Places Leah Nelson Wants to Go

A 400-year-old mummified arm dangles from the ceiling of St. James the Greater, serving as a warning to thieves.

A medieval fresco which reminds visitors that death will come for us all.

Mummified monks and the accidentally interred, in a 17th-century crypt.

Artfully arranged bones of 5,800 Austrians.

Filled with goldfish swimming in a shallow pool of sea water, this ancient crypt is more wishing well than burial site.

Bell tower juts out from a village buried under a lake.

David Sedaris called it "The greatest shop in the world."

Typewriter museum housing more than 1,500 machines preserves the history of the grandfather of computers.

Europe’s oldest natural human mummy.

According to the local folklore, the myriad colors of this lake are the result of a lovelorn wizard's blunder.

This centuries-old Italian chapel hangs midway down a sheer cliffside.

Natural cathedral designed by Italian artist Giuliano Mauri.

Artist Diego Morlin's war between the natural and human worlds is a wanderer's delight.

This military mausoleum captures the solemn grandeur that most memorials only aspire to.

Machismo turned on its head: the lady's hand goes to the dude with the bigger brain.

Hidden in an Italian forest is a completely homemade amusement park that has taken a lifetime to create.

A sudden, striking cluster of hills south of Padua has been attracting visitors for centuries.

The world's oldest surviving anatomical theater, where "the dead are pleased to help the living."

The incorrupt tongue of the patron saint of lost things is venerated in this basilica.

This community on a small Venetian island has taken to painting their houses in bright neon hues.

A small island less than half a mile from Venice is a forbidden island with a dark and twisted past.

The plague quarantine island home to the alleged "Vampire of Venice."

100 year tradition of fist fights, marked by marble footsteps.

Venice's island of the dead.