Places Edited by Jonathan Carey

The largest cactus farm in Africa.

The abandoned ruins of America's first private zoo are open for exploration in the Catskills.

These four islands right offshore have waterfalls, colorful lights, fancy buildings, and a secret purpose.

The original toys that inspired the beloved children's stories are on display at the New York Public Library.

The "shampooer of kings" who opened London's first curry cafe was a celebrity in the 19th century, but is all but forgotten now.

The only pig museum in the U.S. holds one of the world's largest collections of pig items.

A fascinating collection of art made from petrified wood and fossils by two octogenarian twin brothers.

A young state senator's deathbed plea to be buried inside a rock resulted in this unusual grave site.

The remains of a 1st-century aristocratic Roman town house featuring beautiful well-preserved mosaics.

Friendships have been forged over ham and eggs every Wednesday morning for a century.

Senators used to relax in the nearly forgotten marble tubs now hidden in the U.S. Capitol Building's basement.

The watery entrance for condemned prisoners heading to the Tower of London is still visible along the Thames.

The ruins of a medieval castle linked to the murderous French lord that inspired the famous legend of Bluebeard.

The cluster of boulders near Fort Irwin is covered in military insignia.

A brick-paved former section of the historic coast-to-coast highway.

There's a strange stone hoodoo towering atop a wooded hillside and no one is quite sure how it got there.

A small token of gratitude from freezing cold journalists who were given a warm haven while covering JFK's inauguration.

An ancient burial ground believed to have been used for ritual sacrifice.

Dancing skeletal figures pay homage to a medieval mural destroyed during World War II.

One of the last doorless, continuously moving elevators still in use in the U.K.

Stripes of human ashes cover a back lawn in the most sought-after burial grounds in Paris.

The institution is sitting on a goldmine of 21,000 paints, varnishes, pigments, and primers preserved for posterity.

The biologist's fossilized headstone was meant to reflect his love of nature. Its, ahem, unusual shape is probably just a coincidence.

A faded sign from the 1920s remembers Baltimore's resistance toward banning alcohol.