Henry and I decided to visit the two attractions housed under the same roof; Ripley's Believe It Or Not! and Louis Tussaud's Wax Works, in downtown Newport, Oregon.

We began with Ripley's. 

Ripley's is a totally unique exhibition filled with an arty, bizarre, macabre and downright weird collection of oddities and curiosities. The Ripley museums were founded by Robert Ripley who traveled the world seeking out artifacts to add to his weird and wonderful collection. His passion for the mysteries of the world eventually lead to the creation of a newspaper feature in New York at the turn of the twentieth century called "Believe It Or Not!" Due to the extent of Ripley's collection and the public's growing desire to see it, Ripley's Believe It Or Not! museums sprang up all over the country.

I would buy Henry the annual book of "Ripley's Believe It Or Not!" every Christmas as he had been hooked ever since visiting the Ripley's museum in San Francisco when he was 8 or 9 years old. He loved the shocking pictures, questioned the reality of some of the artifacts and poured over the narratives trying to weed out fact from fiction. He was fascinated.

Henry and I are both drawn to the strange and the imaginative, so Ripley's travels, explorations and mysteries delighted us at every turn. Though it was little creepy in places.

We enjoyed some wonderful artwork made of burnt toast, buttons, bottle caps, and trash. We measured ourselves against the world's tallest man and the world's largest boot. At 6' 4" tall, Henry and his Nike dunks were dwarfed by them. We saw a display of shrunken heads, animals with two heads, a footballer with three legs, twisted costumed creatures with violet eyes, historical artifacts, and an array of other unbelievably strange things.

A highlight was The Star Room where we immersed ourselves in the sensations of floating in space surrounded by twinkling stars. We even had the opportunity to complete a space walk. It was all out of this world.

We then moved on to Louis Tussaud's Waxworks that leaned towards superheroes, science fiction, scary movie characters and fantastical beasts. 

I enjoyed Lord Voldemort and Harry Potter duelling in an exhibition of Priori Incantatem from the movie 'Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.' Voldemort was screaming the green killing curse, 'Avada Kedavra,'  and at the same time Harry was screaming the red disarming spell, 'Expelliarmus.' The two spells collided, the twin cores of the wands became intertwined and the rare effect of Priori Incantatem occurred. It was magical to see it happen! My favorite exhibit of the day!

Henry enjoyed sitting next to Sheldon Cooper, placing himself on the set of Stranger Things (apt!) and kicking his legs up on the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office in the White House.

We also enjoyed all the movie references and marveled at the artistic waxwork recreations. Everything looked very real!

An astonishing day out in every way!

In July 2018, this franchise location of Blockbuster in Bend, Oregon, became the last of its kind in the US and in March 2019, it became the last in the world.

Renting VHS videos was a big deal back in the 80's when I was at college. Someone from our Halls of Residence would rent a load of videos on a Friday night, to be returned on Sunday. A weekend rental.  Then in our Common Room, in pajamas, eating pizza or toast, we would collectively watch until deep in to the early hours of the morning, video after video. I was horrified by Freddie and Jason, enthralled by Patrick Swayze's hips in Dirty Dancing, cheered and sobbed for Dead Poets, Lost Boys and the Breakfast Club, awed by Tom Cruise, the jets and the epic soundtrack of Top Gun, inconceivably, happily enchanted by the Princess Bride, watched rom-com Brat Pack movies on endless loops. Fabulous! My favorite movie at that time was the 80's classic, Ferris Bueller's Day Off. I think I have watched that movie more than 100 times. At home, I subjected my family to it so much, even my Mum and Dad were aware of Ferris and could practically quote the movie. 

The music, the humor, the wisdom. It reflected the 80's perfectly. I loved Ferris and Cameron and Sloane. Still do. 

So I stepped into the last Blockbuster and it was like stepping back in time. The familiarity of the place was strangely comforting. Even the smell of the place was familiar. I loved the movie posters on the walls and the promotional life-size cardboard cut outs. They mostly had VHS videos in the old hard cases arranged by genre, including a current chart displaying the faves, and new releases. They had some Blu-ray Discs in there too. You could still rent movies if you had an active club card with the store. Everything about the place made me smile and transported me back in time and there was no DeLorean involved.

They had a lounge area cordoned off with an old fashioned comfy couch, fluffy rug, coffee table and an old TV and video on a wooden console. It was magical. I felt I was right back in that Common Room at college. I was ready to snuggle down and watch a movie with friends.

I later learned you could actually rent the space as an Air BnB so you could spend the night in the store! Wow! Macarena cool!

After a good 30 minutes looking at all the videos, and enjoying the ambience and smell of popcorn, I finally left with a Ferris Bueller poster and an old video in its original case of Pete's Dragon. So much fun!