Places KingSmithy Wants to Go

Abandoned castle was once a grand example of Russian privilege, built exclusively to win a frivolous bet between noblemen.

Moscow's imposing monument to the Space Age.

The world's second-largest excavated hole.

Former headquarters of the KGB.

A sculpture park of the tossed aside relics of the USSR, from Stalin to a massive Soviet emblem.

Secret Soviet city once home to Russian cosmonauts and space training facilities.

Nightmarish example of the unintended consequences of weapons testing.

Palace where the nearly un-killable Rasputin was murdered.

An 18th century wonder of the world, lost in WWII, re-created at the Catherine Palace.

It took over half a century but a Russian monument to a famous and tragic space pup finally stands in Moscow.

Museum celebrating the achievements of the Soviet space program.

The gorgeous entrances into the city's underbelly look more like grand halls than subway stops.

This building holds the embalmed remains of the leader of the Bolshevik Revolution.

Dr. Strangelove-esque tours reveal the inside a bunker once reserved for Stalin himself.

This museum explores the tumultuous history of Lviv under Nazi and Soviet occupation.

The largest park in Lviv is surrounded by a network of disused rail tracks.

Remains of a station that only operated for one year.

A fortress built to pacify local uprising that had a stint as a Nazi concentration camp before becoming a five-star hotel.

Kyiv's answer to Muscle Beach is a Soviet-era gym made from scrap metal.

It's the only museum of its kind in Ukraine.

The last planned Soviet city was built for the former residents of Prypiat after the Chornobyl disaster.

This oddly shaped building is a surprising Soviet-era crematorium.

One of the most valuable palace-garden complexes in the eastern borderlands—and one of the most haunted.

One of the largest museums in Ukraine remembers the story of the German-Soviet War in iconic, brutalist style.