The Island of the Dolls is located just south of Mexico City, between the canals of Xochimilco. The Island of the Dolls was never intended to be a tourist destination.

With the dark past and thrilling history of the place, one cannot help but be mystified by what the Mexicans call La Isla de las Muñecas.

The La Isla de las Muñecas is an island covered with decaying old dolls, tied up in the surrounding trees in a creepy manner. 

Want to know the dark origin of the place?

The story of La Isla de las Muñecas is closely connected to Don Julian Santana Barrera's story.
Barrera is a native of Xochimilco.

The Don was known to have left his wife and family in the middle of the 20th century to isolate himself on an island. The island was on Teshuilo Lake.

His reasons for doing so were unclear initially, but it slowly unraveled that Barrera was not of sound mind.
He then discovered the body of a young girl, drowned in the lake. A doll came down the canals shortly after the discovery. This has changed Barrera's life and the shape of the island for years to come.

Barrera was alone on the island, and he hang the doll from a tree in hopes of appeasing the dead girl's spirit. However, as years passed by, one doll hanging from a tree was not enough for him.

Following the next 50 years, Barrera would search dolls from the trash and the canals. From there, he would hang them to the island's trees.

Sometimes, he would hang the dolls in a complete form, while others were hanged with decapitated heads and body parts. However, the biggest question surrounding the story was the girl's death on the island. 

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Many people, including Barrera's own family, did not believe that he found the girl. 

Whether he made it up, imagined an experience, or was somehow mistaken is still unclear, according to a Discovery article.

Barrera, however, devoted the rest of his life to her despite not knowing for sure whether the girl existed or not.

Some say that Barrera was haunted by the girl's spirit and started hanging more dolls in an attempt to please her.

Barrera believed that the dolls themselves were possessed by the spirits of dead girls, according to the Island's site.

People closed to Barrera said that he was driven by some unforeseen force that changed him.

Same Manner of Death

Barrera passed away in 2001, and his body was discovered drowned in the canal, in the same place that he had always said he had seen the little girl.

Tourists then began going to the island to pay tribute to the death of the island's former caretaker.

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Tourists started bringing dolls of their own. To this day, people pay their respects to Barrera and the girl by hanging dolls on the trees. Many ferries are stopping on the island to tour the ancient Aztec canals.