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You know what one of my favorite things out West was? ALL THE DINOSAURS. Dinosaurs everywhere, man! I think if you’ve been following this blog for any amount of time you’d know that I love giant roadside attractions and dinosaurs are certainly one of my favorites.
The majority of the ones we found were in Arizona and we just happened to stumble upon them, some with help from the Roadside America app. The ones I’m most excited about though? The two in the last pictures! They’re kind of famous. They’ve been featured in a few different movies, most exciting to me being Pee Wee’s Big Adventure. If there’s one place from any one movie that I’ve ever wanted to visit, it was these dinosaurs. So stoked to cross them off my list!
“Dinny”, the Apatosaurus, is actually a gift shop. I was elated to be able to go inside him. It’s surprisingly roomy inside. There were even pressed pennies available to purchase. Score!
xoxo
All of the photos above were taken with a pentax k1000 and Fujifilm 35mm Superia X-TRA 400.
30 comments
Huh, who would have thought there would be so many dinosaurs out west?! I tried to pick a favorite but it was just too darn hard! They're all so neat! I've always wanted to travel out west one day, but all your photos are making me want to go NOW.
Riiight!? It kind of happened all of a sudden too. One day we found one dinosaur then all of a sudden every few minutes we were stumbling upon them. It was awesome!
You won't regret it! This is road trip everyone should make at least once, seriously. Best week ever!!
ha ha…. been there before. We lived in Arizona for a couple of decades and there was some strange, yet wonderful and fun things along the roadsides. Glad you enjoyed Dino and all his dino friends. LOL
Yeah, we were kind of blown away by all the strange roadside things in AZ. I'm already itching to go back.
These remind me of Pee Wee's Big Adventure movie! Love all your pics!
You didn't read the post, did ya? 😛
Love the variety! I'm planning Dino themed road trips in my head already!
I love the one by the rock shop sign that looks like it's sitting on an invisible chair, and the one in the 6th photo down is awesome! I can't believe one of them is a shop, that's amazing! I hope I can get out there one day and see all this awesome stuff, I've always wanted to roadtrip around the US.
Haha, invisible chair dinosaur was one of my favorites. I still can't figure out what position he was supposed to be in, but hey, I guess invisible chair best describes it.
The paper-machey looking guy with the legs coming out of his mouth is by far my favourite! So goofy.
chloex
All around that one were weird paper mache looking animals that for some DUMB reason didn't take pictures of! Totally regretting it now.
You could not have made a better decision to use film for these photos. And I have always wanted to explore the inside of a dinosaur! Could you imagine if they did the store to look like intestines and a heart, et cetera? (It didn't look like that, did it?)
Thanks Carly! I'm so happy with all my film photos from the trip.
DUDE. That would be awesome. Seriously, that would just be the coolest thing ever.
OK, dinosaurs are seriously awesome and I would move to the US just for them 😉
Haha! Better get movin' then, there are tons of them here!
i went to the pee wee dinosaurs last summer! so amazing! i was kind of bummed you didn't get to press the penny yourself, which is silly because all you usually do is turn a crank. it didn't seem as fun to just buy it from the girl at the counter for some reason!
I know, me too! The guy told me they had one where I could actually make it myself inside the museum (or whatever it was) but I didn't really want to pay admission just to crank the handle myself. I guess a penny, even if I didn't get to crank it myself, is better than no penny.
Ahhhhhh these are the BEST! And a pressed penny machine as well?? What. A. Dream.
Wow, I neeeeeed to see these in person. The one that looks like it's eating someone is my favorite. I laughed so hard when I saw it.
Omg what a cute place!! xx
Ahhh!! I want ALL the dinosaurs! Love it! Obviously I need to take another trip to Arizona.
Damn this is cool, i wish we had roadside dinosaurs in the UK <3
The Quirky Queer
Haha, did they have any cool dino goodies in the apatosaurus gift shop (aside from the pennies)? Pretty awesome! 🙂
Nah, mostly just junk in there! It was still really cool to get to go inside him.
The placement of the gas signs in the 3rd photo up is making me laugh. I'm far too childish.
No! Not Childish! I was kind of bummed no one else mentioned it because I thought that was such a perfect shot with the gas sign. I love that picture so much!
Awesome!! i love dinos, we don´t things like that here in Central America, maybe in a park but nothing like in USA.
xo
The Pee Wee dinos! I'm officially jealous. Lol.
These dinosaurs are so rad! I loove that you shot these with film too, it just adds to the aesthetic <3
Do you have a blogpost where you have your pressed penny collection displayed?
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