Visit Khujand

The world's largest car-free old city.

The Qissa Khwani storytellers bazaar, Gandhara art in the museum and the road to the Khyber Pass.

Visit Dushanbe, the capital of Tajikistan. Explore the National Museum of Tajikistan (home to a 13-meter-long Buddha statue and artifacts from the Silk Road), stroll through Rudaki Park (named after a Persian poet, with fountains and a statue of Ismail Samani), and see the Dushanbe Flagpole (one of the tallest in the world at 165 meters). Try local dishes like plov (rice pilaf with meat and carrots) and shashlik (grilled meat skewers) at the Green Bazaar.

Hokkaido's southern port: the night view from Mount Hakodate, red-brick warehouses and the morning fish market.

The Seomun night market, a medicine-herb street and the Haeinsa temple with its 80,000 printing blocks nearby.

Flemish gables, the Grand Place and the Braderie, Europe's biggest flea market, every first weekend of September.

Cezanne's town of fountains and plane trees, with Mont Sainte-Victoire on the horizon he painted sixty times.

The fiery city of the Meuse: Montagne de Bueren's 374 steps, the Sunday Batte market and Liege waffles.