America's Stonehenge
Salem, New Hampshire
What do you value most in your Stonehenge? Appearances? Mysterious powers? If it's the latter, then the enigmatic "America's Stonehenge" is your henge of choice. It doesn't look anything like its namesake; in fact, it looks like a New Hampshire hillside of ragged oak trees and tumbled-down rocks. But it's America's only Stonehenge with an "oracle chamber," a "sacrificial stone," and other ominously-named features.
America's Stonehenge has been run by the Stone family since it opened as "Mystery Hill Caves" in 1958. It covers 105 rugged acres, and it's a half-mile walk from the gift shop to the top of the hill, past a series of half-buried cairns, walls, chambers, and huts. It claims to be the oldest megalithic site in America, but that boast has been disputed, and the meaning of the place is open to anyone's interpretation. Was it built by ancient Greeks or Phoenicians? By wayward Irish monks, centuries before Columbus? Or by a New England farmer who just wanted a quiet spot to make soap and store roots?
The curious are encouraged to ponder the mysteries year 'round, and in the winter the attraction thoughtfully rents snowshoes to its visitors.