Places Megan Johnson Wants to Go

The doodles of a genius line the walls of a secret room under the Medici Chapel, where they were hidden for nearly 500 years.

Over 50 exquisite hand-painted Renaissance maps decorate a Medici storage room.

Giant, pink stuffed rabbit on an Italian mountain.

This immaculate and historic water garden culminates in a massive stone dining table with an inset fountain for chilling the wine of the Cardinal's guests.

The once forbidden "secret cabinet" of erotic art from excavations of Pompeii and Herculaneum.

An Italian hillside ghost town.

Ruins of a 10th century church tucked away deep in a botanical garden.

Abandoned medieval hill town.

This sword isn't waiting for a king to pull it out. It was placed there by a saint.

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

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

Geothermal waterfalls in Tuscany.

The last moments of the ill-fated Pompeiians, frozen forever in plaster.

The middle finger of modernity.

Renaissance villa and gardens complete with a tormented colossus.

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

This Venice bookstore has resigned itself to constant flooding by keeping its books in bathtubs and boats.

Pompeii's less famous neighbor is still revealing her secrets.

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

An Italian crevasse filled with abandoned buildings gives visitors a look at the world without humans.

Castle and secret tunnel withstood a siege until its owner was killed by the Holy Roman Empire, while sitting on the toilet.

The "dragon babies" of southeastern Europe.

The world's oldest grape-producing vine has survived four centuries of turmoil and even has its own anthem.

This massive subterranean fissure is known as the "underground Grand Canyon."