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

Spreckels Mansion

27-room home built with the fortune of a sugar magnate.
San Simeon, California

Hearst Castle

The unbelievably opulent home built for an infamous newspaperman.
San Simeon, California

Piedras Blancas Elephant Seal Rookery

This stretch of beach along California's central coast is a busy highway for the largest seal in the northern hemisphere.
Cabazon, California

Cabazon Dinosaurs

The "world's biggest dinosaur" once housed a creationist museum in its abdomen.
Rancho Palos Verdes, California

Wayfarers Chapel

A Swedenborgian glass church surrounded by redwoods sits perched atop a massive landslide area.
Los Angeles, California

Hollywood Forever Cemetery

Resting place of Hollywood's immortals is also site of summer film screenings.
Mecca, California

Salton Sea

The ghostly remains of an accidental sea.
La Quinta, California

Big Metal Roadrunner

A giant desert bird that once swung music fans at Coachella now has a home in a nearby traffic circle.
Thousand Palms, California

Thousand Palms Oasis Preserve

Hike amid the palm trees that thrive among Southern California's Indio Hills.
Indio, California

Shields Date Garden

A giant knight, sex education, date shakes, and Jesus coexist happily in this Coachella Valley desert oasis.
San Francisco, California

Golden Gate Park Bison

San Francisco's urban bison herd has persisted in the face of extinction, development, and disease.
San Francisco, California

Garden of Fragrance

Olfactory delights in San Francisco's Botanical Gardens.
San Francisco, California

Spanish Monastery Stones

The remains of a 12th-century chapter house in Golden Gate Park.
San Francisco, California

San Francisco Botanical Garden

Golden Gate Park's historic collection of plants.
San Francisco, California

Dangling Legs at the Piedmont Boutique

The giant pair of sexy legs sticking out the window of this costume store have become its main draw.
San Francisco, California

Beat Museum

A collection of memorabilia from the Beat era in the back of a San Francisco bookstore.
Boulder City, Nevada

Hoover Dam Old Exhibit Building

Experience a charming 1930's version of "infotainment."
San Jose, California

The Winchester Mystery House

A peculiar mansion built by the troubled heir to the Winchester Rifle Company fortune.
San Francisco, California

Alcatraz Island

In all of the 29 years it was in operation, no prisoners ever escaped successfully... or so they claim.
San Francisco, California

Musée Mécanique

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

Lake Havasu's London Bridge

This immigrant bridge once spanned the Thames but is now a fixture of an Arizona city.
Baker, California

World's Largest Thermometer

This giant temperature attraction created some giant electric bills.
Yermo, California

Calico Ghost Town

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

Antelope Valley Poppy Reserve

Each year these high desert hills are absolutely covered with poppy flowers in a surreal show of nature.