"But the true epicure in the terrible, to whom a new thrill of unutterable ghastliness is the chief end and justification of existence, esteems most of all the ancient, lonely farmhouses of backwoods New England; for there the dark elements of strength, solitude, grotesqueness and ignorance combine to form the perfection of the hideous."

-H. P. Lovecraft, "The Picture in the House"

There's no denying that New England is a weird place. After all, we've had nearly 400 years to weird up the joint, and any place that has been home to the Salem Witch Trials, Stephen King and Adam Sandler just can't be all that normal.

But unlike other strange locales infested with all sorts of outlandish weirdness (I'm looking at you, New Jersey), our weirdness is of a slightly subtler bent. We might not have the ancient, eldritch monsters that pallid New England horror-scribe H.P. Lovecraft wrote about, but here on the Seacoast we do have a farm full of wolves, a museum with a mutant chicken and a history of extremely close encounters with visitors from way out of town.

And so, for those dedicated to the eternal pursuit of the bizarre, kooky, creepy and just plain strange, here's a tour of some of what the Seacoast has to offer.

local legends

Rock-throwing devils and Viking graves are just some of the local legends that have endured. But like most good spook stories, the facts have been slightly fudged in order to increase the dramatic weight of the tale.

peas are green

Despite the popularity of the story of Thorvald's final resting place, it was all so much bunk. The "runic markings" aren't runes at all, but most likely gouges in the rock caused by erosion, or perhaps with help from a human hand. Experts on Viking history place Thorvald's grave in Nova Scotia, far, far north from Hampton Beach.

Then there's the tale of "Lithobolia," the rock-throwing devil that plagued George and Alice Walton in New Castle during the summer of 1862. The story, taken from the journals of Richard Chamberlain, goes like this: during that summer, the Waltons were continuously pegged with rocks of varying sizes. The stones were thrown at their heads, their backs and their home. George Walton, a Quaker and tavern owner, reported being hit by the stones between 30 and 40 times. Other mischief occurred-the Walton's grandchildren reported the sound of snorting and stones rolling across the floor of the attic; household items would disappear and turn up later, broken. Chamberlain, a tenant at the tavern, recorded the events, and while he puts the blame on supernatural forces (including a curse placed on Walton by one of his neighbors), the more likely explanation centers on the Walton's grandchildren or some disgruntled townsfolk unhappy with the family's black and Native American servants.

But even after they're declared false, why do these tales endure? J. Dennis Robinson, who's been researching Seacoast history for nearly 30 years, believes the answer lies in simple human nature. His extensive Web site, www.seacoastnh.com, chronicles all aspects of the region's past, from the peace treaty that ended the Russo-Japanese War in 1905 to the story of Lithobolia. The pages on his site that get the most view, however, are the ones that spin (and debunk) weird tales of ghosts, alien abductions and Viking graves.

"It's easier to tell these kinds of stories," Robinson says. "You need audiences to listen and this is clearly what people want to read. I can look on my Web site and I can see what pages take off and which pages that I've spent weeks researching just sit there like a log."

Robinson recalls a recent talk he gave to 25 journalists at the Wentworth by the Sea hotel. After his presentation, the only question to come from the audience was whether the Wentworth was haunted.

The stories persist even after being debunked because of a desire for something unexplainable, according to Robinson.

"The more science we get, the more we want something we don't understand," he says. "It's really kind of the spiritual part of your brain, the part that accepts on faith. When you become science machines like most of us are, that part of your brain is not exercised."

As a local historian though, Robinson said he's more interested in stories rooted in fact.

"I'm interested in truth, and these stories just don't smell true for the most part," he says. "There's always kind of a gamy smell when you start asking questions... I find it absolutely exciting to be locked in an archive with new facts that explain why this happened."