Hello, I'm new here, so please stop me if someone has mentioned it before, but it looks like no one has brought up that wacky little place in amongst the trees in Santa Cruz. Any opinions? How much of it is a carefully constructed optical illusion by the owners and how much is weird science? Any takers? I tell you, I went there and couldn't figure it out, so it remains... a mystery!
As an aside, while trawling around the internet, I discovered something interesting. A group from the east coast called "The Midnight Society". They meet and discuss local myths/legends and bizzare places and happenings around their area ( I think they are in New Jersey). For the curious, here is the url:
www.midnightsociety.com/
I love checking up on these guys, though I am not sure how often they update their site. However, it has interested me in the possibility of contacting them and opening a california chapter, sometime in the near future. Any comments?
As an aside, while trawling around the internet, I discovered something interesting. A group from the east coast called "The Midnight Society". They meet and discuss local myths/legends and bizzare places and happenings around their area ( I think they are in New Jersey). For the curious, here is the url:
www.midnightsociety.com/
I love checking up on these guys, though I am not sure how often they update their site. However, it has interested me in the possibility of contacting them and opening a california chapter, sometime in the near future. Any comments?
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Sat, January 22, 2005 - 10:54 AMHe, he. I am ridiculous. I Just realized that we have pictures of the mystery spot in the photo album. I swear I shall wear my glasses from now on. -
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Sat, January 22, 2005 - 1:18 PMI've never been there, but from what I can gather it's just like a little place they used to have at Knott's Berry Farm in Buena Park when I was a kid. Balls rolled uphill, you couldn't stand up straight, etc., etc. I wonder if it's still there- does anyone know? I bet it's not- it wasn't exactly a thrill ride.
Here's a website that tells a bit about how the Mystery Spot is constructed:
www.berkeley.edu/news/berk.../spot.html -
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Sun, January 23, 2005 - 10:35 PMDoesn't every state have a "mystery spot"? Hardly a real roadside attraction like the ones I love. -
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Mon, January 24, 2005 - 1:54 AMRe: "Hardly a real roadside attraction like the ones I love."
Dear Beth,
Hmm. Sorry, I didn't realize that there were higher echelons of roadside attractions here. The Santa Cruz Mystery Spot was a place that I personally enjoyed, and lived quite close to, for a time. Since I am new to this group, why don't you give me some suggesstions of some of the "real" road side attractions that you love so that I may be enlightened? -
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Mon, January 24, 2005 - 3:58 AMHow are mystery spots not roadside attractions? They're tatty and somehow wonderful, they've been around forever, they're the result of some entrepeneur trying to make a buck by tarting up a natural feature for the amusement of bored tourists.
Besides which, part of the charm of the classic roadside attraction is its utter fakery: bizarrely out of scale statues, petting zoos with animals you wouldn't particularly want to touch, colossal piles of absolutely nothing....
"Real roadside attraction" seems a bit oxymoronic to me.
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Mon, January 24, 2005 - 9:39 AMI love the roadside attractions you can find up north along the avenue of the giants. I love the little things that you used to be able to find when I was a child that are vanishing in front of my very eyes. We used to go to this tiny town east of our tiny town in Texas called Snook. If you blinked, you missed Snook.
Anyway, they had the old signs on the road for "The cat that looks like a rabbit" and we used to go to the country store everytime we were there to look at the cat that looked like a rabbit.
I know in this world of political correctness, going to see this kinda thing would be considered a huge no-no, but hey it was the 70's and we are talking Texas country.
I didn't mean to make you feel bad about your posting. I just noticed that a fair amount of states have "mystery spots" somewhere in their state.
A while ago, someone told me about this great website, roadsideamerica.com. They have a great database of all the roadside attractions in the U.S. People submit them to the site, and keep the site editors up to date about their roadside attractions.
I thought this one was cool: www.roadsideamerica.com/attrac...ch.html
They also have a page about the Mystery Spot in Santa Cruz and one in Oregon: www.roadsideamerica.com/set/SC...ts.html
Cheers!
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Mon, January 24, 2005 - 11:36 AMHey, weeks go by and no one posts ANYTHING to this tribe- I for one am happy to see some discussion of the Mystery Spot, or Spots, as the case may be. Thanks for bringing it up, Jackie. Just because something is faked and borderline sleazy does not mean it's not a bona fide Roadside Attraction! -
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Mon, January 24, 2005 - 2:36 PMI personally think the sleaziness is part of the fun. Thanks for the websites, Beth. -
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Tue, January 25, 2005 - 3:35 PMAny roadside attraction that is worth stopping for has to have an element of hucksterism to it. Why would you want to stop and look at the world's largest ball of twine if it didn't have that element in it right?
I love that website, and I'm glad I could share it with you :)
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Tue, January 25, 2005 - 3:33 PMLighten up MJ! -
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Tue, January 25, 2005 - 6:00 PMLighten up? No Way! Look at what a long discussion we're getting out of this. It's great! If we keep it up it will soon be the WORLD'S LONGEST, totally appropriate for this tribe! -
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Tue, January 25, 2005 - 7:16 PMOoh, let's keep it coming then. ;)
So, many people associate roadside attractions directly with americana, but has anybody been to any roadside attractions in other countries? Do tell. Maybe I should post this as a separate thread, but what the hey- let's make this last. -
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This is the maximum depth. Additional responses will not be threaded.
Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Tue, January 25, 2005 - 7:53 PMI can't think of any other places I've been outside of america that have a handle on the roadside attraction. Not that I've been to lots of places outside of america.
Do the Dionne quintuplets count as a roadside attraction? They made Quebec quite a few $$$ in the depression. -
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Tue, January 25, 2005 - 11:56 PMI say anything goes- the quints count!
I have not been outside the country much myself, but a couple of years ago a friend visited Czechoslovakia. He sent me a postcard of a cathedral outside of Prague that had a giant chandelier made up entirely of human bones and skulls!!! I think it was a memorial to plague victims- something like that. -
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Wed, January 26, 2005 - 4:20 AMThe bone cathedral is Kutna Hora. I could see it fitting into the category of weird destination for tourists, I personally wouldn't count it as a roadside attraction, simply because it wasn't built for tourists, or with the intention of making money out of its own cheesy spectacularity.
In a sense, the classic roadside attraction is uniquely American, because they first began popping up in the 1920s, as reasons for people to drive on the spiffy new interstate highways they were just starting to build then. And at that time, over 90% of the world's automobile traffic was in the US.
The closest thing I can think of that matches an American roadside attraction in spirit is the Moving Statue at Knock, in Ireland. It's intensely tacky, its inexplicably popular, and although it didn't start out that way, it came to exist as a spectacle for the point of being a spectacle. At one point during the '80s, busloads and busloads of little old ladies were making a pilgrimage to this godforsaken nowhere little village in the middle of Nowhere, Ireland, to see a plaster statue of the Virgin Mary that was supposed to have wiggled once. -
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Wed, January 26, 2005 - 8:42 PMWell... that's probably true- it has to be an attraction, and you have to be able to drive up to it in a car. See the U.S.A. in your Chevrolet, Route 66, etc. Roadside Attractions.
Are you sure about the Moving Statue? I'm trying to find a reference to it on the internet. I can find some apparitions at Knock, and a statue recently installed at the shrine in their honor, but the only reference I can find to a moving statue is at a place called Ballinspiddle. But, so far as making money is concerned... you can sign up to go on a two week pilgrimage that hits both holy places for only $1898.00!!
www.101foundation.com/pilgrim...2003.htm
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Thu, January 27, 2005 - 5:27 AMThanks for looking, MJ!
Ballinspiddle is the one I'm thinking of. (It's been awhile. I was there 20 years ago), where the statue started moving. The whole thing was all the more hiliarious because the place name is so silly.
Knock is another Mary shrine where some other statue phenomenon was supposed to have happened (knocking? I dunno). The bus tours used to go to both places. And I see they still do, for one low, low price!!!!
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Fri, March 4, 2005 - 2:38 PMI used to live in Santa Cruz, and would take family and friends there.
It is just fun.
I also used to live in Arcata, so I know exactly what you were talking about with the Avenue of the Giants- really the whole of 101 is just a haven of road side goodies north of Ukiah. My personal fav is "carvin' for Jesus." I haven't done more than pause there, but wow. Cheesy, with just a bit of scary.
Anyway, Mystery Spot definitely insights conversation and what can be better to drag loved ones to than a cheesy stop that is cheap, fun and makes everyone talk to each other?
Thanks for the posts. -
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Wed, August 10, 2005 - 12:15 AMD00d..."your camera will verify numerous variations you see, yet are inclined to disbelieve..."
I cann't count the number of Mystery Spot brochures I've sprinkled about: on BART cars, inside purses for sale at the Grand Canyon gift shop...I once walked up to the window at the Mystery Spot in Santa Cruz and told them I like to leave their brochures around and could they possibly spare a few? The woman's eyes widened as she handed me a stack of about a hundred.
I hadn't even realized I was providing free publicity, I just liked the cheese factor.
As a former RA at UC Santa Cruz, the Mystery Spot makes for the best dorm trip ever, and is, dare I say, a fine Fine FINE roadside attraction. The place was in a Ripley's comic at one point, fergoshsakes.
I say this having recently visted the Twine Ball in Darwin, Minnesota.
The Mystery Spot is totally legit. -
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Re: Santa Cruz Mystery Spot? +some Stuff of Interest.
Fri, September 2, 2005 - 1:41 AMYay for the Mystery Spot! Gotta love it.
Living in Britain, I have discovered that there are some things that could be considered roadside attractions, usually based around a spectacular natural feature. They always have to cheese it up to get families to stop. There is Wookey Hole that features not only caves, but a "Dinosaur Valley"! A little disapointed at the lack of Wookiees.
Really.
www.wookey.co.uk/
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