Lucy stands stall in front of an 80 foot tall Van Gogh replica.

On our recent road trip, I was introduced to my wife’s tradition of looking for roadside attractions along the way. Thanks to Roadside America, we had a wide variety of things to see that could break the monotony of the drive.

Fifi in four states at once

Some of the attractions had historical value, like Custer’s Last Stand: Little Big Horn (Crow Agency, Montana), Four Corners Monument (near Shiprock, New Mexico), and Billy the Kid’s grave (Fort Sumner, New Mexico). A few we would have done even if we hadn’t found them on Roadside America, like the Seattle Underground Tour (Seattle, Washington). The Berkeley Pit Overlook (Butte, Montana), a former pit mine now holding a toxic lake, was a surprising but informative stop. Even the Statue of Victim of Sewage Tank Collapse (Spokane, Washington) taught us a bit of local history.

Yep, it looks like a milk bottle

A few of the attractions only merited a glance out the window as we drove by, like the Plumber Guy (Moab, Utah), the Church of God-Zilla, Zilla, Washington, the Milk Bottle Building, (Spokane, Washington), the Center of the Universe (Wallace, Idaho), and Our Lady of the Rockies (Butte, Montana).

There were inevitably a few disappointments. We were unable to get our car to roll uphill on Gravity Hill (Salt Lake City, Utah). Excitement built up to a crescendo as we approached the Wonder Tower (Genoa, Colorado), but it was closed indefinitely by the time we arrived.

A house carved into a mountain

Other worthwhile distractions on trip were the World’s Longest Aerial Tramway – really more than just a roadside attraction (Albuquerque, New Mexico), Hole N’ The Rock (Moab, Utah), Spider VW Bug (Lexington, Oklahoma), Teapot Dome Gas Station (Zilla, Washington), Dick and Jane’s Spot (Ellensburg, Washington), Fremont Troll (Seattle, Washington), World’s Largest Easel (Goodland, Kansas), Glenn Goode’s Big People (Gainesville, Texas).

My lovely wife even submitted one of the attractions to Roadside America – Danger: Falling Cows (Manson, Washington).  But there was one roadside attraction that clearly stood out as her favorite. Which one? The World’s Largest Ball of Twine (Cawker City, Kansas). Now we’ve been there, done that.

That’s one big ball of twine