Ominous places in the world, they exist

You can see many interesting and beautiful sights of Europe and the world. But there are others that are not very pleasant to watch.

I warn you, it's not very pleasant to watch. These places are not horror movie backdrops. They exist in the world and will amaze you.

But they do exist, and we must not pass them by without seeing them.

Capuchin Catacombs, Palermo, Italy

Of all the catacombs in the world, from Salzburg to Paris, none are quite as creepy as Sicily’s Catacombe dei Cappucini (Capuchin Catacombs). The macabre space was created back in the late 16th century when the cemetery at the Capuchin monastery became overrun. Religious men were originally intended to be the exclusive residents, but once word got out about the natural mummification processes occurring in the space, it soon became a status symbol for local citizens to earn a final resting spot there (in their best clothing, of course). 

As a result, the underground tombs now contain around 8,000 bodies divided into separate corridors, including one for religious figures, one for professional men, one for children, and even one for virgins. The corpses are displayed like a museum exhibit, dressed to the nines and arranged in grotesquely lifelike posts. Sound like fun?

 Hanging Coffins, Sagada, Philippines

If you want to visit the dead in Sagada, you'll have to look up—rather than six feet under. The people of this region are known for burying their dead in coffins attached to the sides of cliffs, like an aerial cross-section of your average cemetery. The tradition goes back thousands of years: carve out your own coffin, die, and get hoisted up next to your ancestors. Many of the cliffside coffins are hundreds of years old and all look completely different, as they were specially made by the person who now rests inside of them.

 Snake Island, São Paulo, Brazil

Located about 90 miles off the coast of São Paulo, Ilha de Queimada Grande (also known as Snake Island) is one of the most dangerous islands in the entire world. The site earned its moniker due to its insanely high density of golden lancehead vipers; some studies report an average of one to five snakes per square meter. When sea levels rose some 11,000 years ago and separated Snake Island from mainland Brazil, the newly isolated snakes became hyper evolved—and hyper terrifying—to adapt to their changing environment. Without any ground-level prey on the island, the snakes learned to hunt in the treetops and strike at birds from the air. 

And because they couldn’t track down the birds and wait for the poison to kick in, their venom adapted to become five times stronger than that of their mainland counterparts—capable of killing their prey instantly, as well as melting human flesh. Because of their potency, the Brazilian government bans the public from ever setting foot on the island (as if you would want to).

Sedlec Ossuary, Kutná Hora, Czech Republic

The incredible Sedlec Ossuary is a small chapel located beneath the Cemetery Church of All Saints, known worldwide for its macabre decor. Back in the early 1300s, an abbot of the Sedlec Monastery brought back holy soil from Jerusalem and scattered it across the church’s cemetery, and suddenly everyone wanted to be buried in that sacred ground. But overpopulation kicked in and the old bodies had to be dug up to make room for fresh corpses. In true “waste not, want not” fashion, the abbots decided to put the exhumed bones to good use. A local Czech woodcarver named František Rint was given the daunting task of arranging the collection of more than 40,000 human remains in a visually impressive way—and he clearly delivered. 

The bony structures include four candelabras, a family crest, and several streamers of bones cascading down from the ceiling. The most stunning display is probably the church’s massive chandelier, which contains almost every bone found in the human body (plus some creepy cherubs for good measure).

Aokigahara Forest, Yamanashi Prefecture, Japan

This seemingly serene forest at the bottom of Mount Fuji has an extremely tormented history. Colloquially known as “Suicide Forest,” Aokigahara is the world’s second-most popular site for suicides (after the Golden Gate Bridge)—in 2010 alone, 247 people attempted to take their own lives here, and 54 of them were successful. Some blame this phenomena on the forest’s association with demons in Japanese mythology. Others point towards the density of the trees, which muffles sound and makes it extremely easy to get lost. Many hikers even mark their path with tape or string to make it easier to find their way back out again. This, combined with the sprinkling of clothing and letters throughout the labyrinthine woods, gives Aokigahara a terrifying Blair-Witch–meets–Palace-of-Knossos vibe that will chill you to your bones.

Veijo Rönkkönen Sculpture Garden, Parikkala, Finland

Veijo Rönkkönen was one of the most famous contemporary folk artists in Finland during his lifetime, but he was also a recluse, refusing to showcase his pieces in public spaces. Instead, he built his collection of nearly 500 concrete figures in his backyard, forming his own personal sculpture garden in the process. The biggest display on the grounds is a group of around 200 statues arranged in a variety of yoga poses. While there’s something obviously unsettling about the sculptures (supposedly all self-portraits), they are nowhere close to being the most sinister items in the garden: Rönkkönen’s collection features an array of creepy individual statues, from a nun lurking behind bushes to a cloaked man with long, outstretched arms. 

The malevolent grins (accessorized with real human teeth) and black, sunken eyes of these figures are exactly what the doctor ordered...provided you have a desire to never sleep peacefully again.

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