Catalog
Ben-Hur's Jerusalem, Nazareth and chariot arena were filmed in Italy: Cinecittà Studios in Rome for the 1959 classic, and Matera and Cinecittà World for the 2016 remake. The route follows the story from Jerusalem and Nazareth to the sea battle, the great chariot race and the Valley of the Lepers, and shows where each scene was shot. Most stops are stand-ins for the story's places, and each says so.
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix was filmed on the River Thames, in Westminster Underground station, at the Glenfinnan Viaduct and in Glen Etive in the Scottish Highlands. The route follows the film in order: the Order's night flight over London, Harry's walk to his hearing at the Ministry of Magic, the Hogwarts Express in the Highlands, the empty glens of the aerial shots and the Thestral flight to the Ministry over the Thames. Interiors were built at Leavesden Studios in Watford, so only the exteriors can be visited.
War Thunder's tank maps are based on real places: Stalingrad Tractor Plant, Bastogne, Hürtgen Forest, Cologne Cathedral, Berlin's Reichstag, Novorossiysk, Volokolamsk, Breslau (Wrocław), Darwin Hill in the Falklands and the Fulda Gap. The developers say how close each map is to its original, from rebuilt photographs of the Stalingrad factory to a layout only inspired by the real ground. This route follows ten of them in the order of their history, with a short note on what happened at each real place. Maps are classed here as exact only where the developers copy a real district; the rest are marked approximate.
The Battle of Okinawa, fought from March to June 1945, ran from the Kerama Islands and the Kadena landing beaches to Shuri Castle and Mabuni Hill in the south of the island. This route follows the land campaign through six places you can find on a map today, from the first landing to the Cornerstone of Peace, where the names of those who died on all sides are inscribed. Several sites are memorials, and the pins for the Kerama Islands and Kakazu Ridge are approximate.
Saint Nicholas, the early Christian bishop of Myra, was born at Patara, served at Myra (modern Demre) and now rests in Bari, with more relics in Venice. This route follows his legend from Lycia to Nicaea, Gemiler Island and Apulia. Historians know little of the real man, so the route follows the traditional story and the journey of his bones. It ends in 1087, when sailors carried them across the sea, and in the Venice church that holds more.
Leif Erikson's voyage runs from Eiríksstaðir in Iceland through Brattahlíð in Greenland to L'Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland, the only confirmed Norse site in North America outside Greenland. The route follows the sagas: a boyhood on Erik the Red's farms, a crew of thirty-five, and the lands Leif named Helluland and Markland. The saga lands are only traditionally identified, so their pins are approximate regions rather than exact spots.
York has been defended by walls since Roman times, and this walk strings together six places around them: the Multangular Tower, York Minster, Clifford's Tower, Micklegate Bar, the Shambles and Walmgate Bar. Each stop is a moment in the city's story, from a Roman fort built around 71 AD to a siege in 1644.
The Salem witch trials of 1692 began in Salem Village (now Danvers), reached the Witch House and Proctor's Ledge in Salem, and are remembered today at the Rebecca Nurse Homestead and the Salem memorial. More than 200 people were accused, thirty were found guilty and nineteen were hanged. This route follows the story from the Parris household and the Nurse farm to the magistrate's house, the execution site and the 1992 memorial park. The Parsonage stop is approximate and has no map pin.
Antoni Gaudí's Barcelona runs from Casa Vicens in Gràcia and Palau Güell in El Raval to Park Güell, Casa Batlló, La Pedrera and the Sagrada Família. Follow the architect from his first major house in 1883 to the tram accident of June 1926. Most stops are open to visitors; the exact spot of the accident is approximate.
Richard III's story runs from Middleham Castle in Yorkshire to Bosworth Field, where he died in 1485, and on to Leicester, where his grave was found under a car park in 2012. The route follows his childhood at Middleham, the battle of Tewkesbury, the princes at the Tower of London, his last charge at Bosworth, and the Greyfriars dig and cathedral tomb in Leicester. The exact Bosworth battlefield is still debated.
Agatha Christie's Devon runs from Burgh Island, the model for Soldier Island in And Then There Were None, to Churston, Dittisham and her own Greenway estate on the River Dart. The route follows five stops through The A.B.C. Murders, And Then There Were None, Five Little Pigs, Towards Zero and Dead Man's Folly. Two stops share the Greenway pin, and Nasse House is fictional.
Philip Pullman's Jordan College is a fictional Oxford college that borrows from Exeter College, with the Gyptians moored in Jericho and the trilogy's last promise made on a bench in the Oxford Botanic Garden. Film and TV shot Jordan at Christ Church and New College. The route follows Lyra from her home college to the canal and the garden, with the film and series stand-ins. Jordan itself is invented, so some pins mark real stand-ins.
Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited is set in Oxford, at a fictional country house played on screen by Castle Howard, in Venice and at London's Savoy Chapel. It follows Charles Ryder, who is drawn into the family of his friend Sebastian. This route visits Hertford and Christ Church in Oxford, the Yorkshire house that played Brideshead, the Venice palace used by the 1981 serial, and the Savoy Chapel. Brideshead itself is fictional, so some pins mark filming stand-ins.
Flaubert's Madame Bovary is set in the Normandy countryside around Rouen: Yonville-l'Abbaye is traditionally held to be based on the village of Ry, and the novel's city scenes play out in Rouen, around its cathedral, its opera and its old churches. The route follows Emma Bovary from the couple's first home at Tostes, through the market town of Yonville, to an evening at the opera and the famous cab ride through Rouen. Several places are approximate, since the novel names few of them as they are today.
Proust's Combray is the village of Illiers, his Balbec is the seaside resort of Cabourg, and his narrator's walks lead through the Champs-Élysées in Paris and on to Venice. The route follows five places from the novel across its volumes, from the madeleine memory in Combray to a trip to Venice with the narrator's mother. Most pins are approximate, since Proust blends real places into invented ones.
Dan Brown's Origin is set across Spain: Edmond Kirsch's reveal at the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, a chase through Gaudí's Casa Milà and Sagrada Família in Barcelona, a finale at the Barcelona Supercomputing Center, and a royal palace in Madrid. Robert Langdon and curator Ambra Vidal race to broadcast a dead billionaire's discovery. The route starts at Montserrat Abbey and follows the story through six real places, most of which you can visit.
Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara follows three friends on a Spanish road trip, from the Costa Brava and La Tomatina in Buñol to Seville, Alájar and the running of the bulls in Pamplona. Each friend picks one adventure sport that all three must complete. The route follows the story's chapters, with notes on what was filmed where. Some pins mark a region or town rather than an exact set.
Woody Allen's Vicky Cristina Barcelona is set in Barcelona and Oviedo and shot there and in Avilés, from the rooftop of Casa Milà to the Hotel de la Reconquista and the Avilés lighthouse. The route follows the summer of Vicky and Cristina in story order: Gaudí's chimneys, a spur-of-the-moment weekend in Asturias, Park Güell and the arched gate of Sant Pau. Each stop is a place where a scene from the film was set or shot.
Life Is Beautiful (La vita è bella), Benigni's film, is set in Arezzo and shot in Arezzo, Cortona, Montevarchi and Papigno. Guido's romance with Dora plays out around Piazza Grande, the abbey of Saints Flora and Lucilla and a villa in Montevarchi. The route follows the story from Guido's arrival in 1939 to the camp of 1944. Several stops are stand-ins: the opera house is in Cortona and the camp was built near Papigno, not set in a real camp.
Fallout 4 turns Boston into the post-nuclear Commonwealth, and most of its landmarks are real: Fenway Park becomes Diamond City, the Old North Church hides the Railroad, and the USS Constitution still floats in Charlestown harbor. The fourth main Fallout game, it is set ten years after Fallout 3. This route follows the Sole Survivor from Vault 111 outside Concord to the Institute beneath MIT, then to the Castle on Castle Island, the Navy Yard and Bunker Hill. Some story sites are invented, so their pins mark the real places that inspired or contain them.
Magnificent Century was filmed at Hadımköy's TEM studios, with a replica of Topkapı Palace; its story runs from Topkapı and the Old Palace to Süleymaniye, Hürrem's bathhouse and tomb. Hürrem rises from harem slave to Suleiman's legal wife, a jump the series turns into a court war. The route follows her from Topkapı and the Old Palace, where the harem lived until 1541, past the mosque Suleiman built for his son, Sinan's Süleymaniye, the bathhouse she endowed near Hagia Sophia, and the tiled tomb where she lies. The palace on screen was a set; the real buildings are still in the city.
Saturday Night Fever was shot on location in Brooklyn: Tony Manero struts down 86th Street, buys pizza at Lenny's and works at a Bay Ridge hardware store. The route follows Tony's week from the family house on 79th Street to the 2001 Odyssey disco floor, the rehearsal studio in Bensonhurst, the promenade bench under the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge and the bridge itself. The disco and Lenny's are gone, but the hardware store, the house, the studio and the bridge are still there.
Nicosia's walled old city is a five-kilometre ring of Venetian fortifications with three surviving gates — Famagusta, Kyrenia and Paphos. Inside are the Selimiye Mosque, the Bedesten, the caravanserai of Büyük Han and Ledra Street, the shopping street that became a symbol of the island's division. The walk crosses the Green Line on foot. The route begins at Eleftheria Square, enters by Famagusta Gate and loops through the old city: the Selimiye and the Bedesten, Büyük Han, Kyrenia Gate, the Ledra Street crossing, the Ömeriye Mosque and Paphos Gate. The Selimiye, Bedesten, Büyük Han and Kyrenia Gate stand north of the Green Line; the rest are in the south.
Fallout 76 is set in West Virginia, and its map reproduces Flatwoods, Point Pleasant, Charleston's Capitol, The Greenbrier and the New River Gorge Bridge. This route follows the landmarks in the order the main quest reaches them, from the Responders' church at Flatwoods and the airport at Morgantown to the Free States' armory at Harpers Ferry, the Brotherhood's asylum at Weston and the Enclave bunker beneath the Greenbrier. Each stop pairs the real site with what the game does there.