Des Moines, Iowa’s capital city, offers a refreshing take on Midwest travel with a blend of creativity, history, and community pride. Its downtown skyline is anchored by the gold-domed Iowa State Capitol, which offers free guided tours and a striking view from its hilltop perch. Just across the river, the East Village mixes old brick storefronts with indie shops, coffee houses, and vibrant murals. It's where old meets new, a theme that runs throughout the city’s evolving identity.

The Atacama Desert in Chile, the driest non-polar desert on Earth, is a place of extraordinary beauty and otherworldly landscapes. Stretching over 600 miles along the Pacific coast, the Atacama's stark, lunar-like terrain is punctuated by salt flats, active geysers, and rugged canyons. One of the most striking sights is the Valle de la Luna, or Valley of the Moon, where wind-sculpted sand dunes and jagged rock formations create a surreal environment that appears as if it's straight from another

The Marshall Islands, a remote chain of atolls and islands in the central Pacific, invites travelers into a world where tradition, ocean life, and recent history all leave a lasting impression. Spread across nearly a million square miles of ocean, this independent nation offers rare access to some of the world’s most pristine marine environments.

Rothenburg ob der Tauber rises above the Tauber River in Bavaria, where its medieval town center has stood largely unchanged for centuries, making it one of Germany’s most vivid windows into the past. This old walled city stretches along cobblestone streets where half-timbered houses, ancient towers, and narrow alleys invite visitors to wander and imagine life in the Middle Ages.

The Darvaza Gas Crater, famously nicknamed the “Door to Hell,” is one of Turkmenistan’s most extraordinary landmarks. Located deep in the Karakum Desert, this fiery pit has been burning continuously since the early 1970s, when Soviet engineers reportedly set fire to a collapsed natural gas field to prevent the spread of methane.