Yucca, Arizona

Area 66

This golf-ball shaped former desert home now houses a UFO museum.

This unusual 40-foot-diameter geodesic dome structure, known as Area 66, is a UFO museum dedicated to the alleged crash of a “flying saucer” outside of Kingman, Arizona, in 1953. The structure is impossible to miss from the highway and, as such, often draws in tourists and passersby who want to take a picture of the unusual orb, visit the museum, or shop in the convenience store on the grounds.

The structure has had many uses over the years and there are a few competing histories as to when and for what purpose it was originally built. It was used as a real estate office at one time to sell plots of land to “Lake Havasu Estates.” The developers went so far as to send out promotional materials for the homes they hoped to construct showing happy would-be residents waterskiing and enjoying other amenities that were never to be built. The project was a classic scam and a couple people served time in prison for it.

After sitting empty for years, new owners eventually purchased the structure, spent a significant amount of money renovating it, built a store on the property, and named it Area 66. The structure once housed 3,400 square feet of living space, but has been remodeled and opened as a UFO museum.