The Scariest Motel In America Is Next-Level Terrifying If You Have A Phobia Of Clowns

The next time you road trip between Reno and Las Vegas, Nevada, you might want to double up on the espresso shots. If you get sleepy, you might just end up at the scariest motel in America. The obvious overnight stop on that drive is the charming desert town of Tonopah, Nevada, where a roadside inn that makes the Bates Motel from Alfred Hitchcock's "Psycho" look like a picnic lies in wait.

The World Famous Clown Motel in Tonopah (yes, "World Famous" is part of its name) isn't child's play. This place really leans into the chill factor when it comes to the big-footed circus freaks. If you arrive expecting a friendly, Bozo the Clown-type place where good cheer reigns, think again. It's more the kind of place where Stephen King's leering Pennywise from the "It" franchise reaches out from under the bed to grab your ankles. As such, it definitely qualifies as one of the most bizarre tourist attractions in America.

"I had my first episode of sleep paralysis at 3 a.m. I remember it like I was awake. I was looking at my partner sleeping next to me," one Redditor writes, describing an overnight stay. "I tried to scream but I couldn't." Others recount feeling so spooked they fled in the middle of the night. Much like the Hotel California, you can check out any time you like, but ... can you ever leave these memories behind?

The Clown Motel was founded in 1985 by a brother and sister who decorated it with their late father's clown memorabilia collection. The twist? Dad happened to be buried in the cemetery next door. The motel passed through the hands of another local family before being bought in 2019 by Las Vegas hoteliers who have vowed to keep growing the motel's collection of 5,000 clowns and counting, many of which grin at you maniacally from shelves in the lobby (pictured) as you check in. 

Generally, the kind of tourists who seek out the Clown Motel are actively looking for a spine chill. As many as one in 10 children and adults experience full-blown coulrophobia, or the fear of clowns. A 2023 study by Frontiers of Psychology looking into the phenomenon of coulrophobia found that it persists across cultures, citing one large study of people from 64 countries that indicated 53.5% of adults have some degree of clown fear. As for that neighboring cemetery? It's officially less scary than the clowns. Studies show that just 3% of us experience intense thanatophobia or fear of death. So yes, it's true: Collectively, we are more afraid of clowns than we are of dying.

Tonopah lies along the Extraterrestrial Highway, the same route that will take you to mysterious Area 51. So, if the clowns don't get you, perhaps the big-eyed aliens will. If you feel like scanning the skies for evidence of ET, the Clair Blackburn Memorial Stargazing Park is the place to do it, especially if you time your visit for a moonless night. This is one of the best places in the country to view the Milky Way. 

Other attractions in the area include the town's original silver mine — now a museum — and the Central Nevada Museum, which maintains a historic Wild West street scene including a blacksmith and saloon. The old west is all around you in Tonopah. The notorious gunslinger Wyatt Earp settled down here for a spell, opening a saloon and serving as a sheriff, running off claim jumpers at the mines.

If you're just not into clowns, the nearby Mizpah Hotel (pictured) is a historic, Gold Rush-era gem that's been given a glossy boutique makeover. You can sit on a plush velvet settee and sip wines from the hotel owners' Sonoma winery. But while the Clown Motel may be America's scariest, the Mizpah Hotel is equally famous for being haunted. If you're a fine figure of a man, you can expect the ghost of a murdered sex worker — The Lady in Red — to sidle up to you in the elevator and whisper sweet nothings in your ear. The mines, the elementary school, and an old liquor store are also reputed to have restless spirits in residence, making Tonopah a different kind of western ghost town.