The Atlas Obscura Podcast

Reporter Eric Grundhauser recounts a memorable visit to an unusual museum in Iceland, where he explored the ancient lore of the occult, learned how to steal milk from his neighbors, and laid his eyes upon a pair of pants… made of human flesh.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/the-museum-of-icelandic-sorcery-witchcraft-holmavik-iceland

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The largest theater pipe organ in the world lives in a restaurant in Mesa, Arizona. Phenomenal musicians play requests while diners feast on pizza.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/organ-stop-pizza

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The Alnwick Poison Garden in England is a place where stopping and smelling the flowers could actually kill you. The garden is dedicated entirely to plants that are narcotic or deadly.  

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/alnwick-poison-garden

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The Unclaimed Baggage Center in Scottsboro, Alabama bills itself as “the nation’s only retailer of lost luggage.” If you’ve ever lost a bag during air travel, it probably wound up there - along with many other treasures and oddities. READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/unclaimed-baggage-center

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John Milkovisch spent 18 years covering his Houston home in beer cans. The house has been preserved for visitors since John’s death in 1988. 

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/beer-can-house

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Resident food and death correspondent, Sam O’Brien, returns to tell us about a grave with a nut roll recipe engraved on it and the layered and touching story behind the treat.

Know of a recipe grave in your local cemetery? Email us at hello@atlasobscura.com, and include “Recipe Graves” in the subject line.

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A national park in Southwest Uganda is home to nearly half the world’s population of endangered mountain gorillas. They and the local community rely on each other to survive.

Learn how to help the Bwindi Mountain Gorillas: https://ctph.org/

Sound of the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest and the mountain gorillas was recorded by Nick Penny. To see more of Nick’s work, visit:

https://www.nickpennyphotography.com/

https://www.instagram.com/nickp.pics/

Read more in the Atlas: 

https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/bwindi-impenetrable-forest

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 In this two-part series, we venture towards frozen graves tied to an infamous Arctic expedition. We follow two groups of adventurers, separated by more than 170 years, and play witness to the disasters that befell them all.

Read More in the Atlas:https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/graves-of-beechey-island

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In this two-part series, we venture towards frozen graves tied to an infamous Arctic expedition. We follow two groups of adventurers, separated by more than 170 years, and play witness to the disasters that befell them all.

Read More in the Atlas: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/graves-of-beechey-island

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After a profound show of devotion for his master, a dog becomes the symbol of loyalty for an entire nation. 

Read more in the Atlas: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/hachiko-hachi-shibuya-station

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The crumbled ruins of the world’s largest flour mill became one of Minneapolis’ most prominent graffiti-writing locations, and later a museum.

Read more in the Atlas: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/mill-city-museum-site-great-mill-disaster

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In Kongthong, India, every person’s name is a unique song, composed by their mother within a week of their birth, part of a centuries-old tradition.

Read more in the Atlas: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/where-indian-villagers-have-musical-names

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A listener’s voicemail sent us searching for the story of a very special -- and giant -- oak tree Peoria, Illinois, and the family of arborists who cared for it. 

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The oldest (maybe) swimming pool in Iceland is a stunning oasis built into the side of a lush hill.  

Read more in the Atlas: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/seljavallalaug

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This old cement mine in Rosendale, New York, has been used as everything from a mushroom farm to a recording studio.

Read more in the Atlas: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/widow-jane-mine

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The Atlas production team would like to share some of their favorite holiday places as 2021 comes to a close.  This episode will be followed by a series of re-listen episodes from the past year, published over the next two weeks. 

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In 2006 a massive haul of Doritos was shipwrecked on Hatteras Island on the Outer Banks, leaving its mark on the town forever.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/shipwrecked-doritos

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Professional Adventurer George Kourounis knew he needed to visit the Cave of the Crystals, located nearly a 1000 feet beneath northern Mexico, the moment he saw a photograph from inside the cave.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/giant-crystals-naica

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Post Office Bay on the Galapagos Islands is a post office that runs on luck and the goodwill of visitors. It has a knack for bringing strangers together. 

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/post-office-bay

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A music box given to Scott Harrison while he served in Vietnam inspired him to hand-carve all the animals for the Carousel of Happiness in Nederland, Colorado.  

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/carousel-of-happiness

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Jonathan Carey and Michelle Cassidy of the Atlas Places Team catch listeners up on the new and surprising additions to Atlas Obscura that capture their attention. This includes a heiress’s pet cemetery and ruins visible beneath a grocery store floor. 

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: 

https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/doris-dukes-pet-cemetery

https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/aungier-street-lidl-archaelogy

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This small mineral museum in Dodgeville, Wisconsin is home to plenty of rocks - some of which may rival those in the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History.

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In 1986 an unknown natural disaster at Lake Nyos in Menchum, Cameroon left more than 1700 people dead in one night - and puzzled scientists. Learn how they solved that mystery. 

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/lake-nyos-the-deadliest-lake-in-the-world

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Visit a museum inside the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, Georgia, which documents how public health officials have slowed the spread of disease through history.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS:https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/cdc-museum

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Hear from the caretakers of a ghost town in Bolivia that was once the world's highest ski resort.  

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/abandoned-chacaltaya-ski-resort

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Take a trip to Micropia, the world’s only museum dedicated to microscopic organisms and  learn about our invisible life companions.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/micropia

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The Tree of 40 fruits in San Jose California is an horticultural marvel of 40 types of stone fruit trees grafted together to form a living work of art. 

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/tree-of-40-fruit

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The Sporkful host Dan Pashman brings listeners on a quest to find a fruit indigenous to North America that has never been industrialized - but may be seeing a resurgence. 

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/foods/pawpaw-fruit

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It’s easy to dismiss Bigfoot, the yeti, the Loch Ness monster, and other cryptids as far-fetched X-Files fodder. But the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine aims to show that when investigations into unknown creatures are done right, they involve real science, and have real scientific value. 

Monster of the Month Series: https://www.atlasobscura.com/experiences/monster-of-the-month-with-colin-dickey

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/international-cryptozoology-museum

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In a collaboration with our friends at Science Diction, we explore the Indian temple complex that gave rise to the word "juggernaut," which means an unstoppable force. But the real story behind it is far more complicated.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/jagannath-temple

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We follow a long set of wooden stairs deep underground to a sea cave with a mysterious and colorful past, and take in a spectacular, hidden view of the Pacific Ocean in La Jolla. 

Learn more about The Cave Store: https://www.cavestore.com/

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/sunny-jim-cave-store

CORRECTION: A previous version of this episode misstated L. Frank Baum's role in the creation of The Wizard of Oz. He was the author, not the illustrator.

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This stunning geological marvel just north of Dahab, Egypt has been called the deadliest dive spot in the world. But is that reputation deserved?

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: 

https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/red-sea-blue-hole

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Jonathan Carey and Michelle Cassidy of the Atlas Places Team aim to answer the question at the heart of Atlas Obscura - “What kind of place merits an Atlas Obscura entry?”

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://https://www.atlasobscura.com/faq

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Jessica Oreck has spent the last 30 years collecting odd and forgotten objects. Now, they’re all beautifully curated and on display in the Office of Collecting and Design in Las Vegas.

Follow the Office of Collecting and Design on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/office.of.collecting/?hl=en

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/office-of-collecting-and-design

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This unique installation in Sydney, Australia combines art and ornithology, commemorating the calls of the city’s lost birds. Plus, bin chickens!

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/forgotten-songs-sound-sculpture

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Visit the taverns of colonial America to take a frothy sip of the hot ale flip and how it helped pave the way for contemporary mixology.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/foods/hot-ale-flip

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Travel to Denver Colorado and meet Steve Berke who helped found the first International Church of Cannabis in 2015.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/international-church-of-cannabis

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Josh Foer, the co-founder of Atlas Obscura, takes us to a remote patch of land in the Arizona desert, where he built (and later rebuilt) a museum in honor of the company’s former CEO, David Plotz.

The Plotz Plot is accessible from Adamana Road, off of I-40 exit 300, at 35.025639, -109.8195. The lock code is 4444.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/plotz-plot

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Join host Dylan Thuras and producer Harry Huggins as they visit the unruly architecture of The House on the Rock - one of the inspirations for Atlas Obscura.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/house-rock

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This amusement park in Singapore holds the Ten Courts of Hell, a series of dioramas that depict the kind of horrible fates awaiting people who behaved badly on Earth.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/haw-par-villa

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Matthew Shifrin, host of the podcast Blind Guy Travels, stops by to tell us about a memorable trip he took to Italy, and a visit with an ancient wolf he’s never forgotten.
Listen to Blind Guy Travels: https://radiotopiapresents.fm/blind-guy-travels

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This Ecuadorian cave has captured the attention of government officials, scientists, professional cavers and is home to a particularly rare creature.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/cueva-de-los-tayos

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Photographer and author Paul Koudonaris brings listeners to this Ethiopian Church and explores ossuaries, jeweled skeletons, and death practices throughout the world.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/yemrehana-krestos-church

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An island filled with hundreds of hanging and decomposing dolls is a window into the sociology of why we pursue experiences that inspire fright, fear, and an attraction to the macabre.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/la-isla-de-las-munecas

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We send reporter Sarah Wyman to northern Sweden to climb a mountain, explore a grim legend, and listen to the devil’s violin.

Listen to Lena Jonsson’s music: https://www.lenajonsson.com/

Listen to Bengt Jonsson play the kohorn: https://youtu.be/vNWnh-k80mM

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Tonopah, Nevada is home to the Clown Motel - an inn on the edge of the desert that’s packed with statues and figurines of Clowns. The eerie and fully-functioning inn is also a labor of love.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/clown-motel

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Two members of the Atlas Obscura team go in search of the true story that may have inspired the literary classic, Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/castle-frankenstein

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The deep woods of Pennsylvania hold a phenomena that has drawn attention from scientists and people around the world, and was almost recently destroyed.

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The Luray Caverns in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia are home to an instrument draws out the secret sounds of millenia-old stone.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/the-great-stalacpipe-organ-luray-virginia

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Travel to Penobscot, Maine, where one farmer maintains the tradition of burning his crop each year to rejuvenate it the next.

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/why-do-people-burn-blueberry-fields

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