Places Charles WV Wants to Go

One of the oldest and largest wooden churches in France was very evidently constructed by shipbuilders.

The birthplace of the ferocious William the Conqueror, this castle is awash in medieval history.

This 1,400-year-old abbey was once a powerhouse for music and intellectualism known across Normandy.

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

The Church of the Annunciation was carved into the face of a cliff, just like the rest of the town of Haute-Isle.

This tower is one of the best-preserved (and least-visited) remnants of medieval Paris.

The spiral staircase hidden inside this giant Parisian column was likely built for Catherine de Medici's astrologer.

France's national museum of scientific and industrial instruments.

The subterranean "lake" below the Paris opera house inspired the Phantom of the Opera's lair.

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

This structure atop a craggy cliff in one of the most beautiful parks in Paris boasts an unbeatable view.

Indents in the pavement are all that remain from a grisly death machine in Paris.

France's most famous cemetery, with some of its most curious tombs.

The first green space constructed on an elevated viaduct.

A museum of carnival attractions where you are invited to ride the rides.

This modest marker near Notre Dame identifies the very center of Paris.

The oldest continuously operating mint in the world that has been making coins since the 9th-century.

The vast, legendary catacombs hold secrets much stranger than stacked bones.

A museum dedicated to linguistics, from how babies learn to talk to endangered and extinct languages.

One of Jeff Koons’s largest sculptures and his first commemorative work.

Abandoned railway line circling the city of Paris.

The curious underground history of keeping Paris clean.

A modern-day Lascaux cave underneath Paris.

Architect Le Corbusier built his friend a cubist house to match his impressive collection of cubist art.