Places Samir S. Patel Wants to Go

A public display of prehistoric space rocks is named for the Namibian village where they were found.

A house carved into a rock in the 1940s.

Hot springs monkey spa in the middle of Hell's Valley.

This astonishingly geometric cave has inspired everyone from Jules Verne to Pink Floyd.

A sharp bend in a dramatic river canyon cut through red rocks.

A fiery crater has been burning in the Karakum Desert since 1971.

Naked scientists race around the pole in the frigid cold to try to join Antarctica's exclusive 300 Club.

Tropical paradise strewn with hundreds of World War II wrecks.

The ruins of an ancient island city built atop a coral reef in the South Pacific are spectacular and strange enough to have inspired H.P. Lovecraft.

An enormous concrete structure built over a nuclear crater.

The oldest hotel in the world has been operated by the same family for over 1,300 years, even catering to samurai.

It took an artist 20 years to create this sprawling sculpture garden honoring the area's ancient inhabitants.

The first skyscraper to include a Ferris wheel built into the facade.

All that remains of Jacques Cousteau's 1960s underwater "village."

The oceanic dumping ground where spaceships go to die.

At the point of oceanic inaccessibility, you can't get farther from dry land without leaving the planet.

The largest stone moai on Rapa Nui.

While most wind tunnels test scale models, the "Cave of Winds" was large enough for actual airplanes.

The U.S. government built the million-pound stack of steel during the Space Race.

One of the oldest anatomical theaters in the U.S. still in use was once the site of an infamous cadaver riot.

The only visible reminders of an elaborate engineering project that kept the tower from reaching the tipping point.

At least 14 twice-retired ships were sunk to make a lovely rusting breakwater in Comox Harbour.

Late at night, the bust of the "Dracula" actor was snuck onto the facade of this Budapest castle.

In 2010, Nicolas Cage purchased two plots in this cemetery using one to construct this strange pyramid mausoleum.