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

Each year these high desert hills are absolutely covered with poppy flowers in a surreal show of nature.

A common entry point to the Griffith Observatory trail holds its own wonders.

An essential stop before plundering, BYO Cutlass.

One of the most scenic stretches of road in America winds between some of the country's oldest trees.

Quite simply the largest tree in the world (by volume).

An underground mansion with fruit-bearing trees and grapes growing beneath the surface of central California.

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

One man's vast collection of artifacts and ephemera from matchbooks and postcards to vintage neon signs and cars.

A "gravitational anomaly" located in the redwood forests just outside of Santa Cruz, California.

San Francisco's newly reopened hands-on science museum.

A castle that was built stone by stone by an eccentric journalist.

The rocks in this arid basin leave trails of movement behind them.

Towering basalt columns, a creation of fire and ice.

A look into the Church of Scientology's deeply unfavorable view of psychiatry.

Behind this beachfront shop lies a spectacular, colorful sea cave with an equally colorful past.

A strange house built only at night, with rumored mystic inspiration.

A hospital closed seemingly in the middle of operations, leaving behind fodder for horror films and ghost hunters.

Tiki luxury on Nob Hill.

A favorite haunt of dinosaur loving children and hallucinogen loving hippies alike.

Olfactory delights in San Francisco's Botanical Gardens.

Crypt mausoleum in cathedral's basement contains relics of third century Roman martyr, Saint Vibiana.

A library of rare occult books in Los Angeles.

These delicate buggers are some of the rarest fossils that have bubbled up from the Tar Pits.