BEST Things We've Seen on the Side of the Road

We have taken so many pictures since we got a digital camera back in 2005. It took me forever to learn how to add photos to my blog and then I no sooner learned when we lost our hard drive. Luckily for us, one of the four BEST sons in the world was able to restore most of them to us recently and now I can have fun trying to remember where all these things were.

Not all of my side of the road pictures are spectacular. Often they were snapped as we drove past, through the window or screen. But I love the strange or quirky and I spend at least an afternoon every couple of weeks seeking out these places on one of my favorite sites Roadside America.

I'm sure some of what we've spotted is listed there but sometimes it's just fun to find them ourselves. The first one below was hard to miss but much harder to get a picture of for you.
We used to tow an old Datsun that had no redeeming qualities whatsoever. It ran for awhile but it only brought stares because it was so homely. We considered covering it with storybooks and plastic story characters and using it to advertise our fledgling storytelling business by driving it in parades. Unfortunately, it became terminally ill (we had to disconnect the battery cable from it's terminal every evening, in order to make it stop and to prevent the lights from coming on in the middle of the night). So we never got around to doing that. Shortly after turning it out to pasture we came across another vehicle that had had lots of plastic surgery to enhance it's looks.

On the West bound side of route 108, just before you reach Oakdale, California, keep an eye on the fence . You'll come across this shrine to a fallen friend. We discovered Cricket's story when we visited the Cowboy Museum in Oakdale. Seems Cricket was a rodeo horse that had been retired and put to pasture. to live out his days. Cricket was a people and traffic watcher and spent his days for several years beside the fence watching the cars go by. Occasionally, he'd wait for a car at the Eastern most corner of his field and when a car approached he'd race the length of the field just to see if he could beat the car. Rumor has it a few locals made sure he won the race as often as possible. When Cricket died someone -unknown -put up the little monument and it's been there for years.
You know, we never had a motor home until 2004. When we began the search for our RV I pushed for the motor home over a fifth wheel for one very important reason. I was used to making frequent stops and thought it would be more convenient if Jim could just keep driving . But before we bought it there would have been many times I would have been happy to have spotted this roadside attraction we saw in Arkansas.
For that matter even Jim would have been glad to see the Booger Hollow facility had he spotted this just before it.

But ,of course we don't need that because we do, in fact, carry our on-board potty with us. Nope, all we need at the end of a long day's journey is a suitable place to stop for the night. One of these days I'll show you some of our favorite backyards but right now it's late so I'll end with one of Jim's favorite pictures. This is one he loves to show all his friends who are still running the rat race but wish they could be living our life.

See ya down the road
(or along side of it),
Yarntangler