Sunday, July 29, 2007

Week 16 Ends

End of Week 15. ( 10:30 AM, CST - 07/29/07)


After a late departure from Mobridge, SD, I have made my way to Mitchell, SD, home of the Corn Palace. (Thanks for the tip TreasonPal.) The Corn Palace was first created in 1892 as a way for the town to highlight how great the soil was here for farming. An eastern castle like building was decorated with a ton of corn. Every year since then, they have torn down the prior year's layer of corn and re-decorated it with fresh corn. Each year, they pick a theme for the design and this year it's "Rodeo".

When I was travelling with Battlestar, he had asked me what the weirdest thing I'd seen is. Well, this place now takes first place as weirdest, easily beating out the Antler's R Us store, and the Old Shoe Tree. Funny stuff, and it was surprising to see how many people had come to see it. There were hundreds. And they were eagerly buying the thousands of corn products and apparel in the huge gift shop. This is a town with a good sense of humor.

The ride today followed the Missouri River down to I90 along the Native American Scenic

Byway whose highlights included the Sitting Bull and Sacajawea monuments, and not much else. (BTW, I have seen a minimum of 5 spelling for Sakagawea) Pretty country. I particularly liked the sunflower farm.








7 comments:

Anonymous said...

YEAH!!! I'd hoped it was worth stopping at. I mean, c'mon, a CORN Palace?

Anonymous said...

Here's the world's largest basket building - in Newark, OH. (google it if the links don't work)

http://www.worldslargestthings.com/easterntour/basketbuilding.htm

http://www.roadsideamerica.com/attract/OHNEWbasket.html

The SWZA said...

T-Pal, thumbs way up on the Corn Palace reco. Pure genius.

In this Aspen art gallery/weird importer in the '80s, I saw -- for purchase, mind you, and well into the thousands -- a pair of taxidermied giraffes. From the front shoulders up.

Who the hell wants matching giraffe heads and necks? Where would one put a pair of matching giraffe heads and necks?

Better still, who would drop 12Gs on a pair of matching giraffe heads and necks?

I don't want to be eye-level with a disembodied giraffe ever again. Single, or in a pair.

Anonymous said...

They could make good hat racks.

Freaky.

Anonymous said...

The only weird thing I could find in Iowa was the world's largest Cheeto.

Interesting, but not worth it.

RoadTripper said...

TP - Thx for the palace - it helped get my mind straight for the corn driving day I had. Looking into the Basket building. and lol about the hat rack response to swza.

The SWZA said...

If I'm gonna rock a food-related roadtrip, damn straight I want to see the giant Cheeto.

And any other food that is either ginormous or little or resembling a dead president.