United States
Telluride
A box canyon so steep the waterfall lands in town and the only road dead-ends.
Telluride sits in a box canyon so sheer that Bridal Veil Falls practically lands in town, and the only road in dead-ends against a wall of thirteen-thousand-foot peaks. A free gondola floats over the rooftops to Mountain Village, and in summer the meadows above erupt into wildflower.
Telluride began as an 1870s mining camp, and Butch Cassidy chose its San Miguel Valley Bank for his first robbery in 1889. The Victorian main street now anchors one of the Rockies' great festival calendars, film in September, bluegrass in June, and a mushroom festival each August that parades fungi down Colorado Avenue before leading forays into the surrounding forests. Bridal Veil Falls drops 365 feet at the canyon's dead end, the longest free-falling waterfall in Colorado, with a hydroelectric plant perched improbably at its lip. Winter turns the box canyon into one of Colorado's most storied ski towns, the free gondola linking town and mountain through the season.
Couple
Ride the gondola at sunset as the San Juans go pink, eat above the rooftops and let the dead-end geography excuse you from being anywhere else.
Friends
Ski the steeps in winter or ride the high trails in summer, then close the day in a bar that has served this street since 1895.
Family
Summer gondola rides, waterfall walks and free concerts in the park make the box canyon an easy base with the car keys surrendered.
- Bridal Veil Falls drops 365 feet at the dead end of the canyon road, the longest free-falling waterfall in Colorado.
- A free gondola links Telluride and Mountain Village across the canyon through the ski and summer seasons, and locals ride it for errands.
- Butch Cassidy robbed his first bank here in 1889, five blocks from where the film festival now premieres pictures every September.
- Each August the Mushroom Festival parades through town and leads forays into the surrounding alpine forests, a tradition running since 1981.
Pizza at Brown Dog on the main street, a kitchen that carries its recipes to the world championships in Italy.
A drink at the New Sheridan Bar, pouring since 1895 and one of the oldest bars in the west.
Kumbhalgarh
India
A thirty-six-kilometre fortress wall snaking over the Aravalli peaks like a heavy stone python.
Cappadocia
Turkey
More than a hundred balloons rise at dawn through a forest of stone pillars.
Vatnshellir Cave
Iceland
Descending an 8,000-year-old spiral staircase into the frozen, colourful heart of a lava tube.
Crovie
Scotland
Houses pressed against a cliff so tight there's no road, only sea at the door.
Niagara Falls
United States
In summer, six million cubic feet of water a minute plunge into mist felt streets away.
Juneau
United States
No road reaches this state capital, just fjords, glaciers and a harbour full of humpbacks.
Outer Banks
United States
Wild horses roam a sandbar where two thousand ships lie wrecked beneath the surf.
Kenai Fjords
United States
Exit Glacier retreating in real time; the trail markers show where it stood each decade.