Places Kris McCracken Wants to Go

Each spring, a dreamlike carpet of bluebells overtakes the forest floor.

Gladiators once walked this ancient, subterranean passage.

The ruins of this ancient fortification wall sit in the middle of a quiet, residential intersection.

These caves secretly held national treasures during World War II.

An often overlooked ancient site in downtown Athens with substantial history (and nature).

This graffitied 19th-century building was a prototype of European industrial architecture.

Where commuters walk through remnants of an ancient Greek necropolis.

This ancient hydrological marvel is now the base of a modern outdoor cinema.

This ancient Greek place of assembly and marketplace is being revealed layer by layer below the modern Athens cityscape.

A massive cave once a secret military base is now home to thousands of bats.

A decaying, yet still functioning, work of communist architecture.

A supersonic jet stands on a pedestal in this rural village as a monument to military aviation.

This building has two facades of clashing architectural designs.

Massive, unfinished broadcasting station stands as a monument to the fall of communism.

This apartment is a true time capsule of local life in Bulgaria during the Soviet regime.

One of the largest mines in Bulgaria is now home to a vast museum more than 100 feet underground.

Crossing a suspension bridge above a forest is the only way to reach this 12th-century monastery.

Underneath this Byzantinian church lies a necropolis filled with ancient tombs and the ruins of previous churches.

Not far from a popular beach, an unfinished, abandoned mansion for Bulgaria's last communist dictator.

These natural cliffs look like they are a part of an old castle complex.

This massive stone and steel monument remembers a century-old battle that cost thousands of lives and nearly destroyed the city.

A gigantic statue of a Russian soldier watches over the ancient city of Plovdiv, a prominent reminder of the Soviet period in Bulgaria.

A vast Communist-era exhibition space in the Bulgarian capital.

Ruins of an early Roman Christian church dating back to the 4th to 5th centuries.