Places bluntforceM Wants to Go

Sacked by Vikings, blessed by William the Conqueror, dealt a fatal blow during the French Revolution—these ruins have seen it all.

The narrowest street in Paris.

A modern-day Lascaux cave underneath Paris.

The curious underground history of keeping Paris clean.

Walk through spectacular aisles of hanging meat and wagon wheel–sized cheese at the world's largest wholesale food market.

The tradition of open-air secondhand and antiquarian bookselling in Paris dates back to the Renaissance.

This frog-themed restaurant was frequented by Picasso, Saint-Exupéry, and more.

Original cabaret handbills, posters, and feline artwork are a purrfect highlight of the Museum of Montmartre.

Twelve grave-faced marble angels guard the emperor's tomb at Les Invalides.

Once a 19th-century brasserie, this McDonald's exterior celebrates Alsatian design and the "King of Beer."

An off-the-beaten-path boutique stuffed with an eclectic collection of upcycled goods.

A majestic lion statue guards this Parisian botanical garden, and feeds on an unsettling item.

Paris' fabled purveyor of exotic taxidermy and natural history curios.

This whimsical castle of grottoes was the labor of love of a French postman, and one of the greatest achievements of outsider architecture.

An overlooked marble is the only surviving in-place 18th century example of the measurement that changed how we define distance.

The first green space constructed on an elevated viaduct.

This Parisian fountain is a little bit fantasy and a little bit nightclub.

Known as the "Dodo Manège," this carousel features a herd of animals that have disappeared—or may be gone soon.

The water-powered carriages are long gone, but for over a century this funicular railway has been the fastest route to the highest point in Paris.

Statue of death tucked in the University of Medicine courtyard.

A museum on the history of Paris, including a set of Napoleon's toiletries, Proust's room, and relics of the Revolution.

Exquisite wall sculptures carved in secret by an early quarryman in an obscure corner of the Paris Catacombs.

The history of radiation is on safe display at the foot of a radiation science laboratory.

The ruins of a Duke's bucolic dream, where camels once roamed alongside "Dutch" windmills and faux-Italian vineyards.