Places Edited by Samir S. Patel

A rapidly disappearing glacier filled with extinct grasshoppers, perfectly preserved in the ice.

Constant erosion has created a surreal landscape of bleached and preserved fallen trees.

This futuristic airport terminal was abandoned for decades before reopening as a hotel—with a vintage plane of its own parked out back.

Two 2,500-year-old Phoenician boats found on the coast of Spain, giving incredible insight into the ancient maritime traders.

These beautiful ruins deep in the Pennsylvania woods are thought to have been a ski lodge or a speakeasy, but no one really knows.

A petroglyph map of the upper Snake River carved by prehistoric hunter-gatherers.

Conjoined twins Daisy and Violet Hilton were stars of the vaudeville circuit.

Baltimore's classic clock tower was once topped by a rotating, 20-ton medicine bottle.

A collection of witchcraft artifacts and occult paraphernalia started by the leader of the Long Island Coven.

One of the world’s smallest bars, just 13 square feet, is brimming with speakeasy flair.

CDMX's home for the world's culinary delights.

This stunning natural double arch, the largest in the Alps, went undiscovered until 2005.

A perfectly circular lake is formed by the crater of an ancient underwater volcano.

The romantic garden was the epicenter of the Hungarian art scene in the 1880s.

This bug-eyed water wheel uses the power of the Sun to clean up Baltimore Harbor.

This anonymous businessman sculpted in bronze became an enduring memorial after 9/11, and had been mistaken by rescue workers for a survivor in the rubble.

35,000 grape hyacinths flow like water down a garden hill.

A disconnected rotary phone for "calling" lost loved ones offered a unique way of dealing with grief in disaster-stricken Japan.

This beautiful ridge-top trail is dotted by tiny homes apparently built by a group of itinerant fairies.

A "sinister, whimsical, tacky, and really orange" public art installation hidden under a Seattle bridge.

This Tibetan monastery has survived multiple attacks and is also a sky burial site.

A lovely aquatic park built by a one-armed Civil War veteran who made a fortune from lotuses.

This Cold War–era underground city includes offices for Mao Zedong and Lin Biao.

A once-luxurious, now abandoned hotel in the Italian Alps.