February 23, 2005

Go whale hunting. Inland. Do you have strange childhood memories of seeing a blue whale up close, but have never actually been to sea?

Me neither, but this guy did. Turns out he's not mad after all, he just saw a preserved dead whale on a low-loader. Now he wants to find it again. Check out his folly.

posted by kitfisto 19 years ago
  • Holey flying monkeys! That is sic man! And by that I mean cool
  • Strangely enough... I do! I remember going with my parents to see what I can only assume was the same thing, but in Cardiff. Perhaps the Blue Whale went on tour? I can't find anything about it online but I remember being very very small and the whale being incredibly big. I think I was about seven at the time (I'm 33 now!)
  • According to the whale chappy, it toured for about 20 years, so you probably did see it. apparently it started it's tour in Liverpool (my home), but I don't have any baleen-filled memories.
  • Wow. Never heard of a "traveling whale show," but it does make sense, I suppose. I would have paid a few $$ to see this. What an unusual find...thanks, kitfisto.
  • I just read that the tongue of a blue whale is equal to the mass of an elephant. Worthless trivia
  • Once, back in my California days, went to Point Lobos and saw the skeleton of a whale on the shore, still mostly intact, it's weatherbeaten bones looking remarkably like the grey, paint-peeled wood of an old, neglected farmhouse. Closest I've ever come to a whale -- you could walk between the ribs. And yet the beast, long vanished from its bones, was nonetheless impressive.
  • (glad yr back!)
  • http://news.independent.co.uk/world/science_technology/story.jsp?story=612871
  • Why use a lorry? Why not the whale-way? Groan
  • HI bees. Never seen a whale inland before, but I did see a couple of beluga whales in Tacoma/Seattle zoo or animal park (whatever it was called, I can't remember). I remember seeing a huge python at a traveling circus sideshow when I was a kid. I swear it was every bit as long as the trailer its cage was in. There was also a preserved frog baby in a jar, supposed to be half human half frog.
  • I never saw a whale, but I could swear that I did see a giant turtle when I was little. I have a very vague memory of it being outside on our street and me sitting on its back. I've questioned people about it since and no one else seems to remember it. Perhaps I should start my own internet investigation...
  • I saw a blue whale from a plane once, off Cape Cod. All I remember is a very long greyish blurry shape in the water, but I'm glad I saw him/her. Also glad to see bees! /joyful breaching, large splash
  • Preserved and daily re-coated in formalin, his insides were removed, lungs inflated with air, and a refrigeration unit placed in his belly well thank GOD i finally know what to do with my body once i'm dead
  • Hey, my grandfather announced that when he dies, he wants us to ice him down, throw him in the back of a U-Haul, and cart his dead butt up to the University of Missouri (where he's donating his body). If we can find a way to pull that off legally, I tell you what, I'm driving that damn truck.
  • Just drop him off at my lab, the hideous ape-men are getting hungry.
  • In Hermosa Beach, CA, around 1957 or so, there was a "Willy the Whale with the Detachable Tail," a grey whale (I think) that has been hit by a ship propeller and killed. It was in the Old Hermosa Beach Aquarium, on a truck. Maybe it toured. They had made the tail out of something and it looked fake. I don't remember a smell, or how it was preserved, but I remember seeing it.
  • Why use a lorry? Why not the whale-way? OK that is your pun for Feb. I am keeping track.
  • This reminds me of the best headline ever.