Prone to disastrous fires, the city of San Francisco has the Guardian, a fireboat gifted by residents, to watch over them from the bay.

A rococo retro-futurist future-rustic vernacular between yesterday’s tomorrow and the future that never was.

San Francisco’s century-old Christmas Tree.

Staircase winds down the side of Telegraph Hill through gardens, wild parrots flying overhead.

This shop specializes in oddities and Victorian-inspired wonders.

A library built during San Francisco's pioneer times is a student's retreat, bibliophile's sanctuary, and chess player's delight.

San Francisco's oldest surviving monument and meeting place for 1906 survivors.

A shop full of natural curiosities, carnivorous plants, and costumed taxidermied mice.

An essential stop before plundering, BYO Cutlass.

These subterranean storage areas hold emergency water reserves.

Furniture tries to escape an abandoned building in San Francisco.

Sloth rehabilitation center in the jungle of Costa Rica.

The sister plane of the C-123 shot down during the Iran-Contra Affair has found a new purpose in retirement.

The lavish temple of the Cao Dai religion that includes Buddha, Mohammed, Joan of Arc, and Victor Hugo.

A nightmare for the claustrophobic lies hidden in Southeast Asia.

Abandoned limestone cave was once a sacred place of worship.

A battle between nature and architecture in the Cambodian jungle.

For centuries young Thai men used this Giant Swing as a slingshot to heaven.

After a profound show of devotion for his master, a dog becomes the symbol of loyalty for an entire nation.

A Buddhist temple to honor insects that died for science.

The fairy tale castle of the “fairy-tale king,” this was also the inspiration for Disney’s “Sleeping Beauty.”

Synagogue built from the stones of Solomon's temple contains the golem of Prague.

Macabre astrological automaton clock dating to the late 1400s.

A saintly relic hidden in a Prague church basement.