Budget Travel: The Biggest Ball of Twine in Minnesota | brokeGIRLrich
One thing I really miss now that I’m sort of settled in NYC for a while is traveling on a regular basis – even when I was with the circus, I had my car out on tour and would drive from city to city each week. Since this got expensive real quick, I realized that if I needed to kill time while I waited for the train to arrive, I’d need to get creative with what I was doing.
Fortunately, I already had a deep love of weird roadside attractions, which quickly became my goal. And it all started with the roadside attraction I want to talk about today:
THE WORLD’S BIGGEST BALL OF TWINE
I put it in caps because I get really excited about it. And yes, I know it’s weird to get that excited about twine.
Now, there’s some disagreement about exactly which ball of twine is the world record holder. The Minnesota ball of twine comes in at 8.7 tons, is 11 feet high and has a diameter of 40 feet. Like this wasn’t impressive enough, it was all done by one man – Francis Johnson… should you ever roadtrip there and see the surrounding areas of Minnesota leading up to Darwin, you will not be surprised that this was his hobby. There is nothing out that way (um, except for the world’s largest fiberglass chicken – because that is only about 20 minutes away, and yes, I stopped to take a picture of it – it’s not nearly as exciting as the twine ball though).
In 1994, the Minnesota twine ball was unseated by the Kansas twine ball, which was rolled by an entire community and actually weighs less than the Minnesota ball. It is a little taller and does have a wider diameter though.
The thing about the Minnesota twine ball is, it’s got every hallmark of a great roadside attraction. It’s free. It has it’s own little museum. And they sell twine ball shot glasses. You get to memorialize your visit in a guest book. It makes for a great picture.
Fortunately, one of my best friend’s is as insane as I am… being broke grad students made this seem like the perfect spring break trip.
Also, if fortune smiles upon you and you come across the Darwin, MN on the second Saturday in August each year, you’d catch the Twine Ball Festival. Oh, you read that right.
Fortune did not smile upon me, but it was still a terrific, budget friendly stop on our crazy spring break road trip. We even had a theme song for the trip thanks to Weird Al Yankovic. Check it out:
Have you ever road tripped before? What’s the strangest thing you’ve seen along the side of the road?
*Part of Financially Savvy Saturdays on Femme Frugality and Stapler Confessions*
My husband is from Minnesota and has talked about that before. Ha!
Holly@ClubThrifty recently posted…Obamacare: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
It’s definitely one of the state’s most impressive claims to fame! Although they do also have a giant snowman over by St. Paul. It’s pretty impressive too.
The midwest is full of such roadside attractions. In fact Kansas also claims to have the world’s largest ball of twine. Don’t forget the “Truch Henge”, the “Garden of Eden” sculpture garden or the “world’s largest van Gogh”. Clever marketing brought tourists to small towns for years, prior to the interstate system. :o)
-Bryan
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Truch Henge?? Truck Henge? There’s a truck one? I’ve been to the Cadillac Ranch in Amarillo and Carhenge in Nebraska… I was unaware there was a Truck Henge.
Haha, yes “Truck Henge”. Sorry for the spelling
-Bryan
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With all the time I spent on the road in the middle of nowhere, I never came across the ball of twine :/ Of course, I was always on the bus with the entire company, so I dunno how thrilled they would be about making a detour for my whimsical desires.
Stefanie @ The Broke and Beautiful Life recently posted…My First Travel Hack: Flying to Europe for $25
Aw, that’s a shame. Personally, I would’ve been pretty excited if my cast has ever asked to go see some local weirdness!
This is what I love about cross country travel, there are so many fascinating things to see! I have never heard about this twine, and don’t know if I would make a pilgrimage to see it, but if I was in the neighborhood, I would absolutely check it out. When I was young, we used to take Vacation-like road trips as a family and I always loved seeing “South of the Border.” It was always craptacular, but they had so many billboards leading up to it that got you pumped to get there.
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Hah, I loved South of the Border too – my family used to go to Florida to visit my aunt and uncle every couple of years and I would get so excited when the billboards started popping up. I always begged to stop. My parents HATED it there.
I am glad you made it out here to MN. We do have bigger attractions too, like the Mall of America! Judging by the green grass, that must have been at least 6 months ago, we haven’t been warm enough for green grass and leaves on the trees for at least 6 months…
One reason I need to be a snow bird…
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Oh gosh, it was 7 years ago actually! But it sparked my love of all things roadside.
I’m all about taking detours like this….though I can’t say I’ve ever made them my destination! I guess the MN twine is of a higher density? And the FESTIVAL?! Sign me up. Minnesota was such a beautiful state when I passed through. That and Wisconsin, where I actually stayed for a night. Wouldn’t mind going back to the region someday.
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I love Wisconsin too! On the same trip, my friend and I checked out House on the Rock Inn, which was an incredible spot. It was one of Frank Lloyd Wright’s homes and it was just crazy. They’ve turned it into a museum and there were so many cool collections inside.
The weirdest thing I ever saw, was a giant pink hippo in a pond in France. I need to find that picture! 🙂
Love the giant ball of twine!! 🙂 very high up my bucket list, I have a road trip planned through the southern States… one day 🙂
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Cool! I actually saw a large purple hippo statue when I was in Brussels once! I wanted to run back and take a picture, but I was about to miss a flight.
That must have been some crazy roadtrip! LOL the video from weird Al says it all, The lyrics are great – got so excited he wanted to “pop myself a beer”.
I almost feel like I’ve been there now except I still want to see the Crazy Poodle Dog. <3
Reminds me of the big nickle in Sudbury or the Canada Goose in Wawa (both in Ontario, Canada).
We used to love the South of the Border signs driving down south too!
Alas, we never stopped there because we were just trying to get to Florida!
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It was a fantastic song. I actually met up with the friend I was traveling with at her school in Michigan and when we mentioned to one of her roommates about where we were going, he was all “like the song?” We got a little too excited. It was definitely our anthem for the whole roadtrip.
As a Minnesotan, I cannot tell you how much I love this..
Oh wait..
Yes I can.
I LOVE THIS!
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Have you been there??? Or to the fiberglass chicken?
I love the fact the the MN ball of twine has its own museum! And free….when things like this aren’t free it’s such a turn-off. My husband and I love roadside attractions! We’ve got a pretty large roadside gnome near us here in NY.
Christy@SweetandSavoring recently posted…Travel Retrospective: Tamworth Castle, England
Yeah, roadside gnome! And I agree – it can be as bizarre or dorky as it wants to be as long as it’s free. Once you start charging, stuff gets unimpressive real fast. I went to the Neon Museum in Las Vegas because my best friend was DYING to go. Admission was $25 each. I was kind livid and it was definitely not worth it. It was worth $5 tops. Everything over that was highway robbery.
I can’t get enough of this stuff!
I try to check out this website when I’m going on a road trip for work: http://www.roadsideamerica.com
The weirdest / most beautiful things I saw within the last few years was definitely the Heidelberg Project in Detroit. Several homes were recently destroyed by arson and it makes me incredibly sad.
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I LOVE roadsideamerica.com. I definitely grew up checking out every site on the WeirdNJ website too. Another great website is roadtrippers.com – they have an app too – and when you enter your route, you can click “roadside attractions” and it’ll pop up every one within 10 miles of your route.
As a Minnesota native I of course have heard of the biggest ball of twine, but have never had the fortune to visit. In checking just now it’s only just over an hour away, so I may have to make it a day trip this summer!
Other favorite roadside attractions of mine in Minnesota include the bigger than life Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox statues, as well as the 55-foot-tall statue of the Jolly Green Giant.
In a nearby state, my favorite growing up was the giant Muskie at the Freshwater Fishing Hall of Fame in Hayward Wisconsin. You go inside the fish which is over 4 stories tall, and can come out onto a ledge in the fish’s mouth. Thought that was so cool when i was little.
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The giant Muskie does sound awesome! I wish I’d known about it when I drove through Wisconsin!
I love the attractions that small towns build to try to get you to stop. Some that I have seen over the years are:
-World’s largest buffalo
-World’s largest sausage
-World’s largest strawberry
-World’s largest pysanka
and I’m sure there are more.
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Wow. What’s a pysanka??
No, I’ve been on very few road trips and most were to go to a particular destination. Every time I bring it up, my husband just shakes his head. He’s NOT interested. Oh well. This is a HUGE ball of twine. Thanks for sharing with Countdown in Style.
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