Once the largest town in eastern Yuba County now sits abandoned.

Rising out of miles of farmland, these buttes are sometimes called the world's smallest mountain range.

A giant fiberglass Muffler Man found new life as a rodeo guardian.

A raised boardwalk winds through a thicket of stunted, century-old trees no more than nine feet tall.

Celebrating the transformation of trash into objects of beauty.

Experience Larry Spring's self-taught "common sense" laws of physics.

A trash dump made beautiful by nature's power.

A fire lookout atop a glacial pinnacle is reached by climbing three vertiginous flights of stairs.

A mine in the Sierra Nevada that produced nothing but barren quartz.

Despite being a perfectly pleasant place to be, Loyalton can't seem to attract any visitors.

A unique museum where guests can rent and operate a locomotive.

The viewpoint for this attractive, off-the-beaten-path waterfall is reached by a paved, wheelchair-accessible trail.

Downieville's largest Gold Rush structure still standing has one of the longest bars in California.

California's first suspension bridge.

The oldest orange tree in California spawned a generation of citrus farmers.

A train tunnel that was made obsolete by the dam it helped create.

Home of what was the largest hydraulic mine in the world, producing gold and the first diamonds in the U.S.

This massive redwood tree has a hole in the base big enough to drive through.

A grove of "candelabra redwoods" deep in California's Lost Coast.

An optical illusion found amid a logged redwood forest.

One of the last "timber railroads" in the United States was finally abandoned in 1957.

A showcase of engineering might that was also symbolic of westward expansion.

A picturesque example of brute-force engineering conquering nature.

Hidden inside a gift shop that doubles as a museum, this gargantuan yo-yo can only be operated by crane.