraction that eventually found its way to ruin, these renovated canals offer a lush and exotic locale on the Pacific Coast.

Scores of vintage street lamps shine along L.A.’s Miracle Mile.

These delicate buggers are some of the rarest fossils that have bubbled up from the Tar Pits.

Crypt mausoleum in cathedral's basement contains relics of third century Roman martyr, Saint Vibiana.

Hollywood's most famous landmark, the "temporary" sign that has stood for decades longer than intended.

The legendary building that needed ghostly approval before being built.

This iconic L.A. bookshop is housed in an abandoned bank—both symbolic and chic.