Keener Top Lists: Places

Showing posts with label Places. Show all posts

Thursday, November 12, 2020

15 Rather unique hotels

Some hotels go above and beyond in giving guests an unforgettable experience. From a hotel made entirely out of ice to a resort that's underwater, join me as we count down 15 hotels that are much different from the norm.

#15: IceHotel

Don't lick the walls! Oh wait, I already used that quote.

Place of business: Jukkasjärvi, Sweden

True to its name, this hotel is made entirely out of ice. Because of this the place melts every year during Summer, but when Winter comes back around local architects sculpt the building all over again.

#14: Jules Underwater Lodge

If you want this your, you gotta scuba dive for it!

Place of business: Key Largo, Florida

Before it became a hotel, this place used to be a research laboratory. The rooms are 21 feet under the sea and all have large, strong windows that give guests a front row seat to the various sea life surrounding them.

#13: Giraffe Manor

Hey look, we have guests!

Place of business: Kenya

Along with the nice amenities and lovely layout, guests to this place also get to witness the local giraffes stick their heads through the windows for quick visits.

#12: The Wigwam Motel

It's like the discovery of America all over again!

Place of business: San Bernardino, California

The rooms of this place are made to like like teepees, just like the ones Native Americans lived in back in America's very early history.

#11: Marmara Antalya

I'm getting dizzy!

Place of business: Antalya, Turkey

Floating in a massive pool of water and powered by 6 engines, guests in this 24 room loft get a constantly changing view of the outside world through the windows.

#10: Treehotel

Can you spot the mirror cube?

Place of business: Sweden

This hotel offers a number of different looking rooms to view the surrounding forest from, ranging from a giant mirror cube to a ufo. Regardless of which room you choose, you'll get a nice view of the surrounding forest.

#9: Bertram's Hotel

I guess you can say this bus got schooled!

Place of business: Devon, UK

This hotel was built out an old double decker bus. The interior is decorated to look like it came right out of the 1950s.

#8: Attrap' Reves Dome

360 Degree views are the best, aren't they?

Place of business: France

Instead of the usual square rooms, this hotel has eco-friendly bubble domes that let guest get up close and personal with nature.

#7: Beckham Creek Cave Lodge

Pretty fancy for something our ancient ancestors used to inhabit.

Place of business: Parthenon, Arkansas

This 6000 square foot hotel is set within a cave carved into a mountain. Not only do you get a luxury stay, but you also get a stunning view of the mountainside and the valley below.

#6: The HI Jail Hostel

At least this prison is nice, unlike most prisons I know of!

Place of business: Ottawa, Canada

This place used to be a prison before it was turned into a prison themed hotel, complete with jail cells. Every morning guests get breakfast and a tour of the facilities.

#5: V8 Hotel

VROOM VROOM!

Place of business: Germany

This hotel is all about automobiles, from walls covered with car paintings to beds shaped like cars. If that wasn't cool enough, the website also as a virtual reality tour, so you can check it out even if you can't go.

#4: Cartoon Network Hotel

The Cartoon Cartoons have come to life!

Place of business: Lancaster, Pennsylvania

This hotel is all about the Cartoon Network universe, from rooms themed after Adventure Time and The Powerpuff Girls to a Ben 10 themed arcade room.

#3: Dog Bark Park Inn

Who's bigger, this dog or Clifford?

Place of business: Idaho, USA

Not only does this place look like a giant dog, but the interior has dog-themed decorations around every corner.

#2: Hang Nga Guest House

Is this a hotel or a hiding place for fairies?

Place of business: Da Lat, Vietnam

This hotel features a crazy design that makes it look like it came from a fairy tale. The rooms it has are made to look like hobbit caves and each one has its own theme.

#1: Hotel Marqués de Riscal

Modern art at its most live insideable!

Place of business: Spain

Designed by Frank Gehry, this luxury resort combines square geometry with wavy roofs to create a very unique building. The interior is just as amazing, featuring tilted walls and zigzag windows among other curiosities.

If you're looking for a place to get away to when this accursed pandemic ends, I think this list might be useful. If you know of hotels you think should've been on this list, the comments section is your friend. I'll see you later. Have a good day or night depending on what time it is.

Sources

Thursday, September 17, 2020

20 Awesome places to visit on Google Street View

That accursed Covid-19 might've put your road trip plans on hold, but thankfully online map services exist. From the 7 wonders of the world to the theme parks, join me as we count down 15 places you should check out on Google Street view or other similar services.

#20: Edmonton Corn Maze

Even if you can't go to a corn maze right now, you can always try this one for size!

#19: Susan's Garage

Get an inside view of the very birthplace of Google!

#18: White House

You'll feel like the president when you roam this place!

#17: Stonehenge

We might not know a lot about this formation, but we know it looks good!

#16: 13th Gate Haunted House

In this place, it's always Halloween!

#15: Great Barrier Reef

A beautiful underwater adventure awaits your wandering eyes!

#14: Pleasant Moments Chapel

This is one of the best places to take your family, take it from me!

#13: Crown Center

Be it Christmas Eve or any other time, you owe it to yourself to check this place out!

#12: Diagon Alley

Behold, the set of the Harry Potter movies!

#11: Walt Disney World

The most wonderful place on earth is now the most wonderful place in your browser window!

#10: Tikal National Park

Those Mayans sure knew their temples!

#9: Pyramids of Giza

A site as majestic as it is mysterious!

#8: Statue of Liberty

This statue is the very icon of liberty!

#7: Grand Canyon

That is one big hole, if I do say so myself!

#6: Eiffel Tower

Viva la creativity!

#5: CERN

This place is from the future, I swear!

#4: Machu Pichu

This ain't one of the seven wonders of the ancient world for no reason!

#3: Sistine Chapel

Why can't all museum ceilings be like this one?

#2: Mount Everest

Experience the view that only the world's tallest mountain can provide!

#1: Adam Savage's Workshop

This site is the very embodiment of fandom!

Turns out you don't need a private jet or teleporter to see the world. If you can think of some amazing places I missed, leave your suggestions in the comments section. I'll see yu later. Have a good day or night depending on what time it is.

Sources

Sunday, September 13, 2020

15 Interesting webcams

Some livestreams merely involve some random guy playing video games... And others take you to more unique scenarios. From a chance to witness the Loch Ness Monster to a front row seat of the oldest science experiment in history, join me as we count down 15 rather odd webcams.

#15: Bubble Cam

This livestream takes place in the back yard of a Florida couple. The fun part comes from the bubble machine. Click on the bubbles button underneath the viewing window and you'll see a blast of bubbles cover the yard.

#14: Centennial light bulb

This cam takes place in a California firehouse and focuses on a light bulb. That doesn't seem like much, until you read around the site and discover that bulb's been burning for over well 100 years!

#13: RealLifeCam

This website allows you to view the rooms of various people living in an apartment building. Some of the cams are free, but you need a membership to access the rest.

#12: Aquarium of the Pacific

This website allows you to see several aquatic creatures up close and personal. Viewable creatures include penguins, jellyfish and even sharks.

#11: BigRigTravels

This cam puts you in the front seat of a truck driver as he makes his usual deliveries. The whole site decorated like the console of a truck and you can view the action from either an integrated YouTube player or snowman cam.

#10: Watching Grass Grow

This might seem like the most boring site imaginable, but it has some quirks to it. For one, you don't just see the grass grow. Occasionally, a car will drive down the street or the site's owner will mow his lawn. On special occasions, you can see the owner put up some nice looking decorations. The site also has a lawnmower animation that follows your mouse and a MIDI song that plays while you watch the stream.

#9: Cedar Point

This site gives you not one, but two live streams of the famous Cedar Point amusement park, as well as the many people enjoying the rides.

#8: Nautilus Live

With this site, you can witness the strange deep oceans from the comfort of your own home.

#7: International Space Station

Here you'll get to witness the breathtaking views of outer space and the satellites NASA uses to detail it. On occasion, you'll be able view the planet Earth and the NASA crew on-duty.

#6: AroraMAX

This site lets you witness the Northern Lights in all their glory. If you missed the latest stream, you can still see it with the AroraMAX replay window.

#5: EarthCam

This is a site that lets you explore various places around the world, from the bustling city of New York to the beautiful beaches in Australia.

#4: Willard Library Ghost

This page contains camera footage of several rooms of the Willard Library, known for being the alleged home of the Grey Lady Ghost. If you think you see her, you can click on one of the livestreams to submit a picture.

#3: Nessie Cam

With this cam, you get to watch the world Famous Loch Ness from the comfort of your home. If you're extremely lucky, you just might see Nessie herself peer up from beneath the deep. You can even take a snapshot if you think you see her!

#2: Drive Me Insane!

Unlike most of the other webcams on this list, this one is interactive. You use hyperlinks on the bottom of the page to turn various lights on and off in an attempt to annoy the owner of the room being streamed.

#1: Pitch Drop

You'll have to login into this site with either your email or Facebook account (provided you trust them with your personal data), but you'll get front row seats to the longest running experiment on this planet. What you'll see is a semisolid in a funnel. One so thick that from the experiment's debut in 1927 to modern day, only 9 drops of it have fallen through the funnel into a waiting cup.

If you're stuck at home thanks to Covid-19, weather issues or something else, I hope you give these cams a gander. If you know of any interesting live cams I missed, tell me about them in the comments section. I'll see you later. Have a good day or night depending on what time it is.

Sources

Thursday, November 22, 2018

15 Strange restaurants

Some restaurants are more than just burgers and fries. From a doctor themed restaurant dedicated to making you gain weight to a pizzeria with a satanic streak, join me as we count down some really unique food shops.

#15: Dinner In The Sky

One slip and you'll go from eating soup to being soup!

Places of business: Various places

This fancy restaurant offers expensive meals for up to 22 people suspended 165 feet in the air from a crane. If you're acrophobic, I'd recommend keeping an extremely wide berth.

#14: Disaster Cafe

Hang on to your pizza!

Place of business: Spain
Customers take an elevator down into a cave-like dining area, making it seem like you're going to the center of the earth. As if that wasn't enough, every meal comes with a simulated 7.8 magnitude earthquake.

#13: Ice Restaurant

Don't lick the walls!

Place of business: United Arab Emirates

As the name implies, this restaurant is sculpted completely out of ice, despite taking place in an otherwise hot part of the world. How they make this work, I have no idea.

#12: The Rock

This rocks! Pun intended!

Place of business: Zanzibar

Instead of being located on shore, this boulder-shaped restaurant is stationed right in the Indian Ocean, near the Michanwi Pingwe Beach. To get a taste of its cuisine, you're gonna have to swim or get a canoe.

#11: Mr Kanso

Who knew you could get so many things from a hollow metal cylinder?

Place of business: Japan

This place isn't the most elegant on the planet. It has over 300 items on the menu, but every one of them comes from a can.

#10: Heart Attack Grill

This stuff couldn't be worse for you if it all was deep fried!

Place of business: Las Vegas

The doctor theme is rather odd, but the real shock comes from how unhealthy the food is. The burgers are huge and have hundreds, if not thousands of calories, the fries are coated with lard, the shakes are made of pure butter and cigarettes are available for purchase. Its enough to make the average fast food restaurant look like a dieters dream come true.

#9: Fortezza Medicea

Better watch yourself! That waiter was probably a thief or something!

Place of business: Italy

Housed in the old fortress of the same name, this restaurant is also a prison. As a rehabilitation scheme, prisoners are hired to cook and serve food to the customers.

#8: Labassin Waterfall Restaurant

That's a lot of dam power!

Place of business: Philipines

Not only do diners eat outdoors here, but they also get to let their feet soak in water, as they are right next to a waterfall. The waterfall in question, dubbed the Labasin Falls, is actually runoff from the Lambasin Dam.

#7: Baggers

The future is here!

Place of business: Nuremberg

This place completely replaces waitresses with robotic service. Customers place their orders using touchscreen computers and watch their food slide down to them on metallic slides.

#6: Mars Restaurant 2112

This place was too otherworldly for this planet!

Former place of business: New York's Time Square

Customers who come here are surrounded by a decorations reminiscent of the red planet and employees dressed like martians. Customers are taken to the dining area by a UFO and taken to the exit by a teleporter. Unfortunately, the place shut down in January 2012.

#5: Devil Island Prison

Feel like a hardened criminal for one day!

Place of business: China

This restaurant is made to look like a prison. Every table is surrounded by prison bars, staff are dress liked prisoners and prison guards and customers are led to their tables in handcuffs and served coffin shaped fried bread.

#4: Cannibal Sushi

This is as gory as raw fish can get!

Place of business: Japan

This one ain't for the faint hearted. This place serves sushi, but they package it in fake corpses, which you have to them open to get your food.

#3: Modern Toilet

Of all the themes for your restaurant, why the place where people dispose of their digested dinners?

Place of business: Taipei
Perhaps the most bizarre theme for a restaurant is the bathroom. Not only do patrons sit on closed toilet seats, but the food is also served in toilet bowls, including chocolate ice cream.

#2: Hell Pizza

This pizza is literally devilishly good!

Place of business: New Zealand

As the name implies, this pizza place is themed after the bad afterlife. Not only does the place have sacrilegious decorations, but it goes as far as naming its pizzas after the 7 deadly sins. They even have a promotional interactive YouTube video where you play a Hell Pizza delivery boy trying to deliver a pizza to a woman during a zombie apocalypse. You can read about and play it here.

#1: The Clinic

Wait until you see what goes on in the kitchen!

Place of business: Singapore

This bizarre place is made to look like a hospital, right down to bedpans filled with dumplings and syringes filled with ketchup. Patrons chill out in wheelchairs while the doctor-dressed chefs make their food prep look like strange science experiments, right in an open demo kitchen under the glow of operating room lights.

Given the sheer amounts of restaurants on the planet, there is no way I could count every single one of them. If you know of any I missed, I wouldn't mind any suggestions. I'll see you later. Have a happy Thanksgiving.