Places Ryn Wants to Go

The highest point in Alabama was almost completely deforested, but is now home to protected towers and trees.

Since it formed millions of years ago, this cave system has been a sacred burial ground, a Prohibition-era speakeasy, and the center of an amusement park.

A rusted metal giant pays tribute to Birmingham’s industrial past.

The remains of a foundry and old blast furnaces destroyed during the Civil War are preserved in this central Alabama park.

Once one of the largest producers of pig iron in the world.

A unique book shop with a collection of rare tomes and a nostalgia museum.

Every last book in this bookstore is signed by the author.

This 1,500-acre development hopes to be the Central Park of the South.

An abandoned asylum where patients have been forgotten but their possessions remain.

Home on the Hillside, and home of the first breakfast cereal.

An unassuming nature trail winds through dozens of tiny houses built for the wee people.

A collection of the best toys ever made inside a museum devoted to play.

The remains of a failed subway in upstate New York is now an underground graffiti bunker.

An old dining hall now serves up ghost stories for lusty locals.

The floor-to-ceiling collection in an old factory is a unique alternative to stuffy galleries.

This island castle contains enough secret passageways to support a season of Scooby-Doo episodes.

Surprisingly aquamarine waters fill deep lakes formed at the end of the last ice age.

A mummy and sarcophagus are part of the many wonders in this library's collection.

Hike deep into the woods to explore this Gilded Age masterpiece.

The graphite created here was used in the manufacturing of pencils.

This elaborate High Victorian Gothic structure is one of the world's few 16-sided buildings.

A 13,000-year-old mastodon skeleton was found during the construction of a 19th-century New York mill.

A CT scan revealed the identity of this 3,000-year-old mummy that everyone erroneously thought was female.

At this small shop off a dirt road in the forest, the specialty is eel the owner caught and smoked himself.