15 Bizarre American Towns That Feel Like Postcards From Another Planet

The road doesn’t always lead where you expect. Sometimes, it ends in a town where old signs flicker and stories settle into the dust. These aren’t tourist spots. They’re places still writing themselves. This article drifts through 15 American towns that feel like they belong somewhere entirely different.

Slab City, California

With its no rules, no rent, nor even plumbing, Slab City isn’t your average town. This off-grid camp in the Sonoran Desert attracts artists and drifters. With Salvation Mountain splashed in rainbow paint and trailers patched with scraps, it feels like a post-apocalyptic Burning Man that never ended.

Rachel, Nevada

Invisible jets streak overhead, and locals know better than to ask questions. Rachel, with a population of around 60, survives on alien tourism thanks to its eerie proximity to Area 51. Radiation detectors sometimes ping here without warning. Coincidence or experimental field? Either way, this remote town refuses to give you a straight answer.

Chloride, Arizona

In Chloride, the past is still kicking, just not in the way you’d expect. Mining relics share space with painted cliffs and theatrical gunfights that happen whether anyone’s watching or not. It’s part ghost town, part desert stage, and all strange charm.

Terlingua, Texas

On maps, Terlingua barely registers. In person, it’s an unreal blend of post-apocalyptic charm and off-grid soul. Ruined adobe homes scatter around the old mine, and a bar shares space with a ghost tour. Each year, a chili contest draws thousands to this dry nowhere that refuses to be forgotten.

Goldfield, Nevada

Goldfield once had 20,000 residents and its own hotel rivaling Vegas glitz. Now, it’s barely breathing. Graffiti-coated cars rise like monuments in the International Car Forest while empty saloons whisper of gunfights and boomtown dreams. It’s like an abandoned art.

Bombay Beach, California

Time forgot Bombay Beach. Once a glamorous vacation stop on the Salton Sea, its shoreline turned toxic as the lake evaporated. Rusted trailers lean in wind-carved silence, and a scattered crew of artists keep surreal installations alive on salt-encrusted sand. 

Arcosanti, Arizona

Imagine if a spaceship crash-landed in Arizona and decided to throw a peace rally. That’s Arcosanti. Built by dreamers with concrete molds and idealism, it’s half sci-fi set, half hippie hangout. People actually live there—under domes, by solar ovens, or near art workshops that hum louder than the cicadas.

Goffs, California

Founded in 1883, Goffs once pulsed with railway life and wartime training camps. Now, the desert has reclaimed nearly all but a restored schoolhouse, holding tight to regional artifacts. Its preservation isn’t accidental but an effort to archive a sliver of California’s railroad and mining history where silence now reigns.

Gerlach, Nevada

Gerlach exists in a state of duality. With a population under 150, it functions as a logistical node for remote events like Burning Man, held in the adjacent Black Rock Desert. During the rest of the year, its infrastructure barely hums. This cyclical identity gives it a bizarre economic pulse.

Keeler, California

Would you stay in a town when the reason for its existence dried up decades ago? Keeler does. The lake dried up, and with it went the mining and saltworks that once gave the town purpose. Yet a few houses remain, clinging to dust and memory.

Cisco, Utah

Is it still a town if no one lives there, but you can buy property on Instagram? Cisco once had oil and even bars. Today, one artist, Eileen Muza, lives amid the ruins, restoring its abandoned buildings and turning the ghost town into an off-grid artist residency called Home of the Brave. 

Tortilla Flat, Arizona

Six people live here, surrounded by cliffs that seem drawn from a cartoon chase scene. Tortilla Flat clings to a dirt road and serves gelato in a saloon with saddle stools, also hanging thousands of signed dollar bills like wallpaper. Even the Superstition Mountains can’t explain why it still buzzes.

Darwin, California

Once a mining town, Darwin now feels like an unfinished story. With no school, no store, no gas, it shouldn’t function—but it does. A few dozen people remain, drawn by silence or stubbornness. Rattlesnakes outnumber humans, yet somehow, the town keeps breathing under all that dust.

Hanksville, Utah

Near Hanksville, Utah, the terrain mimics Martian soil so closely that NASA tests its rovers there. Harsh UV light, sparse vegetation, and jagged rock formations resemble conditions on Mars. A gas station carved into stone stands alone. Few linger—but NASA’s machines stay, rehearsing future missions across red, rocky terrain.

Two Guns, Arizona

Located on the Colorado Plateau, Two Guns sits above layers of volcanic basalt and sandstone. The site once supported roadside commerce, including a trading post and zoo. The infamous “Apache Death Cave” was a tourist fabrication, yet its enduring ruins offer a case study in constructed myth and decay.