![]() ![]() I was a little skeptical that I had found the right place from our viewpoint, there's just no way that hill in the distance goes downhill. She was both nervous (tilted head) and excited (wagging tail). Petaluma Argus-Courierīack before Tinder and romantic glamping, guys would take girls to the secluded spot in the 1970s to impress them.īut I just wanted to impress Judy, and so positioned my car at the top of the hill and prepared her for the reversal of the laws of the universe she was about to experience. Sonoma Mountain Gravity Hill, March 17, 1978. She asked that I refrain from describing the exact location, and I agreed, though it did recently show up on Google Maps. She said that recently, a group of kids started a fire there with discarded cigarettes. She went on to tell me that for years and years, kids have come to hang out at the spot, and the locals don't love it. She paused and then said, " I think it's an optical illusion," as if there was another rational explanation for what I was about to experience. The "we" confused me - who else was she referring too? The dead bus kids? The woman, who chose not to share her name, nodded slowly, "Oh, we know all about the gravity hill." After complimenting each other's dogs, I asked her if she knew about the strange hill. ![]() Andrew ChamingsĪs I approached the spot, a local woman in a truck pulled up alongside me and slowed to a stop. The road itself looks almost identical to how it looked 50 years ago. There are no signs announcing you have reached Gravity Hill in the North Bay - the quiet rural road on the western slope of Sonoma Mountain is surrounded by vast views of Wine Country, some cows and not much else. When one shows up in nature, it's a little more unnerving, so I decided to hit the road with my dog Judy to prove Sir Isaac Newton wrong. Optical illusions are everywhere, from Magic Eye books, to the Mystery Spot in Santa Cruz, to this ungodly carpet, but most are created carefully by people designed with the purpose of fooling you. Why? Well, if we knew that, it wouldn't be a mystery, but the effect is truly bewildering and just doesn't compute, forcing your brain to give up, as I found out. There are several gravity hills in the U.S., but the one in the North Bay has been described as the most mystifying. ![]()
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