#33 - Jungle Jim's International Market

You can't go on a cross-country road trip without having some new experiences.  Our family has driven I-70 from Colorado to Pennsylvania many times. Several trips back I saw a flyer for a 6-acre grocery market. 6 acres!!! That's even bigger than the Bass Pro Shop which baffled us. It quickly earned a spot on my "gonna see it one day" list.

However, Jungle Jim's International Market is in the vicinity of Cincinnati. http://www.junglejims.com/ That poses a small problem for our I-70 treks, as Cincinnati is NOT along I-70. And when you're about 18 hours into a 24 hour drive, you usually don't want to take a couple hours to detour just to see a grocery store (even though this isn't "just a grocery store.")..

So, this trip presented the perfect opportunity. Since we were stopping at various sites along our way in order to show our Korean student more of America, I just planned a stop in Cincinnati and a visit to Jungle Jim's.

Think regular grocery store combined with Sam's Club combined with flea market combined with cheap Disney imitation attraction.  That's pretty much Jungle Jim's.  Yes, it is HUGE.  It would really take me the better part of a day to fully explore it.  I knew that our approximate one hour visit would just be the tip of the iceberg, and I simply accepted that I wouldn't be able to experience everything that Jungle Jim's had in stock. So, here's a quick summary of just some of what we saw:

• Kangaroo, alligator and ostrich meat (picture follows below). BTW, Kangaroo meat runs $14 per pound.
• More honey varieties than you could ever imagine, including Key Lime honey and peanut butter honey (picture follows)
• Chocolate covered potato chips (we bought some--picture follows. They weren't that great. There was too much chocolate to really even taste the chip)
• Some kind of Thailand fruit that looked like a blowfish and cost $15!
• Indoor fish farms
• Quisp cereal (people of my age--do you remember that?)
• More types of peppercorns that I even knew existed.
  
  


While it was a quick trip, it was fun.  We ended up dumping over $100 on various oddities and treats (although that DID include gifts for the grandpas).  If I lived in the area I doubt I would do my weekly shopping there. It is simply too overwhelming (although their prices were quite good).  I think we mad the right decision in not detouring from our previous road trips. But, since adventure #34 was also in the vicinity, I am glad we took the time to see Jungle Jim's.