3 Hidden and Unusual Things to Do in Palo Alto, California

Gates of Hell Sculpture

“THE GATES OF HELL” IS a massive sculpture work created by the French artist Auguste Rodin. The imagery of the sculpture is based on a scene from Dante’s The Inferno and the gates stand roughly six meters high and four meters wide.

Of the 180 figures in the sculpture, many were later cast into separate effigies, and some are well known on their own. The most famous of these is “The Thinker,” the well-known image of the contemplative man seated and resting his chin in his palm.

The Frenchman’s Tower

STUMBLING UPON THE STRANGE TWO-STORY FRENCHMAN’S Tower in Palo Alto, California may make you think you’ve fallen into a storybook.  The strangely out of place folly was originally built as part of a French immigrant’s irrigation system, but now it simply stands as a curiosity.  

The Tower was built in 1875 by a reclusive French refugee by the name of Paulin Caperon, who had fled France after the Franco-Prussian War. He purchased land in what is now Palo Alto, and built his enigmatic tower.  The spire is said to have held his library on the first floor, while the second floor held a water tank.

Stanford Mausoleum

ORIGINALLY PLANNED AS THE SITE for Leland and Jane Stanford’s grand mansion, the family changed their plans following the death of their young son, Leland Junior. Instead, they built a university that they named after him, and built a tomb near their recently completed cactus garden. Leland and Jane Stanford were later buried in the tomb alongside their son. The mysteries surrounding Jane’s death by strychnine poisoning have never been completely solved.

The angel of grief statue lies just north of the mausoleum and was dedicated to Jane’s brother.