The "Fun Spot of the Desert" is now a haunting ruin, and a reminder that putting a water park in a desert is a bad idea.

Travelers exchange letters with woodland creatures at this mini post office.

Hidden beneath a lake for decades, this brutalist mine has now emerged from beneath the receding waters.

A crumbling wizard is one of the final reminders of a roadside Middle Earth.

Come crisp December nights, this fairly plain neighborhood becomes a holiday dream world.

The lowest point in North America is home to an undrinkable pool surrounded by fields of geometric salt flats.

This mysterious petroglyph evokes the ancient swastika symbol but was later vandalized with the more troublesome Nazi one.

This serene oasis in an affluent Los Angeles neighborhood holds some of Gandhi's ashes and got Elvis into Eastern Philosophy.

Get lost in this haunting fairytale art walk through a man-made eucalyptus grove.

The graffiti-covered remnants of a former triangulation station are balanced precariously on this California peak.

In one Santa Monica parking lot a mushroom cloud made of chains heralds a message of peace.

The programmatic glory of LA's giant whiskey barrel building has become an upscale reminder of the city's kitschy roadside past.

This ultra-modern California span is actually a titanic solar clock in disguise built by famed architect Santiago Calatrava.

This concrete tangle of square pipes has stood as a proud thorn in the city's side since the '70s.

This unlicensed collection of fast-food memorabilia sits on the site of the first ever McDonald's restaurant.

This California tree is the single source of the state's entire orange industry.

Most famous work of one of Frank Lloyd Wright's sons.

Left untouched since a double murder-suicide in the 1960s, Los Feliz murder mansion remains a neighborhood mystery.

High on a hill overlooking Los Angeles lives a world famous, high power conical Tesla Coil.

A massive ultra-modern church presents a science-fiction view of Catholicism's inclusive future.

Bonsai garden in Oakland is curated by the first non-Japanese female bonsai master in the United States.

This Oakland fairytale kingdom, fiercely devoted to childlike whimsy, was an early inspiration for Disneyland.

An outdoor sculpture park of giant pink robots and post-apocalyptic Christmas scenes.

The so-called "Bridge of Thighs" in Palm Springs allows nudists to discreetly cross the road.