Burping, gurgling geothermal mud pots by the Salton Sea.

A desert ghost town—occupied for only 12 years—was once home to more than 500 silver mines.

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.

Ten 25-foot-tall, beehive-shaped kilns, abandoned in Death Valley.

Aqueducts have dramatically changed this old lake, now home to tufa towers and its very own species of tiny brine shrimp.

A "Titanic" superfan changed his name to Jack and set up this strange shrine to the blockbuster, complete with Korean food and Tarot readings.

A long-vacant Scottish Rite temple in Hollywood has been converted into an art museum filled with Masonic relics.

A monthly street "service" of handmade puppets and live original puppets, whose devotees profess has the power to change lives.

Scores of vintage street lamps shine along L.A.’s Miracle Mile.

This hilltop park offers magnificent views and a Frank Lloyd Wright masterpiece.

The so-called "Statue of Liberty of Los Angeles" is on a one mutant mission to keep L.A. weird.

This futuristic airport terminal was abandoned for decades before reopening as a hotel—with a vintage plane of its own parked out back.

One of the largest fleets of armored vehicles in the world, sitting out in the California desert.

The cobbled together compound of a deceased artist which now serves as a filming location.

Collapsing castle on the Hudson river was once the storage site of military surplus business.

A ruined hotel with an unlucky history and an eerie present.

Ruins of the elaborate house where the enigmatic costume designer threw glamorous parties for New York's theatrical elite.

Underground vaults of a former brewery beneath Brooklyn's Crown Heights are now used to ripen cheese.

This unassuming museum's slogan translates to “there is a limit of sadness, anxiety has no limits."

A modern day curiosity cabinet.

A collection of 20th-century automata, penny arcade games, and musical contraptions.

World's largest collection devoted to one fruit.

The ghostly remains of an accidental sea.

The "world's biggest dinosaur" once housed a creationist museum in its abdomen.