Places deriverative Wants to Go

A huge monument to a bizarre book written by Turkmenistan’s longstanding dictator.

The remains of a medieval city loom in one of the most isolated desert regions of Turkmenistan.

The controversial final resting place of the equally controversial first president of Turkmenistan.

A beautiful mausoleum is the crown jewel of a preserved ancient city in Central Asia.

Sumptous memorial to a controversial independence.

A dictator's gold statue once rotated to face the sun on a 75-meter high marble tower.

A memorial to the thousands of Turkmen soldiers and civilians who died in a bloody 1881 battle.

A cave covered with bizarre stalactites of cloth.

If you want to get married in the White Marble City of Ashgabat, you should do it in this surreal disco ball building.

Few people have ever heard of, let alone visited, one of Turkmenistan’s most impressive natural attractions.

An eccentric dictator's take on a Turkmen version of Disneyland.

This harsh mountain path was built as a strange attempt to improve the health of Turkmen citizens.

A cemetery with goat-horn bedecked gravestones.

This famed Silk Road oasis was one of the largest cities in the world before it was destroyed by a Mongol horde.

This cavernous swimming spot doubles as a home to the largest known colony of bats in Central Asia.

A fiery crater has been burning in the Karakum Desert since 1971.

The world's second-tallest flagpole stands proud despite dropping rank.

The largest Lenin statue in Central Asia was moved to an empty field rather than being destroyed.

This dark, damp, perilous tunnel is the only passage from north to south Tajikistan.

The largest dam in the world and the site of a potential disaster.

Where the father of Persian poetry is laid to rest.

This ancient Silk Road outpost overlooking the Wakhan Valley is miraculously still standing.

A building facade covered with the statues of 11 giants of Tajik literature.

The remains of an ancient city-state along the Silk Road.