Places tsrzad Wants to Go

A brooding mansion of clinker brick stands out among the Victorian houses of Pacific Heights.

One of few lasting examples of the brief octagon craze that developed into folly.

Barely visible foundations remain where Stow Lake’s “observatory” once welcomed visitors.

A famous alternative culture epicenter and where Joplin serenaded young hippies.

Over 315,000 preserved amphibians and reptiles in jars.

This 19th-century church is now a popular roller rink.

Russian history in San Francisco.

San Francisco's most expensive hotel suite includes a secret passageway rumored to have been used by JFK.

A walk down memory lane in the heart of one of San Francisco's most notorious neighborhoods.

Fonts are born and bred here at the oldest letterpress type foundry in the United States.

This partially buried wreck is one of the most complete of its kind but is only revealed when the sea allows.

A library and museum dedicated to typography.

A promotional sun clock on the site of San Francisco's great raceway.

The restored and active Victorian-era final resting place of San Francisco.

Gold Rush-era tombstones line the park's paths.

The stones that traveled from Spain to eventually become a holy place for San Francisco's nature worshippers.

San Franciscans leave gifts and messages for the magical beings that live behind the tiny, mysterious door installed on a tree in Golden Gate Park.

With the touch of a button, you can read a randomly selected short story.

The remains of a ruined mansion memorialize the 1906 earthquake.

The randomness of this wall of lava lamps helps encrypt up to 10 percent of the internet.

Visible below the waves are memorials to the city's Gold Rush dead.

A walk-in working camera obscura produces 360-degree live images of the San Francisco coast.

The seawater playground of gilded-era San Francisco burned to the ground in 1966.

A pair of slides and a tree-lined stair corridor have been an urban oasis for nearly 40 years.