The Mother Road

The Gemini Giant in Wilmington, IL

I was lucky growing up to have parents who loved to travel. To a young kid a lot of travel to the destination is boring, but one thing that I remember was all the BIG roadside novelties. When Josh and I started traveling into the Midwest I mentioned Midwesterners love to brag their town has ‘the Biggest’ __________ (biggest Ball of Twine sound familiar?) I call Josh ‘master of the U-turn’ as he will turn around anytime to go back when we pass a sign or strange sight. We’ve seen the things from the largest front porch swing to the largest cow sculpture.
We have traveled the original historic Route 66 in Illinois before and found ourselves on it again this trip. In Wilmington, IL, we saw the Gemini Giant in front of an ice cream shop, The Launching Pad. We went back on a sunny day to get a pic of it and found out there was Classic Car get together that day. Makes me feel like a step back to early days of travel before everyone was in a hurry to go fast on Interstates.
I hope everyone will slow down a little and take more alternate highways through smaller town America; you’ll be surprised at what you find.