Wild Travels
Episode 302
NATIONAL BEARD & MUSTACHE CHAMPIONSHIP, featuring THE WHISKERINAS Chicago, IL
One of the most popular segments in our first season (106) was our visit to the World Beard & Moustache Championship in Portland, so when our host was invited to be a judge at the Nationals in Chicago, he jumped at the chance – especially when he found out that this year’s competitors would include the fairer, but no less bearded, sex…
MYSTICS OF TIME – MARDI GRAS Mobile, AL
Not many people realize that the American version of Mardi Gras started not in New Orleans, but in Mobile, Alabama, and a masked organization called The Mystics of Time are keeping that proud tradition alive.
DRAGONMAN Colorado Springs, CO
Brooklyn-born Mel Bernstein’s alias is Dragonman, and his Colorado Springs compound has a guns & ammo store, a motorcycle that shoots flames, a firing range, and its own road (“Dragonman Drive”), but the real attraction is the 68,000 square foot museum featuring military paraphernalia from every war that America took part in, and includes the disturbing “Nazi Room.”
FAINTING GOATS Mobile, AL
Sharon Reeve’s farm has a menagerie of animals wandering around the premises, but it was her goats that really caught our attention – her fainting goats, to be more specific. Why these particular goats tend to stiffen and topple over when startled is scientifically explainable…and highly amusing.
CATHEDRAL OF JUNK Austin, TX
Chances are you’ll always remember your first glimpse of the Cathedral of Junk, a 120 ton pile – sorry, “installation” – of discarded objects sitting in a backyard on the outskirts of Austin. If you call ahead, its creator might just allow you through the gate for a closer look at this magnificent monstrosity.