Author: Ms. R.

Opened in 1962 and located on the outskirts of town, the open-air Lightning Ridge Artesian Baths are supplied with naturally-heated thermal bore water from the artesian basin. The water temperature is maintained at approximately 41.5 degrees Celsius (106 degrees Fahrenheit) and reputedly contains therapeutic qualities. Perfect at the end of a long day exploring the area, fossicking for opals. Millions of years ago, the area around Lightning Ridge was the bottom of a shallow inland sea. Fossils dating back as……

Read More

Take a journey on the Cardinal Amtrak train to visit this station hidden in the Appalachian Mountains. The Prince, West Virginia station was constructed as a C&O rail station in 1880. It quickly became a freight and passenger hub, which required expansions to the original wooden depot. In 1917, the station was severely damaged by a fire.  As the 1940s approached, the C&O president built the current red brick building. It was praised for its sleek, modern features and……

Read More

This story was originally published on The Conversation and appears here under a Creative Commons license. Intensive livestock farming is a huge global industry that serves up millions of tons of beef, pork, and poultry every year. When I asked one producer recently to name something his industry thinks about that consumers don’t, he replied, “Beaks and butts.” This was his shorthand for animal parts that consumers—especially in wealthy nations—don’t choose to eat. On Thanksgiving, turkeys will adorn close……

Read More

Beer and Oktoberfest go hand in hand in Munich, both being a source of great pride for Bavarians. While visiting Oktoberfest is certainly one-way visitors can introduce themselves to Munich culture, there is also a calmer way that is open year-round. The Beer and Oktoberfest Museum.  The museum is in fact two small separate museums, one that showcases beer and its history in Bavaria—displaying brewing methods, antique mass’, bottles, and stories about the beer barons of yore. The second……

Read More

On an island in the middle of the French river of Edre is a Japanese garden that looks like it was transplanted from the city of Kyoto.  The area where the island of Versailles now stands was originally a riverine marshland inhabited mostly by fish, frogs, waterfowl, and otters. However, in 1831 the river was cleared for the construction of a canal that would connect the city of Nantes with Brest. A byproduct of the canal construction was the……

Read More

Listen and subscribe on Stitcher, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and all major podcast apps. In this episode of The Atlas Obscura Podcast, we visit a unique installation in Sydney, Australia, that combines art and ornithology to commemorate the calls of the city’s lost birds. Plus, bin chickens! Our podcast is an audio guide to the world’s wondrous, awe-inspiring, strange places. In under 15 minutes, we’ll take you to an incredible site, and along the way you’ll meet some fascinating people……

Read More

Val di Scalve is peppered with tiny mountain villages, and Dezzo di Scalve is one of the smallest. Divided by the River Dezzo, half of the village falls under the Colere commonality, and the other half under Azzone, which makes Dezzo di Scalve an administrative anomaly.  On each side of the village is a row of attached houses as is common in the area. However, the row on the eastern side stands out, as one of the houses is……

Read More

Michael Twitty, the James Beard Award–winning culinary historian, estimates he has brewed his grandmother’s persimmon beer about a dozen times. Made by fermenting Diospyros virginiana, the diminutive North American persimmon, with sugar, honey, and yeast, persimmon beer is more akin to fruit wine or liqueur than anything brewed with barley, malt, and hops. Twitty continues to make his family recipe for its sweet-tart flavor and striking amber hue imbued by red pine straw. More than anything, though, he continues……

Read More

Ado-Awaye is an ancient site with no shortage of timeless wonder. Founded in 1500, the neighboring mountain communities Ado and Awaye were amalgamated over centuries into the single Ado-Awaye, once ruled over by the King of Ado, a disgraced crown prince from the larger Oyo kingdom. Hiking the Ado Awaye mountain takes roughly three hours depending on speed. Most of the terrain shifts between rock and forest, beginning with rough steps carved into the mountain. En route to the……

Read More

In the middle of the main square in Béthune stands a 47-meter (154-foot) belfry that was built from wood in 1346, then rebuilt from sandstone in 1388. The monumental structure survived two world wars, even though the town around it was nearly destroyed. You can hear three different melodies played on its carillon at every hour, half-hour, and quarter-hour during the day. One is a traditional Northern French song, “Le Petit Quinquin” (“My Little Darling”), another is “Il Court,……

Read More

Deep among the Sitka spruce and Scots pine of Dalby Forest on the southern slopes of England’s North York Moors National Park is an enormous square clearing. Muddy underfoot, with a handful of vehicles and piles of stone scattered around the perimeter, it’s unmistakably a building site, but the four concentric walls taking shape at its center make it clear that this is no ordinary undertaking. For a start, the curved structures stand over 6 feet tall yet contain……

Read More