Geocaching and Roadside Attractions

Good morning everyone.  Welcome to blog #4.  This week I want to discuss the roadside attractions we find in our travels while geocaching.  For those not familiar with roadside attractions, or know them by another name, they are essentially a large statue or monument, often depicting something of the town or area it's located.  Some are very unusual and are more of a tourist attraction.  Most, but not all may have a geocache hidden within close proximity of the statue.  I have planned day trips where I've set out to get pictures of some roadside attractions and find geocaches along the way.

Picking up where I left off with last week's blog, I'm caching along Highway #5 in North Dakota.  This is after my dead cat encounter.  I've made my way to Dunseith.  This area of North Dakota is part of Turtle Mountain, an area that stretches to the Canadian side of the border.  The area is named after the numerous painted turtles found in the area (I Googled that, LOL).  It's only fitting that the roadside attraction found here is a turtle, but not just any turtle.  This turtle is made up of 2,000 tire rims welded together.

There is a cache here.  It's magnetic.  You've heard of the proverbial needle in the haystack?  Here's a geocaching version of that saying.  Needless to say, I DNF'd this one.  Although I did notice that all vehicles in town had no tires.  Hmmmm.  

I carried on down the road, eventually finding myself in the town of Bottineau.  I found another turtle statue.  This one is 'Tommy the Turtle', a talented turtle capable of operating a snowmobile.  I have to give Tommy credit for thinking safety.  He is wearing a helmet.

There was a geocache hidden here.  It may have been missing already when I came.  Hampering my search was a bunch of kids playing on the turtle.  Another DNF.  Looking at the geocaching site, there is no longer a geocache listed here.  Not to be left out, there is a town on the Canadian side of the border, Boissevain, Manitoba.  It is straight up the highway from Dunseith.  They have their own 'Tommy the Turtle', but no geocache is hidden here.  I visited this one on a separate caching trip with another geocacher, Auntie Mo.  On that trip, we came across a large fire hydrant, glass bottle house and church, Sara the Camel, Dutch style windmill, a wild turkey, and of course, Tommy the Turtle.

There was one more monument I came across on that trip to North Dakota.  I had been to this one back in 2007, on a family vacation to Mt. Rushmore.  This one is in Rugby.  It is the geographical center of North America.  My third DNF.  It didn't help that it was starting to get dark out.

I have come across many other roadside attractions in my travels and plan on seeing more.  One particular one is located north of Winnipeg in the town of Winnipeg Beach.  It is part of the Whispering Giant series, created by artist Peter Wolf Toth.  There are approximately 74 of these sculptures across America, with only two in Canada.  This one was part of a day trip I took with the purpose of 'discovering' more roadside attractions, (That trip netted me 8 roadside attractions, 26 traditional caches and 1 multi).  There is a Peter Toth sculpture in the Mandan/Bismarck area of North Dakota and North Dakota's oldest active cache isn't far away.  Hmmmmm.  That could be a possible weekend trip in the making.  I have been to 40 of these attractions so far.  I hope to add to that list this year.  Is there a roadside attraction near you?  Is there a geocache hidden there?  If not, what are you waiting for?

That's it for this week.  As my oldest boy, Duesenberg 2002 says, 'peace out'.  Remember, geocaching is meant to be fun.  Enjoy.  :)