Holy Relics in Connecticut ✝️

Holy Land USA has come a long way since my first visit 5 years ago. Heck, it’s come a long way since my visit last year! With an ongoing clean-up and, er, resurrection of the space, new concrete remnants are surfacing, new-to-me. It is a unique place to spend an hour en route that offers plenty of photo ops, relative ease of exploration and general weirdness.

The Bible, in stone

The large restored sign is my favorite part.

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Getting close to it

Say it like you mean it: USA!

We roamed about carefree within the half restored concrete bible, fascinated. But the grounds were the location of a horrific crime 10 years ago. Just 16 years old, Chloe Ottman was raped, strangled, raped again and then stabbed repeatedly by a boy she thought was her friend–then dumped in the surrounding woods. The details of the gruesome attack, which took place at the area’s large illuminated cross–since replaced, are so disturbing. The boy is now serving a 55 year sentence and the story was turned into a Frenemies episode on ID T.V., the crime porn channel that is so outrageous it seems like a satire to me. Chloe’s friends and family were outraged by the episode that twisted the events for entertainment purposes. Immersing myself in the details of this event, the grounds most certainly take on a different feel. May Chloe rest in peace.