The world's most unique places to visit

If the options for your next vacation come down to the usual beach relaxation period or volunteering at an elephant shelter in Thailand, which would you choose?

Should the pachyderms sound more appealing than sipping a Mai Tai in Ko Samui, you're not alone. Exciting, interesting and a little bit strange are elements that travelers are currently seeking in their vacations, experts say.

In pictures: World's most unique places to visit
10 beautiful destinations, one step removed
Video: The most expensive cruise ship
America's hidden travel gems
Europe's hidden travel gems
10 travel traps to avoid

One particularly unique vacation travelers are currently discussing on Virtual Tourist: Guided tours through the Ukraine's Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, which infamously and disastrously suffered a reactor explosion in 1986.

Guides assure that short-term exposure the environs is not harmful, but there are also strict procedures. For $170, visitors get a combined history and ecology lesson.

Off the Beaten Path, a travel agency based in Montana, offers an excursion that supports a Native American tribe in the Northern Rockies.

The service hires local guides, and visitors have the opportunity to attend a powwow with a Native American host, eat dinner at a tepee camp and attend meetings of local tribal members.

Altaffer remembers the two ornate treasure caves of Kim Jong Il and Kim Il Sung in North Korea, filled with various gifts from diplomats and other world leaders. In one room, there was an entire train car, a gift from Joseph Stalin.

But visiting North Korea is not for the faint of heart. Not only is it extremely difficult to gain access, once there, visitors must follow strict, government-approved tours.

After visiting four times, Altaffer crowns Pyongyang the most bizarre place he has ever been: "It's like Mars, with people."