In our quest to indoctrinate the world with the “Go BIG” message (MWAH HA HA!), we have ventured off in a few different directions of late. For “Show and Tell” today, may we present:

appSmitten.com

The first exciting development we’d like to share with you is that Matt and I are the new – and only – travel app reviewers for appSmitten.com! This site hand-selects the best apps in several categories (food, kids, health, news, education, etc.), then sends you weekly or daily recommendations via email to help keep you organized, entertained, productive, etc.

Our first reviews describe the brand new app for the iPhone and iPad, the Travel Channel Layover Guide With Anthony Bourdain, and a handy Android app, Packing List. Stop by and check us out on appSmitten! (Disclaimer: we receive a small commission each time someone we refer to the site signs up to receive the e-mail service.)

Kelley’s Break Room

Kelley’s Break Room is a really funny humor blog I’ve been following for a while. I was tickled – and a bit like “who, me?” – that she considered me humorous enough to write a guest post last week! In my oh-so-compelling post, 5 Ways to Create a Family Vacation You Can Actually Afford, I offer some ideas to incorporate fun into cheap (sorry, “budget-friendly”) family travel. While bringing the funny. I hope I succeeded; what do you think?

The Azumano Travel Show

The Azumano Travel Show, a radio program on AM860 radio in Portland, OR, interviewed me last week about our strange compulsion to visit BIG roadside attractions! The best question they asked me: “If you could build a world’s largest, what would it be?” Hint: My answer involved food. Naturally.

You can listen to the five-minute program right on their website. Mom says I sounded “professional.”

Measuring up to 90 feet, the Diplodocus was one of the longest animals ever to walk the earth.

Dinos rule. The Girl knows this. She likes her animals fierce.  She also appreciates a take-no-prisoners approach in plant life — her favorite is the Venus Flytrap.  I’m not worried.

Where we went, and who was coerced into going:

As we found out on our recent road trip, Pittsburgh is dinosaur country. In 2004, a public art project called DinoMite Days commissioned artists to create 100 uniquely decorated fiberglass dinosaurs, which were installed throughout the city. We discovered several which remain on public display.

WHY did you go there, exactly?

For the real dinosaur deal however, we knew we had to go to the Carnegie Museum of Natural History, home to the world’s largest collection of Jurassic dinosaurs.

Okay, what was so cool about it?

Walking through the “Dinosaurs in Their Time” hall gave us quite an education. Now I know that the Jurassic period was the middle of the three stages in the Mesozoic era (and the others are the Triassic and Cretaceous periods. Look at me how smart.)

Read the rest of this entry »

SOMEONE had to pose with the half-naked performer with perfect teeth.

The Philadelphia International Flower Show, the world’s largest indoor flower show, opens TODAY – Sunday, March 4— and runs through March 11. We were fortunate enough to attend the “Preview Day” yesterday.

Held at the Pennsylvania Convention Center, this annual show features a fun new theme each year. This year, it’s “Hawaii: Islands of Aloha.” We (and by “we,” I really mean “me”) were intrigued by the promise of waterfalls, waves, and volcanoes. Some of us (Matt) would have preferred being at the MAAC college basketball tournament in MA. Luckily, there is a Dunkin’ Donuts in the convention center, so at least he was able to caffeinate.

Because we’re coming to you live (or very nearly so), we’re departing from our usual format and instead providing this list of reasons why you MUST make it here for the Flower Show, before it’s over.

Top Five Reasons To Attend the 2012 Philadelphia International Flower Show

The Hawaii showcase area

Through sight, sound, and scent, this corner of the convention center space transports you. It begins at the main entrance, as you walk under a “wave,” a tunnel of curved screens playing audio and video of underwater scenes. You’ll occasionally catch a hammerhead shark passing overhead.

The exhibits to the right include a tall waterfall with a pool and tropical garden at the bottom; another display with a thatch roof hut where the hula dancing shows are held several times a day, and other walk-through trails under flower-covered trellises.

Read the rest of this entry »

Andy, the "RoboThespian"

I married a geek. Three years later, I gestated his miniature. So it’s not a stretch to say that the world’s largest robotics exhibit would be something of interest to these two. But here’s the thing. Even if you’re not a geek (or haven’t outed yourself yet), you’re still going to love roboworld™, the world’s largest permanent robotics exhibition,  at the Carnegie Science Center in Pittsburgh.

Where we went, and who was coerced into going:

On our road trip to Pittsburgh, PA last week, the four of us spent the morning at the Carnegie Science Center. NOTE: A single morning was not enough time. I hated myself for having to rush the kids from exhibit to exhibit.

Bad Mommy: “No more Bernoulli Effect for you! Keep moving!”

WHY did you go there, exactly?

Did you know that there’s a $500 billion emerging robotics industry in southwestern Pennsylvania? Pittsburgh, then, was the natural location for roboworld, which opened in 2009. This $3.5 million exhibition occupies 6,000 square feet, with three distinct areas featuring robots sensing, thinking, and acting.

roboworld at the Carnegie Science Center

Okay, what was so cool about it?

The Science Center is four floors of pure geek revelry, but roboworld is on the second floor. You’re greeted by Andy, the life-sized RoboThespian™, who you can program to speak and move via touch screen.

Along one whole wall is a robot Hall of Fame showcasing robot replicas from popular movies and TV shows spanning several decades. The Boy was overjoyed to see C3-PO and R2-D2, while Matt and I related more HAL 9000 from “2001: A Space Odyssey,” and Robby from “Forbidden Planet”.

"Can I trade my sister for this?"

Practically every exhibit had some interactive component, so you could spend hours just in roboworld. (But you do want to leave time for the other exhibits, especially the model train village right next door).

Read the rest of this entry »

A week ago today, we road-tripped to Pittsburgh, PA for the long President’s Day weekend. We have much to share over the coming weeks about the BIG things there.

Our first meal was at the original location of Primanti Bros., a culinary institution which was recommended by pretty much everyone. It’s known for BIG sandwiches with a wide selection of fillings.

Matt, always up for a BIG artery-clogging challenge, ordered this hot sausage and cheese monstrosity:

The fluffy bread was the only "light" part of this 'wich!

When you order sandwiches with “the works,” you will get tomato, cole slaw, and – oh yes – French fries. ON the sandwich.

Read the rest of this entry »

Electra Woman and Dyna Girl first appeared on the Krofft Supershow in 1976. I may have wanted to be one or both of them. Photo credit: Sidandmartykrofft.com

While I don’t broadcast my age, my frequent references to 70’s pop culture should leave little doubt that I’ve been here a while. Today I learned something I didn’t know about Sid and Marty Krofft. Do you remember watching The Krofft Supershow on Saturday mornings, anywhere from 1976-78? Well, in 1976, they masterminded the world’s first entirely indoor theme park – The World of Sid and Marty Krofft – inside the Omni Center in Atlanta, GA.

Leading up to the entrance was the world’s longest freestanding escalator. That escalator is all which remains of the attraction, which closed after only six months. This part of the complex is now the headquarters of CNN, and the escalator leads you from the lobby of the CNN Center up to the public tour.

Many thanks to Jen at Two Kids and a Map for the trip down Memory Lane. And for this month’s guest post! Jen and her family just got back from Atlanta, where they took the long ride up the world’s longest escalator which led them to the start of the CNN tour.

Here’s her escalator experience:

Where we went, and who was coerced into going: 

We went to the global headquarters of CNN for their Inside CNN Studio Tour while spending a long weekend in Atlanta, Georgia.  It is the largest of the network’s 48 bureaus worldwide.  Besides being the largest CNN  bureau, it also houses the world’s longest unsupported escalator.

World's longest freestanding escalator

WHY did you go there, exactly?

Read the rest of this entry »

Our love of BIG has its limits. Bugs are usually beyond our scope of warm regards. Although we did love this gigantic Cootie.

This one is kinda cute too, no? Mainly, because it’s not alive.

Big bug, small state.

Do you know where it lives? Ten points to the first person who tells us! Extra points for specificity. (By the way, “specificity” is my new favorite word.)

Here’s a hint: my friend Nellie, yet another “Go BIG” convert, took this photo for us…and could only do so safely because she was sitting on the passenger side.

UPDATE: Poor Mr. Nibbles Woodaway, living a life of obscurity, even though he is the world’s largest bug! Only three people chimed in with the correct answer. Our facebook friend Bill S. was the first to name his location: on the top of the New England Pest Control office building in Providence, RI. He’s a 30-year old, two-ton, 58-foot termite, and an icon you can see from the southbound side of I-95.

This blog is so much more to me and my family than a hobby. As well as a continuous source of amusement as I try to describe it to people! “I write a blog. You know, a personal website. On the internet. Our family visits world’s largests, and then I describe it on the blog. Yes, large attractions and events. Have you heard of the world’s largest ball of twine? Like that.”

So I was really satisfied – and well, proud – to find out yesterday that I won two awards – a gold and a bronze — from the North American Travel Journalists Association (NATJA) for two posts I wrote last year!

We earned the gold in the “Internet / Family Travel” category for this post about our visit to The Big E, or the Eastern States Exposition. It’s the state fair of Massachusetts and several other New England states, and it’s where you’ll find the world’s largest traveling amusement park, the North American Midway.

The highlight of that trip, however, was trying the Craz-E burger — a bacon cheeseburger sandwiched between two halves of a glazed doughnut. When Matt set his eyes upon it, he got a glint in his eye I haven’t seen since our first date. “Lustful” is an apt description.

Read the rest of this entry »

See, the problem with taking frequent family road trips is that it gets to be a part of you, and you end up needing to hit the road as frequently as possible. We didn’t travel anywhere this month. It’s killing me.

However, staying put gave me the opportunity to plan out our next several adventures. Travel planning is almost as fun as the travel itself; without all the back seat fight refereeing. (“Stop singing in your brother’s ear. Let your sister pick the DVD. Give him back the pretzels. Did you just take her last sip? LET’S ALL PLAY THE QUIET GAME!!”)

In a few short weeks, the Go BIG family is wheels up! Here’s what the next few months look like:

February – Pittsburgh, PA

The world’s largest permanent robotics exhibition – “roboworld” – at the Carnegie Science Center

The world’s largest collection of Jurassic dinosaurs at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History

Credit: Joshua Franzos for Carnegie Museum of Natural History

Read the rest of this entry »

What passes for excitement in these parts is seeing not one, but TWO “world’s largests” in one day. In September, we went to the world’s largest DIY Festival, the World Maker Faire, held at the New York Science Center in Queens. It was A. MAZING. But this post is about globes.

On the walk from the parking lot to the main gate, we stopped by the world’s largest globe. The Unisphere in Flushing Meadows-Corona Park was built for the 1964-1965 World’s Fair as a symbol of world peace. It is 140 feet high (that’s 12 stories) and 120 feet in diameter. Made of stainless steel, it weighs 900,000 pounds! It is stationery. It is beautiful.

Wearing our goofball T-shirts in front of the Unisphere

Of course, we’ve also seen another BIG globe, specifically, the world’s largest rotating globe, at the DeLorme headquarters in Yarmouth, ME.

Read the rest of this entry »