sdbach89's User Profile - Atlas Obscura
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San Francisco, California

Internet Archive Headquarters

The grand, column-fronted, sculpture-adorned home of the ambitious digital library.
Saint-Bernard, France

Tour Isabelle Double Arch

This stunning natural double arch, the largest in the Alps, went undiscovered until 2005.
Kuwait City, Kuwait

House of Mirrors

Lived-in building, bedecked with an astonishing array of mirror mosaics.
Milledgeville, Georgia

Central State Hospital

One of the largest-ever mental hospitals now sits abandoned, surrounded by 25,000 unmarked graves.
Rybachiy, Russia

Dancing Forest

The reason for the strange contortions in the trunks of these "drunken" pine trees in Russia is still a mystery.
Maywood, Illinois

Underground Railroad Memorial at McDonald's

A plaque marks a former safe house on the secret route, now hidden next to a McDonald's.
Mount Vernon, Iowa

American Gothic Barn

A hidden barn-sized rendition of Grant Wood's most famous, and most parodied, painting.
Portugal

Mina de São Domingos (Sao Domingos Mines)

An abandoned mine now resembles a post-apocalyptic landscape of derelict buildings and blood-red pools of water.
Edurudona, India

Thimmamma Marrimanu

The world's largest banyan tree is followed by a community of worshippers.
Shengshan Island, China

Houtouwan

This abandoned fishing settlement may well be the greenest village in the world.
St. Petersburg, Florida

Sunken Gardens

A luxuriant botanical garden below sea level.
Istanbul, Turkey

Basilica Cisterns of Istanbul

A marvel of Byzantine engineering under the streets of Istanbul.
Los Angeles, California

Sunken City

Remants of foundations, streets, and streetcar tracks inhabit the cliffs where a landslide occurred in 1929.
Jaipur, India

Jal Mahal

More than half of this Indian palace is drowned but it looks all the more spectacular for it.
Seoul, South Korea

Yongma Land Abandoned Theme Park

Plenty of old carney magic still haunts this photogenic amusement park.
Amboy, California

Guardian Lions of Route 66

A pair of large white marble lions guard this stretch of the Mojave Desert, and it is utterly mysterious how they got there.
Waitomo, New Zealand

Waitomo Glowworm Caves

Tubing through a cave lit with glowworms is a magical underground experience.
Wanaka, New Zealand

That Wanaka Tree

A solitary tree has grown up all alone on Lake Wānaka, backdropped by the beautiful Southern Alps.
Waimangu, New Zealand

Lake Rotomahana

The once and future home of New Zealand's famed Pink and White Terraces.
Botyre (Ayent), Switzerland

The Bisses of Valais

Medieval irrigation channels built into the sides of mountains provided Valais with water for hundreds of years.
Fackler, Alabama

Neversink Pit

This natural wonder drops 16 stories straight down through rare flora and streaming waterfalls.
Arlington, Virginia

Gravelly Point Park

This lovely picnic spot featuring thunderous jet landings is an aircraft spotter’s dream.
Sydney, Australia

'Forgotten Songs' Sound Sculpture

A collaboration of art and ornithology mourns the calls of Sydney's lost birds.
Sonora, Texas

Caverns of Sonora

A Texas cave network is home to some of the world's most spectacular-looking and bizarrely named mineral formations.