Places jmuehlbauer Wants to Go

This world-class vineyard has a peculiar collection of contemporary sculptures scattered across the property.

This teeny-tiny park built by a San Francisco man in 1962 is mostly stairs.

A fire lookout atop a glacial pinnacle is reached by climbing three vertiginous flights of stairs.

Across Ring Mountain is a vast collection of Native American petroglyphs unique to the region.

This museum explores the history of the book, from scrolls to mass-produced objects through tools, stories, and massive cast-iron binding machinery (some of it operational).

A creepy steel gremlin has protected the Bay Bridge since 1989.

A home covered with elaborate mosaic and other pieces of art.

One of the largest Buddhist communities in the West sits on the site of an old hospital.

A bronze tribute to a legendary Californian, the self-proclaimed "Emperor of the United States."

This contorting sculpture is the tallest in San Francisco.

Of all the origin stories for weed's secret code, this one likely has the goods.

A giant chess set, minus the psychedelic drug trip.

Oakland's beautiful monumental cemetery.

A crumbling Beaux Arts monument to the Bay Area's age of rail.

A sudden forest of traditional Papua New Guinean art works is hidden in a corner of Stanford University.

The headquarters of a secretive order is also a beautifully-designed park.

This Oakland fairytale kingdom, fiercely devoted to childlike whimsy, was an early inspiration for Disneyland.

Russian history in San Francisco.

Fonts are born and bred here at the oldest letterpress type foundry in the United States.

Spiral labyrinth hidden in the hills above Oakland, CA.

Bonsai garden in Oakland is curated by the first non-Japanese female bonsai master in the United States.

A library and museum dedicated to typography.

The stones that traveled from Spain to eventually become a holy place for San Francisco's nature worshippers.

The restored and active Victorian-era final resting place of San Francisco.