Places avexplore Wants to Go

This Alaskan town appoints the general store's resident feline as honorary mayor.

A futuristic temple of light uses prisms and rainbows to create an atmosphere of peace.

A rare memento of a lost Indigenous group.

The land is full of geologic eye candy, such as otherworldly spires, mushroom-shaped hoodoos, and prehistoric fossils.

A lava tube cooled to form this long tunnel that stays chilly even at the height of summer.

Home to a timed geyser created by complete accident.

Designed in 1887, this clock from the county office clock tower has been restored and is on full display.

This old selenite mine is dotted with tiny crystals that make it shimmer like it's covered in glitter.

This Stonehenge-inspired solar calendar stands alongside a landfill, in the middle of the Nevada desert.

Preserving the remains of Native American cultures which otherwise would have been submerged behind Hoover Dam.

The rocks exposed at Valley of Fire State Park also occur in a much less known but equally spectacular area a few miles to the southwest.

Named after an outlaw who used the basin as a hideout.

This former Mormon settlement is reemerging from the receding waters of Lake Mead.

The highest concentration of petroglyph sites in Gold Butte National Monument, plus an improbable early 20th-century dam.

An unusual slot canyon in the Aztec/Navajo Sandstone has a cross-section like an inverted old-fashioned keyhole.

An unexpected sinkhole in a desert flat within Gold Butte National Monument.

A remote mine in sedimentary rock was called the richest copper ore deposit in Arizona Territory

The lost ruins of the forgotten ferry lie hidden beneath the silt.

Nearly 300,000 acres of wildlife, natural splendor, and a hidden ghost town have been designated a national monument.

While you're unlikely to find riches here these days, this remote mine is a time capsule of the Gold Rush era.

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

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

A remote field of nearly pristine sand dunes in the heart of the Mojave Desert.

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