Places escapementality Wants to Go

This modern New Zealand attraction honors ancient forms of astronomy and scientific understanding.

Eat your Big Mac in a DC-3.

This preserved village shows the modest lifestyles of the area's 19th-century Chinese gold miners.

A strange machine made to evaluate the world economy using water and lots of tubes.

This aluminum “stairway to heaven” has impaled at least a couple of birds.

Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauo tamateaturipukakapikimaungahoronuku pokaiwhenuakitanatahu.

A Maori village obliterated by an 1886 volcanic eruption.

A gigantic sculpture garden is packed with innovative oddities.

One man's dream has turned into this naturally growing chapel made of almost nothing but trees.

After the devastating 2011 earthquake, historic Christchurch begins to recover, starting with the pop-up Re:START mall.

In an Auckland neighborhood, looming chopsticks lift noodles from the sidewalk.

This mechanical clock performs "Romeo and Juliet" in a Shakespeare-themed New Zealand town.

A hidden gem of a museum that lets you search for your own fossils.

The ruins of New Zealand's largest classical-style church.

Water-powered gadgets whirr to life in this quirky eco park.

These two delightful animal-shaped buildings host a visitor center and wool shop.

This museum/fur store is devoted to educating guests on how awful opossums can be.

Enjoy coffee and cake while viewing antique medical equipment at this unique cafe.

A giant doughnut was given to the small New Zealand town of Springfield to promote "The Simpsons Movie."

Home to some of the world’s darkest skies, this project blends ancient Māori culture with world-class astro tourism.

An eerily charming collection of salvaged buildings and curios grown out of a family scrap business.

Three rooms of bones, curios, and one artist's collection of natural artifacts create this intriguing museum.

This unusual rock formation looks like an apple that has been neatly sliced in half.

The premier place to experience the Victorian imagining of the steam-powered future.