I dont know if anyone posted this..and I dont believe its a spoiler...but I found the website for the house on the rock......

http://www.thehouseontherock.com/index.htm

love it, thanks....::goes about making vacation plans::

How cool. I'd love to go there and see it..but seeing that I live on the other side of the planet...

I wonder if there's realy an antique carousel there

yes, there is - if you look around the site there's a photo of it

There's photos of every section mentioned in the book. I truelly have to go, and take AG with me to read that passage as I walk through the halls.

Ooh, I love replying to months-old posts. Makes me feel special.

Thanks for the site...will check it out. I went to that place when I was a wee little girl, I remember being delighted when I learned it was featured in the book...heh heh...so many of the weird little things that will forever buzz about in my head came from that place.

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"And ever has it been that love knows not its own depth until the hour of separation." -Kahil Gibran

Gaiman gives a pretty good description of the rooms they walk through. Shadow notes that it is not the regular path for tourists. I can't help but wonder if the path creates a rune or word that means something outside of the book.

Just a thought.

I visited the House on the Rock a few weeks ago, and it is almost exactly like Gaiman described it, if not stranger!

I knew I wanted to go and I convinced my retired father to go along with me while we were visiting my sister (the House is an hour from her house). I described American Gods, and explained why I *needed* to see this place for myself. He came along for the ride, but by the time we had taken the tour I think it may have made a bigger impression on him than me.

I tried to see as many of the things in the book as possible. I went into the Infinity Room and looked 150 feet down into the forest below. I got a few dollars worth of House on the Rock tokens to use in the music machines, clockwork toys, and to have my fortune told. I sat in the pizzeria cafe, near the ice cream shop. I saw the Tile Car and the Burma-Shave signs. I sat in front of the Mikado machine and listened to the music. I was amazed by the World's Largest Carousel (but couldn't ride it, of course). I walked through the monster's mouth leaving the Carousel, into the massive room with blood-red walls and filled with pipe organs, brewing vats, cannons, and who knows what else.

We didn't see the Santa Claus collection, because it was only October. They close for a week or two around the beginning of November to set that stuff up.

Anyhoo, I thought it was a strangely fascinating place. A cathedral of the bizarre. We both agreed that we wouldn't want to be a night watchman in that place...just a little too creepy.

One suggestion, if you ever do visit: try to go during the week. I guess it can get a little crowded on weekends, and it's much better to have the place to yourself like we did on a Monday.

I actually had been meaning to read this book for a long time but I didn't grab it till I read that there was mention of House on the Rock.

I went to House on the Rock my sophomore year of college with my boyfriend on a camping trip to salvage our relationship - ha ha ha! The description of it is excellent - but there's a lot left out - like how Streets of Yesterday smell like old lady bathroom - or how the "angels" in the giant carosel room are held together with duct tape and have frosted lipstick and paper maché nipples peeking out of their Sears-brand flat-sheet togas. Don't even get me started on the CIRCUS exhibit. If you think clowns are scary now wait till you're faced with a 5-foot tall clown head surrounded with bare light bulbs.

I have to disagree with page 118 where the girl working there tells them it'll take 2 hours to see everything. It takes 3 hours to escape the gaping maw of hell. I'm fairly certain that at night the rolling-eyed manniquins wearing rubber masks climb off their calliopes and eat Christian babies to the tune of the Godfather as played by an unmanned orchestra.

Go there at your own risk. It's possibly the most boring car-ride in North America to get there and it's feckin' expensive, too. And don't count on it doing any favors for your love life. Sorry for the long sentences, I couldn't help myself.

It's too bad you didn't enjoy The House on the Rock. I disagree with your opinion that it won't do any favors for your love life. After my husband and I made or first visit we decided to return on our honeymoon. Each visit took about four hours. I thought the place had a rather sexual feeling to it but it may have just been the dim light and carpeted walls affecting me.

Vice has the House of the Rock in its new issue... it looks scary. you might be able to find the pics at www.viceland.com (er... Not Safe For Work) If you're in some sort of large city, you can find it at fine indie record stores

gmzoe: wrote out full words of NSFW

This message has been edited. Last edited by: GMZoe,

there is connection...
a dial-up in the center,
no longer a vacuum;
no longer consumed by darkness...

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I just bought American Gods and have no idea what it is about. Good to know it has something I will recognize in it (House on the Rock) as I grew up in Illinois and took yearly trips to Wisconsin. Looking forward to reading the book.

I'm glad I stumbled accross this thread, I'm planning on going to the House on the Rock next month and I fear I would have grossly underestimated the amount of time it would take to see all the crazy sights!

At the advice of Nel, I'm putting my tour summary here too...

House on the Rock... rocks. I'm very serious. How else to describe it... It was so awesome! I got many pictures Clicky here, there were 62 on my camera... of course I didn't upload them all. And unfortunately I couldn't upload the movie of the carousal, so I just took a choice few shots from the video. Right as you walk in things get wierd. With instruments playing themselves and all... I went to all the places that were in American Gods... the Chinese music place where they met Czernabog, the pizza place, the carousal, etc. Got my fortune told by 2 different Esmareldas! The 1st says I need to accomplish things, and my lucky number is 6... The 2nd says, I am strong, and have a desire to destroy things. Then it says "keep in the open air and take lots of exercise", my lucky number is 9. I put a coin into like every single one of the music things. My favs being the hearse that played the funeral dirge, the octopus that played Octopus' Garden, and the Chinese thing that played that Halloween sort of song... And then I had to try out the little things that move when ya put coins in em. I saw the one Shadow saw, where the guy comes out of the church, and there's the bird thing that comes out. And then there was this HUGE whale with squid attacking it in this one room. On the streets of yesterday, I saw a lot of wierd old adds... tape worms for weight loss, a magnetic belt, arsenic for your complexion, all very wierd. And there was this huge Rude Goldberg machine. It was neat! Then, there was a car with a hot tub in it! (with 3 hearses by it) and a car that looked like it was made of alligator skin. And there were just so many little things... masks, and armour, and swords, and ivory carvings, and lots and lots of model boats! And I went into the infinity room... WOW!!! It was so cool. (But the camera deleted the damned picture of it!!) Anyway, it really was just so cool... Oh, there was just so much to see. I was there for almost 4 hours... That may be in part due to incredibally slow people in front of me... I get up ahead to have very very obnoxious people behind me. There was this couple with these kids... And the kids were climbing on stuff and poking stuff, and the parents just laughed. Oh my gosh! I've never been so annoyed. Well, so we left rather late, and stopped at a Swiss place... New Glarus it was called. Got some Swiss stuff, and stopped at this Swiss restaurant... Ooh, so good... Thus ended my ever so amazing trip. And I suggest that when you get the chance, you people should go to House on the Rock.

dude. this place ruled.

i wanna go back.

If anyone is interested I will leave these up for a little while.

http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v715/LOST_kitty_k/The...e%20on%20the%20Rock/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oFHp6fx9SQ4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-hza2czeC8

i've visited that website once, i hope i will visit real House On the Rock someday..