Places Rural Exploration VA Wants to Go

A quintet of history museums make this Virginia graveyard as much a resting place for funereal history as it is for people.

A home built with marble tombstones from the graves of 2,200 Union soldiers buried in a Virginia cemetery.

A 300-yard long natural tunnel runs through a ridge deep in the Appalachian Mountains.

Forget Hollywood, one of the biggest stars in the world can be found in Roanoke, Virginia.

To fit bodies into this Renaissance crypt, they were first left to decompose in the crypt's rotting room.

The “Sistine Chapel” of the Middle Ages merges 11th-century science and religion in wondrous hues.

In the bowels of a 19th-century brewery lurks a fine-dining restaurant offering an array of themed feasts.

This cemetery overlooking the Benbulben rock formation is the final resting place of one of Ireland's most beloved poets.

A hidden medieval crypt where a famous legend says the devil used to teach black magic.

It’s said this crypt was the setting for the tragic finale of the Shakespeare play.

An intricate network of underground tombs carved into volcanic rock.

The secluded resting place of a local historical figure who perished during the sinking of the Titanic.

This former wildlife sanctuary is being transformed into an art park.

After the nearby mercury mine shut down, this town was abandoned and declared a Superfund site.

A royal relic from the time that gambling was accidentally made legal in South Carolina.

Nature (and graffiti) reclaim this old waterworks that has been surrounded by a bike path and network of walking trails.

An ornate abandoned schoolhouse hidden in the woods near a decaying mill town.

A sacred site for Native Americans surveyed by George Washington and owned by both King George III and Thomas Jefferson.

A train station that was abandoned by the coal industry and converted into a cocktail bar. Now it’s home to the local visitor bureau.

What was once one of the country's largest confectionary plants is now an abandoned ruin, but is still pretty sweet.

Abandoned silver mine strewn with wrecked and twisted structures.

An abandoned stretch of highway, deteriorating next to the operational one.

A theme park that suffered massive flooding during Katrina was abandoned, and now proves irresistible to trespassing explorers.

Abandoned hotel with adjacent lake and golf course.