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I'm partial to the Madonna Inn of San Luis Obispo, California.  It was built in the late 50s by a successful but eccentric developer who was actually named Alex Madonna. He and his wife maintained the Inn as a labor of love for years, and after it burned to the ground in 1966 they rebuilt it to be even more resplendent than before. It is most famous for its various theme rooms, many of which feature rock walls. The Madonnas had a serious thing for rock walls (more on that later).    If rough-hewn limestone ain't your bag, don't worry. Ever wanted to live inside "It's A Small World"? Thanks to the Madonna Inn, you can.  Or do you prefer Victoriana, with an assload of lumber crashing through the ceiling? They have that too.  The Madonna Inn is also known for its fine dining. This is the Gold Rush Steakhouse. Here it's allegedly decorated for Valentine's Day, but it pretty much looks like this all the time.  The Silver Bar Cocktail Lounge is the perfect illustration of the Madonna Inn's style, if you want to call it that -- weirdly Disney Germanic, like a gigantic cuckoo clock, with lots and lots of pink. There is no rock wall in the Silver Bar, but there are rock-pile pillars between the windows (not shown).  Pink tennis courts! Just cause.  There's also a bakery. Pink is the main idea here too.  The true soul of the Madonna Inn lies in that unique combination of  and rock walls, and the best example of this has to be the famous urinals (noted as a tourist attraction by the SLO Chamber of Commerce). You piss on the rock wall and then a waterfall turns on and removes the evidence.  The Madonna Inn is unironically beloved by many, many southern Californians. It's kinda ramshackle, it's not near anything in particular, it smells real weird and it'll give you hosed-up dreams for weeks after a stay there, but for whatever reason even the most jaded Hollywood trendoids will defend it to the death and they're usually not even trying to be funny. Long may it reign. spite house has a new favorite as of 07:49 on Feb 10, 2015 |
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Feb 10, 2015 07:45
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From Tumblr: quote:Sounds like something somebody with a dinosaur would say I can't find the post about it, but apparently it's from a snake zoo in Arizona or something.
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Feb 10, 2015 11:43
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Bad Angus! Bad!
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You're visiting London, a city with a thousand odd years of rich cultural heritage, relics and buildings and where do you go? Every Londoner knows, those stupid yellow bags are the mark of a complete loving idiot. Honourable mentions also go to Victoria's Secret, Buckingham Palace and Harrods.
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Feb 10, 2015 13:08
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GiantAmazonianOtter posted:You're visiting London, a city with a thousand odd years of rich cultural heritage, relics and buildings and where do you go? Dude if they sell Peanut M&Ms by the bucket full I'm there. Can not get enough.
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Feb 10, 2015 13:13
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Gridlocked posted:Dude if they sell Peanut M&Ms by the bucket full I'm there. They only sell normal and peanut. No exciting flavours like pretzel, peanut butter, crispy, almond, mint, dark. They are no different in terms of what you could buy at a corner shop except maybe a couple of different colours at a massively inflated price.
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Feb 10, 2015 16:07
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One of our local traps, a private reptile zoo, shut down after 142 reptiles were seized by the SPCA. http://globalnews.ca/news/1822266/drumhellers-reptile-world-closing-after-spca-seizure/ They had to euthanize 9 reptiles plus 500 mice in the building because of how ill they were. It's really depressing, because the place was actually really awesome back in the 90s but has been on steady decline since.
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Feb 11, 2015 10:10
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For tourist traps subsisting on fading 1950's nostalgia you can't beat Route 66. I went on a trip along it in 1997. If anybody else has, do you remember some ramshackle old hut up in the mountains? It wasn't entirely a tourist trap, more a hippie stopover run by an old dude filled with cool stuff like Japanese Playboys and underground comics (I was seventeen year old nerd and that is what I remember the most okay?). He offered us roasted hemp seeds. Most of the rest of the trip was endless dumps like the ones posted in this thread with a few gems like Carlsbad Caverns and the Devil's Rope Museum. I wanted to buy a barbwire walking cane but they were like fifty bucks or something even more ridiculous. Sadly, the online store has none of those but does have this, a bundle of 18" sections of barbwire for 165 bucks. Along it in Amarillo you can find the Big Texan "Steak" house!  Yes you can indeed get a free 72oz steak! if you eat it and nearly as much weight in sides in an hour. My friend attempted and failed to complete the meal, and was on the hook for a $50+ crappy steak. He kept at it for at least two days that I can remember. 
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Feb 13, 2015 00:24
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jfrancis posted:I-10 The Thing Arizona. Sorry no pictures at the moment.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Thing_%28roadside_attraction%29 Another "attraction" with miles of signs teasing you on the way up to it. It does have some cool old cars in it but other than that it's the same kitschy crap style establishment that everyone is familiar with. Keep going a little down the road into Willcox AZ and you reach the Rex Allen Museum. Arizona's most famous singing cowboy. I grew up in Willcox and his son would come to our school every year during Rex Allen Days and sing. It was awful but the parade was fun because I could basically just get high all day without fear of being caught.
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Feb 13, 2015 02:48
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spite house posted:I'm partial to the Madonna Inn of San Luis Obispo, California. I mentioned this before on this very thread but I've gone on about a million road-trips from southern California to northern California in my life, I've seen this from the road every time and every time I look upon it with a mixture of curiosity and revulsion at how ostentatious it all is. Good to know it's actually kinda terrible
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Feb 13, 2015 05:30
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I stumbled upon this tourist trap in White Post, VA while doing a job that involved a lot of driving, I had to visit after seeing the signs DINOSAUR LAND It's been around for about 50 years and to be honest it shows. a lot of the dinosaur models are weather beaten. Some even have their foam innards exposed. Doesn't really detract from the experience though, if you want to wander around a park and look at giant dino models built in the 60s this is your place.  This is one of the first things you see coming into the park, a humongous shark that you can enter through its gills and poke your head out through its mouth, as my younger brother demonstrates here  Inside the shark you find this bewildering door, is it the entrance to a fallout shelter? is the park powered by nuclear fisson? Who cares! Lets look at the rest of the park!   Here are the first things you see when entering the park proper. What do they have to do with dinosaurs? Nothing! This will be a recurring theme in the park.   A mother Pterodactyl protects her young or something There are some regular dinosaur stautes to see:       But I bet what you really want is DINO DESTRUCTION   MURDERSAURUS REX     And if dinosaurs aren't your cup of tea(despite going to a place literally called DINOSAURLAND) they've got you covered: How about a Moa?  Or a giant balding sloth?  Or a huge mantid?  Or a giant cobra for some reason?  How about a mammoth with developmental issues?  Or King "loving" Kong, where you can climb up a flight of stairs behind his hand and pose in his palm!  Or whatever the gently caress this is supposed to be  Even the gift shop is all over the place, you can get neat fossils  Fluffy cute animals  And wizard statues. Lots and lots of wizard statues.  If you're ever in the middle of buttfuck nowhere, Virginia, I highly recommend Dinosaur Land
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Feb 13, 2015 10:20
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I like to think that yellow, orange, and green monstrosity is their attempt to make a velociraptor after Jurassic Park's popularity.
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Feb 14, 2015 00:59
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Disneyland.
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Feb 14, 2015 01:13
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Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. It's a town that's defined by being a tourist trap. Miles away from anything else at all, it's a whole town that's just "antique shopping" and go karts and motels to sleep at. It's like a tourist trap whose only draw is being a tourist trap. Seriously, try finding anything that actually justifies a town being there: https://www.google.com/maps/place/P...770c0708e28804e
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Feb 14, 2015 03:20
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ikanreed posted:Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. It's a town that's defined by being a tourist trap. Miles away from anything else at all, it's a whole town that's just "antique shopping" and go karts and motels to sleep at.
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Feb 14, 2015 06:33
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My favorite tourist trap is the town of Holbrook on the road from Sydney to Melbourne round about the NSW border. Thrill as you see a submarine that is miles away from the ocean!
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Feb 14, 2015 16:29
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ikanreed posted:Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. It's a town that's defined by being a tourist trap. Miles away from anything else at all, it's a whole town that's just "antique shopping" and go karts and motels to sleep at. Dollywood, and pretty mountains are part of the draw. Plus it's like 10 minutes from Gatlinburg, so there is dual tourist traps there!
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Feb 14, 2015 16:43
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Possibly Chicken posted:Dollywood, and pretty mountains are part of the draw. Plus it's like 10 minutes from Gatlinburg, so there is dual tourist traps there! I know I've been to Dollywood when I was really little, but I don't remember much about it that doesn't blend together with Silver Dollar City. The two places are basically interchangeable in my mind. Same rustic faux-Old West theme, same types of shops, same rides and roller coasters and both are built in a mountainous, forested region.
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Feb 14, 2015 17:24
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King Vidiot posted:I know I've been to Dollywood when I was really little, but I don't remember much about it that doesn't blend together with Silver Dollar City. The two places are basically interchangeable in my mind. Same rustic faux-Old West theme, same types of shops, same rides and roller coasters and both are built in a mountainous, forested region. Dollywood has changed a lot in the last 10 years or so, Still has the same mountain theme and stuff, but a lot more rides and coasters. Funnily enough Dollywood used to be a Silver Dollar City until Dolly Parton bought it. So that explains a lot.
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Feb 14, 2015 17:30
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Vancouver is known for being ultra modern with glass towers everywhere, and yet its biggest tourist trap is this old timey steam clock in the old timey neighbourhood of Gastown. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JRorkXGLPCw Pretty cool right? The only problem is nothing is old on the Canadian west coast - the clock was built in the late 1970s, at the same time that cobblestone and old timey street lights were introduced to the area. It's all fake. It is the oldest area of Vancouver, but its original appearance was more wild west than Victorian London:  But I guess American/Albertan towns had milked that theme to death in this part of the world.
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Feb 14, 2015 21:27
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IndustrialApe posted:For some reason Denmark has dozens of these things, the one that sticks out in my mind is Billund Terrarium (why go there when Legoland is around the corner? I shall never know!) which was an old shed with some cold reptiles and some mystery place that i still have dreams about because it was that weird and desolated. Billund Terrarium went bankerupt in April 2002.
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Feb 20, 2015 22:17
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Back in the 1890s, Europe's top tourist attraction was the newly opened Eiffel Tower. A group of London businessmen wanted a piece of that action, so they decided to build their own. In the Northern beach resort of Blackpool, for some reason.  Ah, beautiful Blackpool. Maybe it was less of a shithole back in Victorian times. The tower has a viewing gallery at the top with a glass floor, so you can contemplate plummeting to your death. The base contains a massive ballroom used for concerts. It looks like this:  Classy. And because this is a family attraction in England, there is also a pub. From wikipedia: Wikipedia posted:The Tower Lounge Bar is a large pub with a capacity of 1,700, but staff usually limit occupancy to 1,400 for a more relaxed atmosphere. So that's Blackpool Tower. It's a tacky, overpriced knock-off full of screaming children, doddery pensioners and angry drunks. It's great. You should go. 
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Feb 21, 2015 00:05
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When me and my sister went on a vacation to Natural Bridge in Virginia a few years back, we kept driving by a sign in the middle of nowhere that simply read "FOAMHENGE." We thought we would check it out out of pure curiosity. Turns out, its exactly what it sounds like. It even has a wizard!    Worth reading:  Also worth reading:  Its clear the people who made this had a lot of fun doing so.
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Feb 21, 2015 01:13
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 Just got back from this hellhole on Monday. Bourbon St during Mardi Gras was the craziest, most disgusting and terrifying place I've been, and I've been to some bad places. There are no rules. People say that police will arrest you if you pee or show your dick or fight, but I saw all of that go consequence free. Jesus that place was rank, I must have washed my clothes 100 times since I returned. I know I know I know New Orleans is a great place outside of Bourbon blah blah and we saw great parts of it but gently caress me I'm staying faaaaar away from the Sodom and Gomorrah that is Bourbon st.
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Feb 21, 2015 03:46
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Jellymouth posted:Its clear the people who made this had a lot of fun doing so. Especially the mexicans
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Feb 21, 2015 05:47
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Reverse Centaur posted:Vancouver is known for being ultra modern with glass towers everywhere, and yet its biggest tourist trap is this old timey steam clock in the old timey neighbourhood of Gastown. This is the correct way to do steampunk. Functioning steam powered contraptions instead of glued on gears and brassed nerf guns.
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Feb 21, 2015 09:20
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 My favourite tourist trap died last year  We'll miss you, Dinky the Singing Dingo of Stuart Wells Roadhouse, in the middle of fucken nowhere, Australia.Seeing how Dinky's gone, the new winner of "Favourite Tourist Trap" is Old Tailem Town.    A lovely old town you can explore, not as edgy as urbex stuff, but still, kinda cool. Here's the google maps view. The actual town nearby also has one of the best drat bakeries on the planet. Speaking of which, in Australia a really good bakery counts as a tourist trap. I'm not joking. Least Favourite Tourist Trap is this loving abomination:   I didn't believe in unfun, until I discovered Wycliffe Wells. If you have contempt for tourist traps it's because of these types of places. When I was a kid on a road trip with my bro and my mum we managed to stumble across the southern hemisphere's largest ball clock whilst travelling between nowhere and nowhere (Tungkillo and Mannum), owned and operated by a hilarious dirty old man. Basically, one of these, but with basketballs. It worked, too! Can't find a fucken thing about it online. Apologies for not featuring the usual Aussie Tourist Traps
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Feb 21, 2015 15:51
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White King, The World's Largest Dead Polar Bear in Elko, Nevada.  And there are multiple, shady little whore houses only one block away! 
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Feb 21, 2015 19:16
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Gropiemon posted:
This is what I came here to post. It's a little museum of "oddities" with The Thing itself being a mummy. It has signs for hundreds of miles in every direction.
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Feb 21, 2015 23:24
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This thing, the "bunyip" at Murray Bridge in South Australia, is a rusty mechanical monster that emerges from a pool of seriously stagnant water and makes growling noises when you press a button. It tends to terrify children, partly because it hasn't aged well. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqCumqMWJok
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Feb 22, 2015 12:40
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Vladimir Poutine posted:This thing, the "bunyip" at Murray Bridge in South Australia, is a rusty mechanical monster that emerges from a pool of seriously stagnant water and makes growling noises when you press a button. It tends to terrify children, partly because it hasn't aged well. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqCumqMWJok You think that cartoony piece of poo poo terrifies children? Guess you never got to see the original bunyip which wasn't so cartooney and more "this is deranged evil that dad paid 20c to see/hear" to the mind of a 5 year old:  I remember there were two of them when I first saw it. Pretty sure I wet the bed the night after seeing those loving things back in 1988 or so.
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Feb 22, 2015 14:20
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Hannibal Smith posted:I visited that place as a kid on the way to Mt Rushmore. The thing that sticks out the most in my mind is how angry everyone working there was. Nah, the one in South Dakota is still running, Tourist traps in the Black Hills never, ever close.
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Feb 23, 2015 04:19
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Vladimir Poutine posted:This thing, the "bunyip" at Murray Bridge in South Australia, is a rusty mechanical monster that emerges from a pool of seriously stagnant water and makes growling noises when you press a button. It tends to terrify children, partly because it hasn't aged well. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqCumqMWJok Well, good thing I wasn't sleepy tonight.
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Feb 23, 2015 07:36
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Sierra Nevadan posted:White King, The World's Largest Dead Polar Bear in Elko, Nevada. How could I miss this 
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Mar 3, 2015 16:35
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  The  Full of  all with a picture of the billboard that say "Here it is."  Also thongs that say "Here it is." That's about all there is to it.  Also the guy that runs it lives in a room behind the cash register.
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Mar 3, 2015 21:04
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Hannibal Smith posted:I visited that place as a kid on the way to Mt Rushmore. The thing that sticks out the most in my mind is how angry everyone working there was. Speaking of which, Mount Rushmore. And that incredibly tacky Crazy Horse mountain nearby.
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Mar 4, 2015 01:12
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HenryJLittlefinger posted:
Pretty sure I bought a bull skull here. Tacky as gently caress but again 17 year old nerd = skulls are awesome. I think my parents still have it at their house.
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Mar 4, 2015 03:29
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Some photos from my BIG AMERICAN VACATION OF 2011  , a once in a lifetime chance to see such cultural and historical landmarks as:The Mr D'z Route 66 Diner of Kingman, AZ:  Chloride, AZ's famous rusting roadside garbage:    ... quaint little post office:  ... quaint little (closed down) bank:  ... art:     ... and whatever this thing is:  Alamo, NV's luxury western-themed bed and breakfast hotel, A Cowboy's Dream:  Nevada's Extraterrestrial Highway:  ... home to the Black Mailbox:  ... and Rachel, NV's Little A'Le'Inn:   As a European living in a 2400 year old city, this sign from Virginia, NV never fails to make me smile:  Wendover Will:  Obligatory Four Corners shot:  (note the Las Vegas slot-machine socks) Route 66 signage in Albuquerque, NM:  Steve Irwin shrine in The Rattlesnake Museum, Albuquerque, NM:  Amarillo, TX's world famous Big Legs:  ... and Cadillac Ranch:  Liberal, KS's International Pancake Day Hall Of Fame:    ... and Wizard of Oz stuff:     Finally, Flagler, CO's I-70 Diner:  
hackbunny has a new favorite as of 14:01 on Mar 4, 2015 |
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Mar 4, 2015 13:57
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Holy smokes! You have not merely experienced America, you have experienced true Americana.
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Mar 4, 2015 16:15
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Wait, why is a random girl dressed as Dorothy running backwards into traffic?
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Mar 4, 2015 16:36
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Ofaloaf posted:Holy smokes! You have not merely experienced America, you have experienced true Americana. I took a long detour on the way to the Burning Man festival, and an even longer detour on the way out (of course for the purposes of this thread I omitted Las Vegas, the Hoover Dam, Arches National Park, Monument Valley...). Two weeks aren't a lot for Burning Man plus 3500 mile (  ) road trip, so I was pretty much limited to trashy roadside attractions/food/accommodation and the odd natural parkKing Vidiot posted:Wait, why is a random girl dressed as Dorothy running backwards into traffic? She's going to lower the flag from the pole, of course  Liberal, KS is an entirely unremarkable town, smack in the middle of the panhandle area and devoid of anything of interest to tourists. So they bootstrapped themselves into a tourist trap with the Pancake Day and by claiming to be Dorothy's hometown (a claim nobody cared to contest). They have a Wizard of Oz museum, complete with live Dorothy. I came too late to visit the museum (wtf americans, do you call 4 PM a closing time. and why are tourist offices closed on sundays ffs), but I got to witness Dorothy bringing down and folding the flag. I then went to grab something to eat, the punchline being that there is not a single pancake house in the American Capital of the Pancake (she isn't moonwalking, it's the wind) hackbunny has a new favorite as of 17:01 on Mar 4, 2015 |
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Mar 4, 2015 16:52
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