Twelve plaster figures inspired by da Vinci's famed painting haunt the desert landscape above a real-life ghost town.

Odd outsider art installations surround a Gold Rush-era ghost town.

This central Nevada cave is the spiritual home of ancient and enigmatic pictographs.

Factory that once supported an entire company town of 350.

This massive redwood tree has a hole in the base big enough to drive through.

Coastal dunes, site of buried Egyptian movie set and former utopian colony.

This railroad magnate's 19th century tower is more than a little bit out of place in the Nevada desert.

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

A collision of human error and natural geothermal pressure created this rainbow-colored geologic wonder.

Smooth basaltic rocks tell a tale of ancient glacial waterfalls.

This ultra-modern California span is actually a titanic solar clock in disguise built by famed architect Santiago Calatrava.

One of the last free public hot springs is decorated with hippie art.

An abandoned Jazz Age dream home and con man's hideout in Death Valley.

The rocks in this arid basin leave trails of movement behind them.

An errant donkey ushered in a new era of mining in Nevada.

Only intact Ichthyosaur skeleton in the United States.

Machinery left over from California's once thriving mercury industry now attracts artists and explorers.

A hard-to-reach oasis in a desolate corner of Death Valley National Park.

A deserted hodgepodge of experimental structures designed by nearby university students.

The highest dunes in California are the most likely place in the area to hear the Singing Sands.

Sunset-colored dunes of volcanic ash make taking a poor photo impossible.

This tiny cluster of abandoned buildings looks like the future of the ghost town - today!

Cambria's most unique B&B features creative surroundings and fantastic food.

This cave was hidden for thousands of years, storing the worldly goods of ancient Native Americans.