Tag Archives: Roadside America

May22

The Jolly Green Giant

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I don’t think we knew the Jolly Green Giant was there. We certainly didn’t go to Blue Earth, Minnesota to see the Jolly Green Giant. I think we went to Blue Earth, MN for the free camping.

According to Wikipedia,

Blue Earth is a city in Faribault County, Minnesota, at the confluence of the east and west branches of the Blue Earth River. The population was 3,353 at the 2010 census…[5] Interstate Highway 90 is centered on Blue Earth, as the east and west construction teams met here in 1978. As a tribute, there is a golden stripe of concrete on the interstate near Blue Earth.

At the time, there was also free camping at the Faribault County Fairgrounds in Blue Earth. It was a good deal. There was potable water on site. There were restrooms on site too, with flush toilets and hot showers. There were also a limited number of campsites with electrical hookups. All of these amenities were put to use by participants of the county fair and other big events, but when nothing was happening at the Fairgrounds, the county said, Come on over and camp for free!

Many small communities throughout the Midwest offer free camping in town or county parks, or at least they did a decade ago. I guess the town and county leaders figured they had more to gain than to lose. People staying in a small town would probably buy some supplies from the local businesses. Food, ice, propane, maybe gas for the rig would all add up to a tidy bundle of money for the stores in a town. If campers stuck around for a few days or a week, they might even shop more than once. Why not let them stay on land that would otherwise be empty?

We did our part for the economy of Blue Earth, Minnesota at the Wal-Mart (which I read somewhere online isn’t a Wal-Mart any more). I don’t remember what we bought, but I’m pretty sure ice was on the list. It was summer after all, and even though we’d thought it would be cool in the northern state of Minnesota, the air was hot and humid.

At the time, we typically slept in our van in Wal-Mart parking lots. I remember the Wal-Mart in Blue Earth had signs in the parking lot basically saying, You can’t park here overnight. Go park for free at the fairgrounds right over there!

After we procured our supplies, I drove the van over to the Faribault County Fairgrounds. I believe that’s when we saw the Jolly Green Giant statue towering above everything else.

He’s life-size, I marveled.

Jolly Green Giant (Blue Earth, MN) I had forgotten how short his toga is.

I’m not sure a mythical creature who’s never been truly alive can actually be life-size, but according to Roadside America, he’s

55.5 feet tall [about five stories]…[and] [h]is six-foot-long feet fill size 78 shoes.

The Roadside America post also gives the history of how the Green Giant ended up in blue Earth.

The Giant has stood in Blue Earth since 1979 due to the efforts of radio station owner Paul Hedberg…The entire project was funded by Blue Earth businesses, with Hedberg himself kicking in the largest amount…Creative Displays, fiberglass statue manufacturing forerunner of F.A.S.T. Corp., built the Giant in the summer of 1978…on July 6, 1979, the Jolly Green Giant was bolted to his eight-foot-high base, complete with a staircase so that visitors could pose for snapshots between his legs.

After finding a place to park in the sparsely populated camping area at the Fairgrounds and checking out the facilities (Look Pa! a gen-u-ine flush toilet!), we walked over to visit the Jolly Green Giant.

There was a Jolly Green Giant museum near the statue, but it was closed for the day. The Jolly Green Giant himself was always available to receive visitors and pose for photos, however, and I stared up at him in wonder. Did I mention that the statue is really tall?

As the Roadside America article mentioned, there are steps up to the platform the Green Giant stands on. Visitors can climb the stairs and stand between the Giant’s big feet. We each took our turn climbing up for a photo opp with the Giant. At the time, I hardly ever brought out my camera to document our activities, but I was so impressed with the Giant that I dug out my camera that day and photographed the big guy in all his green glory.

Outside the museum there were wooden cutouts of Little Green Sprout and farmers with a sort of lust for vegetables painted all over their faces. I took some photos of those folks too.

According to the Little Green Sprout’s Organics webpage,

Since 1972, Little Green Sprout has been an enthusiastic apprentice to the Green Giant. Little Green Sprout is an adventurous eater who loves to try new things and is always working on nurturing his healthy eating habits.

You can also view a timeline of Sprout’s history on the aforementioned webpage.

Little Green Sprout (Blue Earth, MN)

After looking around and taking some photos, we wandered back to our campsite and had dinner. I have no recollection of what was on the menu, but I doubt we ate any Green Giant vegetables

I’d hoped to hang around in Blue Earth for a few days. Camping was free, after all. (I think people were invited to camp at the Fairgrounds at no cost for two or three nights; after that campers were asked to pay a few bucks for each additional night they stayed.) Also, who could argue with free flush toilets and free hot showers? I really did want to visit the Jolly Green Giant Museum, and it would have been fun to check out what else Blue Earth had going on.

Alas, we packed up the next afternoon and headed out. We never stayed in one place for very long in those days. We were constantly on the move then, constantly looking for something we never did find.

If you want to visit the Jolly Green Giant, the aformentioned Roadside America article offers great directions.

If you are interested in camping at the Faribault County Fairgrounds, the City of Blue Earth website gives the following information:

The campground has 4 tent sites and 9 electrical sites with full hookups. There is a fee of $20.00 per night for the electrical sites and $10.00 per night for the tent sites. The City allows a maximum of five consecutive nights of camping at the campground unless prior arrangements have been made. There is a $5.00 charge for waste tank dumping. A payment box is located at the site for your convenience.

If you have any questions about camping at the Fairgrounds, you can Contact the Blue Earth City Hall at (507) 526-7336.

I took the photos in this post.

Dec9

Zzyzx

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From the informational sign in the parking lot.

I like to visit places other than the usual crowded tourist destinations. Yes, sometimes it’s fun to see what the huddled masses are looking at in the conservatory at Bellagio or in the depths of Carlsbad Caverns, but I prefer to stay off the beaten path. One such unusual discovery was Zzyzx, California.

According to Wikipedia, Zzyzx is an unincorporated community in San Bernardino County. It was formerly known as Soda Springs.

I know I saw the exit sign on I-15 when I passed that way in mid-October of 2015, but I didn’t stop. I probably wondered about the name, but I was in a hurry to get to my friends in Las Vegas, so I kept driving. During some period of research, (probably of the giant thermometer or the Alien Fresh Jerky shop, both in Baker, CA), I saw a link about Zzyzx on the Roadside America website.

On the edge of a dry lake bed, you’ll find a bizarre pseudo-town: “Zzyzx” (pronounced “Zye – Zex,” rhyming with Isaac’s). Travelers between Las Vegas and Los Angeles sometimes stop in the Mojave Desert along I-15 to pose next to the novel highway sign for Zzyzx Road. But few realize that heading several miles down a narrow, mostly paved route will deliver them to an oasis with an oddball history…

LA radio evangelist Curtis H. Springer, self-proclaimed minister (and quack doctor), decided the [oasis was] the ideal location for a health resort. He and his wife filed a mining claim on a 12,800 acre parcel of what were public lands. He named it “Zzyzx Mineral Springs and Health Resort,” touted as “the last word in health” and the last word in the English language — a gimmick so it would be the last listing in any directory…

Most of the concrete buildings still stand. You’ll find a mix of well-maintained structures…and then complete derelict buildings along the shore…There are a couple of low concrete buildings, doors and windows gone… one with a mysterious row of unattached toilets.

Well that sounded interesting, so I added Zzyzx to my mental list of places I wanted to visit someday.

In December 2016, I was once again on I-15, making my way to Vegas. This time I planned to make a side trip to Zzyzx.

The Desert Studies Center has taken over the grounds of the former health spa.

I found the grounds of the former Zzyzx Mineral Springs and Health Spa had been taken over by the Desert Studies Center, a field station of California State University. The good folks of the Desert Studies Center apparently cleaned up the grounds; gone were the mysterious toilets mentioned by Roadside America. In fact, a casual tourist might not realize the place was once a health spa run by a man many would call a charlatan if not for the informational signs in the parking lot. Of course, there are probably few casual tourists in Zzyzx. Perhaps a few curious souls are pulled off the interstate by the strange word on the exit sign, but most people who make the 4.5 mile drive from the exit to the Desert Studies Center campus have either heard about the center or the colorful past of the mineral springs and spa.

I left Barstow around sunrise so I could visit Zzyzx early in the day, and I was glad I did. Although my visit happened in early December, the desert sun was already hot by mid-morning. I wore my sunhat and wandered around the grounds.

A row of cute little rooms where folks who visited the resort once stayed. I would like to spend a night in one of these rooms.

Conferences are held at the Desert Studies Center with attendees housed in the rooms where folks who came to take the waters (a scam, the aforementioned Roadside America article explains: “The ‘natural’ hot springs feeding..mineral baths were completely artificial, heated by a hidden boiler”) and otherwise get healthy once stayed. On the morning of my visit, young adults (high school seniors? college freshmen?) were clearing out of the guest rooms and packing their luggage into the vans that had brought them to this desert spot. I thought someday I wanted to attend a conference there so I could sleep in one of the cute little rooms.

The Main Building where I found informational exhibits.

Other buildings left over from the health spa days are also used by the Desert Studies Center. The Main Building seemed to house administrative offices, but there was also an area open to visitors with several informational exhibits which, quite frankly, looked like they began their existence as 1990s era high school social studies fair projects. The most interesting exhibit featured early settler artifacts found in the area. Other exhibits were about local plants and animals and the history of the twenty-mule teams that ferried borax out of Death Valley in the 1880s.

Lake Tuendae is on the property too, making the area a literal oasis in the desert. The aforementioned Wikipedia article says the lake is really an artificial pond and is now a “refuge habitat of the endangered Mohave Tui chub.”

This is Lake Tuendae, actually an artificial pond.

I probably spent about two hours walking around the old site of the Zzyzx Mineral Springs and Health Spa. I enjoyed learning about its place in the history of U.S. health scams, and I enjoyed looking at Lake Tuendae and the educational exhibits in the visitor area of the Main Building. Mostly, I enjoyed knowing I could now say I’d visited a place whose name most folks will never be able to pronounce and even fewer will ever visit.

You can find directions to Zzyzx on the Roadside America website. That site also has a lot of information on the history of the place.

I took all the photos in this post.

Dec29

Alien Fresh Jerky

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I don’t know exactly what this is supposed to be, some kind of alien, I guess, but it greets visitors as they approach the Alien Fresh Jerky store. The World’s Tallest Thermometer can be seen in the background on the left.

I only stopped in Baker, California because I’d read there was a penny smashing machine at the Alien Fresh Jerky store. I have a friend who collects smashed pennies (or at least she did once–I may be behind the times), so I thought I’d stop and get her a fast and cheap souvenir.

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Many huge aliens stand above the Alien Fresh Jerky parking lot.

It was a contributor to Roadside America  who alerted me to the possibility of smashing a penny. D. Pruiksma said on 10/10/2010,

Just across from the World’s Largest Thermometer, Alien Fresh Jerky has it all. There’s jerky, T-Shirts, mugs, bumper stickers, refrigerator magnets, strong political opinions and, of course, a place to smash a penny with one of four Alien Fresh Jerky imprints. And, let’s face it, what self respecting roadside attraction would be complete if one couldn’t smash a penny. Once they had that, they knew Alien Fresh had arrived.

Roadside America also said the store had a

self-serve, “sample” counter. Mmmm! (use the tongs).

I’m not a huge meat eater, but I did plan to try some free jerky samples.

I took some photos before I went into the store. There were lots of fake aliens at the Alien Fresh Jerky store, both inside and out. I found lots of opportunities for taking free photos of fake aliens. The store has aliens on the roof. There’s a car full of aliens in front of the store. Huge aliens stand above the parking lot. A dozen or img_7712more aliens live inside the store. Yeah, aliens galore.

There’s apparently a plan to build a UFO hotel. In 2013, the Roadside America team wrote,

The manager didn’t laugh when we asked about how the new “UFO hotel project” is going — he said that it was underway for 2013. The plan, publicized in late 2012, is to build a 3-story, saucer-shaped motel with a pool resembling an E.T.’s head. If all goes well, Baker will be promoted as the “Gateway to Area 51″…

img_7722When I stopped by the store in early December of 2016, there was no hotel onsite, UFO themed or otherwise. There were signs behind the store advertising the hotel and an empty lot beyond the signs, but no clean, comfortable (or otherwise) rooms. The vacant lot looked as if it had maybe been leveled, but no one should plan to stay at the (nonexistent) hotel any time soon.

Not only was there no hotel, when I went inside the store, I found no jerky samples and no penny smashing machine. Oh sad day!

There was a lot of jerky for sale in the store. Lots of snacks like nuts and dried fruits were also available. There were beverages for sale too. All the food and drinks seemed overpriced. I didn’t buy anything.

I did consider having the alien in the machine tell my fortune, but in the end, I decided to keep my dollar. What could a fake alien encased in plastic possibly tell me about my future?

There are fake aliens all over the store. I saw Yoda, as well as at least a dozen of the dudes with big heads.img_7727

The Alien Fresh Jerky store is a must-see spot for fans of aliens, but I probably won’t stop there again. I don’t need to see another fake alien because I saw enough fake aliens in this one convenient location to last a lifetime.

I took all of the photos in this post.

 

 

 

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The driver alien turns its head.  Yowza!