Places From the Backwoods Wants to Go

Strange physical sensations and optical contradictions keep visitors coming back for more.

The Beaux-Arts aquarium boasts a vast collection of saltwater and freshwater fish on an island in the Detroit River.

A wacky two-story folk-art assemblage of carved and found objects, with lights, motion, and sound now in need of financial support.

The bones of an old zoo crumbling in the shadow of a new one.

A Beaux-Arts triumph rises from decades of decay to become the heart of a new innovation district.

The city is full of whimsical portals to another world.

This freshwater spring fills with 10,000 gallons of water per minute.

Largest magic museum in the United States with more than half a million pieces of memorabilia.

Hell on Earth is actually a small town in Michigan where anyone can be mayor for a day.

Turnip-shaped island just off the Michigan shore in Lake Huron.

Once a bastion of its community, this gothic cathedral now stands as a haunting ruin.

Abandoned concert venue legendary for its rock counterculture.

Khmer Rouge's high security prison.

This extravagant villa built by a Burmese merchant is part pagoda and part European mansion.

One of Amsterdam's narrowest houses is located right across the canal from its widest.

The first (but not only) upside-down house in Germany.

This mechanical wonder towers above a river in Michigan's capital city.

This experiment in the lifespan of seeds will take a century before it is complete.

A park and memorial dedicated to the victims of the deadliest school massacre in American history.

This eccentric folly house was designed by Romanian thinker Bogdan-Petriceicu Hasdeu, with a helping hand from his deceased daughter's spirit.

The writing studio of an American adventure author, built in the style of a medieval castle.

The stones of this formerly witch-obsessed castle were used to build a church.

A small but immensely extravagant palace built by the "Night King."

Ruins of a German castle on top of a towering stone pillar.