(MONEY Magazine) – I was recently at a family function, where I bumped into a cousin I hadn't seen in several years. He asked what I was doing these days, and I explained that I was about to start writing a monthly travel column. "Ooh," he said. "Beaches, resorts, fancy hotels--that sounds great!"

I didn't bother trying to explain this to him, but I'm not particularly interested in beaches, resorts or fancy hotels. My travel style has always centered on more esoteric pursuits: back roads, tiny towns, eccentric cultural museums, greasy spoons, industrial sites, county fairs, abandoned buildings, dive bars, mom-and-pop motels. I'm just not the Club Med type.

Which is just as well, because if I'd been wasting my time at Club Med, I probably wouldn't have gone on so many factory tours. Many people think of factory tours as a children's activity, but I've found that I'm much more appreciative of them now that I'm an adult, and I love building them into my travel itineraries. Even the simplest consumer product is often the result of a dazzlingly sophisticated manufacturing process, and factory tours give us a chance to observe and appreciate this wizardry up close. Last year, for example, when I was in Winston-Salem, N.C. and took the tour of the R.J. Reynolds cigarette plant, I was dumbfounded by the complexity of the operation. I could have spent the whole afternoon just staring at the contraption that made the filters--and I don't even smoke.

Unfortunately, the RJR tour was discontinued at the end of 1997, a casualty of the rising tide of antismoking sentiment. A number of other well-regarded plant tours have fallen by the wayside in recent years as well, including the Kellogg's tour in Battle Creek, Mich. and the Steinway & Sons piano factory tour in New York City. Others may soon follow--the Wall Street Journal recently reported that liability risks and secrecy concerns are leading many companies to abandon factory tours in favor of more staid and manageable corporate museums. Feh, I say--a corporate museum may be easier to run, but it can't deliver the same adrenaline rush as an unobstructed view of an assembly line, bottling plant or die-casting machine. Corporate museums create the specter of the Wizard of Oz, but factory tours provide a glimpse of the man behind the curtain.

While factory tours may be on the wane, however, they're not yet an endangered species. Hundreds of companies still offer them, ranging from such corporate monoliths as Coca-Cola and Boeing to smaller firms like the Original American Kazoo Co. Here are some I have enjoyed within the past year, all of which--like most factory tours--are free of charge.

Herr's Snacks, Nottingham, Pa. Eastern Pennsylvania is loaded with pretzel and potato-chip manufacturers, and the Herr's tour is probably the best of the lot. If you can manage to get through the relentlessly juvenile video that kicks things off (someone involved clearly watched way too much Sesame Street), the rest of the tour is excellent, with well-trained guides and good views of the assorted frying, baking, extruding and packaging equipment. The highlight is a visit to the potato-chip production line, where you get to eat warm chips fresh off the conveyor belt. (It was over a month before I was willing to settle for normal, packaged chips again.) The tour lasts about 90 minutes. For more information, call 800-284-7488, or write Herr's, Herr Drive, Nottingham, Pa. 19362.

Anheuser-Busch, St. Louis. Ever watch a Budweiser commercial and wonder what the story is behind that "exclusive beechwood aging process" they're always crowing about? You'll learn that and more at the Anheuser-Busch plant, easily the best of the several breweries I've visited. Tour groups convene in the visitors' center, where a variety of displays do a good job of documenting A-B's corporate history, including the firm's survival strategy during Prohibition and the early role of the oft-overlooked Eberhard Anheuser.

From there the tour of the grounds (three of whose old brick buildings are on the National Historic Register) includes stops at the brew house, the Budweiser Clydesdales' stables and the bottling plant, where the mesmerizing high-speed equipment fills, labels and caps at an impressive rate of 1,100 bottles a minute. And since you're bound to work up a thirst while taking all this in, the tour concludes with a drinking session featuring the full range of A-B brews. The tour lasts 75 minutes; 314-577-2333; Anheuser-Busch, 1127 Pestalozzi St., St. Louis, Mo. 63118.

McIlhenny Co., Avery Island, La. Avery Island (which is actually a salt dome, not an island) is a private, secluded place. Visitors to the tiny community, about 150 miles west of New Orleans, pay a 50 [cent] toll upon entering the town and are allowed to drive on only two of the village's roads, one of which leads to the McIlhenny Co. McIlhenny makes only one product, but it's a doozy: Tabasco sauce. The short plant tour includes a quick historical primer on the company and the region, an interesting video and a sensational view of the factory floor, where you can see the product go from empty, unlabeled bottle to finished carton. As a bonus, the whole place smells like hot peppers, so you can even get your sinuses cleared out along the way.

Don't miss the gift shop, where the beautiful Tabasco logo has been printed on everything from beach towels to boxer shorts. And if you arrive by early afternoon, ask for some crushed pepper mash, a Tabasco byproduct. It's great for cooking, and, like the sauce itself, a little goes a long way. The tour lasts 25 minutes; 318-365-8173; McIlhenny Co., Avery Island, La. 70513.

For those who want more information on factory tours, there's a book devoted to the subject: Watch It Made in the USA (John Muir Publications), by Bruce Brumberg and Karen Axelrod. Although the writing is weak, the listings are extensive and useful. Maybe I'll get a copy for my cousin. He can read it the next time he's relaxing on the beach outside his fancy resort hotel.

Paul Lukas, author of Inconspicuous Consumption (Crown), won a 1998 Lowell Thomas Award from the Society of American Travel Writers.