Orhan Pamuk said that "Real museums are places where time is transformed into space."

Museums are portals to our past that bring history to life. Every major city in the world has ones worth visiting. But these should be at the top of your list.

Once the largest palace in the world, The Louvre, with its famous glass pyramid is now the world's largest and most-visited art museum.

Home of Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa painting and the statue of the armless Venus de Milo, exhibits here come from diverse origins as Egypt, medieval Europe, classical Greece and Rome, and Napoleonic France.

A showcase to the glory days of the Italian Renaissance, the Uffizi is one of the oldest and most famous art museums in the world.

Constructed in the 16th century as offices for the Florentine magistrates, the gallery contains masterpieces by great Italian artists such as Botticelli, Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and Raphael to name a few.

Home to an extensive collection of ancient Egyptian artifacts, it's no doubt the mummies and mind-boggling treasures of the boy-king Tutankhamen make this storehouse of a great ancient civilization so popular with visitors.

There's so much to see here, pre-planning is helpful to zero on what's most important-like seeing the mummified royal pharaohs and their queens.

An ode to great masters like Rembrandt, Van Gogh and a tribute to the Dutch Golden Age, Rijksmuseum is the largest and most prestigious art and history museum in the Netherlands.

As guardian of the country's finest works, the museum's most popular pieces are no doubt Rembrandt's magnificent The Night Watch, Jewish Bride and Self-Portrait as the Apostle Paul.

The Museum of Anthropology contains a myriad of archeological and anthropological artifacts from the pre-Columbian Mexican heritage.

Stone of the Sun, the Aztec calendar stone, 12-feet in diameter and weighing almost 25 tons is housed here, along with treasures recovered from the Mayan civilization at the Sacred Cenote at Chichen Itza.

Known by many simply as "The Met," the massive Gothic-style building in Central Park is the largest and finest museum in the western hemisphere.

A collection of more than two million works from around the world covers periods from the Stone Age to the 21st century. Walking into the museum's magnificent Great Hall is a treat in itself.

Founded in 1764 by Catherine the Great, the Russian museum houses a massive art and culture collection of more than three million pieces.

Occupying six historic buildings including the Winter Palace, the former residence of Russian czars, the museum's unrivaled bounty includes works by Picasso, Matisse, Michelangelo, and da Vinci.

It's worth a visit to this amazing galleria founded in 1784 as an artist's academy for no other reason than to view Michelangelo's awe-inspiring statue of David.

Carved from discarded marble when the artist was only 29, the 16th-century statue, considered the greatest sculpture ever created, is such a perfect piece of art that even the veins on David's arms are prominent.

Built in the 11th century by William the Conqueror, the Tower of London contains the Crown Jewels including Queen Victoria's royal diadem with 3,000 precious stones and the 530-carat Star of Africa diamond.

A darker side to the museum, however, is the macabre Execution Row, where Anne Boleyn and others met their untimely fates.

A remarkable repository of masterworks, Chicago's Art Institute houses two of American art's most recognizable paintings: Grant Wood's American Gothic (the pitchforked-holding farmer) and Edward Hopper's Nighthawks (the famous austere dinner scene).

A series of Monet's Stacks of Wheat is also located in this magnificent place boasting the largest membership of any U.S. art museum.

No stay in the Eternal City is complete without a visit to the Vatican Museums.

Located in the world's smallest independent state, Vatican City, the museums are housed in a labyrinth of palaces and galleries. The star of the collection is the famous Sistine Chapel whose magnificent ceiling was painted by Michelangelo in the early 1500s.

In 1816, King Fernando VII created the Royal Museum of Painting and Sculpture which later became known as The Prado.

It's been said that the treasure house filled with sculptures and incredible works by Botticelli, Bosch, Rafael, Fra Angelico and others could keep Madrid on the European cultural map all by itself.

It's impossible to say which of the Smithsonian's 19 museums and galleries are the best. The good news is they're all free.

Main attractions like Dorothy's ruby red slippers, dresses of the first ladies and the original Star-Spangled Banner can be found at the National Museum of American History. The Museum of Natural History houses the famous Hope Diamond and the Wright brothers Spirit of St. Louis, and the Apollo 11 command module are on display in the National Air and Space Museum.

A neoclassical converted railway station in Paris is now home to some of the most notable artworks in France -paintings by Paul Gaugin and sculptures by Auguste Rodin.

Works on display in the arching, glass-roofed building include such masters as Delacroix, Renoir, Whistler, and Monet.

A chance to see spectacular art and spectacular views of the Pacific Ocean and Los Angeles, the impressive houses an extensive collection of European paintings, sculpture, illuminated manuscripts, decorative arts, furnishings and photography representing medieval times to present day.

If the collections aren't impressive enough, the architectural splendor of the sculptured gardens and tree-lined walkways located on the property are themselves a work of art.

With an unrivaled collection of Cycladic, Minoan, Mycenaean and Classical Greek art, the star of Athens' treasure house is without a doubt the bronze statue of Artemision Poseidon-his perfect athletic body posed launching his trident.

Other magnificent pieces include pottery artifacts and frescos rescued from the island of Santorini, and a funerary mask thought to be that of Agamemnon, high king of the Greeks during the Trojan War.

The Egyptian gallery here boasts the world's finest collection of Egyptian antiquities outside Egypt, including the famed Rosetta Stone, carved in 196 BC.

The museum is also the current holder of the controversial Elgin Marbles, a collection of Classical Greek marble sculptures shipped to England by Thomas Bruce, British ambassador at the time of the Ottoman Empire.

It was the war that changed the world. And the WWII Museum in New Orleans does a phenomenal job with its exhibits and films relating the war's causes, how it was won, and its impact on the world today.

A not-to-be-missed experience is an award-winning film narrated by Tom Hanks with high-tech effects exploding on the oversized 4-D screen guaranteed to bring tears to your eyes.

This German museum was built exclusively to house the colossal 2nd century B.C. Pergamon altar, a 40-foot high colonnaded Greek temple. The altar with its 27 steps leading to the top was discovered in 1864 and brought to Berlin in 1902 from Turkey.

Collections in its Museum of the Ancient Near East feature the imposing bright blue glazed-brick Ishtar Gate of Babylon from 6th century BC.

In 1974, farmers outside the ancient capital of Xi'an, China, dug up what turned out to be an incredibly large-scale pit containing terracotta soldiers and horses belonging to the Emperor Qin Shu Huang (211-206 BC).

The unexpected discovery covering an area of 16,300 meters is one of the most significant archeological excavations of the 20th century, and contains more than 7,000 uniquely-sculpted and fired pottery soldiers, horses, chariots, and weapons.

Yad Vashem is Israel's official memorial and museum dedicated to the six million victims of the Holocaust.

The 45-acre campus and museum honors not only Jews who fought against their Nazi oppressors but Gentiles who selflessly aided the Jews in their hour of need. The sobering Hall of Names personally commemorates the identity of every victim and includes more than 600 photos of those murdered in the Holocaust.

September 11, 2001, is a day no American will ever forget. As a way to commemorate the men, women, children, firefighters and police officers who perished on this tragic day, a memorial and museum were constructed on the site of the former World Trade Center.

Through displays, archives, narratives, monumental and authentic artifacts, the stories of 9/11 are documented for generations to come.

Pompeii was an ancient Roman city destroyed and buried under volcanic ash and pumice in the massive eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in 79 AD.

Though many of the archeological artifacts can be found in the National Museum of Archeology in Naples, nothing can prepare visitors for the experience of walking through this extensive ghost city of a now-vanished civilization.

The entire site is a museum and its once opulent existence can be relived in the intricate mosaic floors and frescoes of its famous ruins.

This maritime museum is home to nine incredible exhibitions and most notably, the world's only existing preserved 17th-century warship, the Vasa.

The ship sank in Stockholm in 1628 but was not salvaged for restoration for another 300 years. Most surprising is that the incredibly ornate 6-meter-long warship is almost fully intact.

Byzantium's greatest legacy, once a church, later a mosque, the now-museum is widely recognized as an architectural marvel and a masterpiece of mosaics.

Photographs can't do it justice. Seeing its massive dome and four elegant minarets then stepping inside to witness its haunting beauty and magnificent history is almost indescribable.