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BOWLING GREEN, Ky. — Bowling Green drivers got a shock this week as a giant piece of fruit rolled down Nashville Road.
The Big Banana Car has been traveling the country and made its way through Kentucky.
Steve Braithwaite, owner of the Big Banana Car, has been driving his fruit on wheels for more than a decade.
“To my knowledge, it’s the only banana car in the world," Braithwaite said. "But it’s in the Guinness Book of World Records as the world’s longest banana.”
Bowling Green residents said they were blown away seeing the enormous fruit on four wheels giving people rides up and down Nashville Road.
“I was like, ‘Oh, my gosh, this is a once-in-a-lifetime-type of thing,’" said Bowling Green resident Jennifer Dotson, who rode the Big Banana Car.
For Braithwaite, the car has been his entire life, driving his prized possession through many states and giving people rides in places he has stopped. He had been wanting to build an extravagant car for many years, but was not sure how to design it.
"Everything I saw, everything I looked at, I thought, ‘Could I turn that into a car?’” he said.
But one day, Braithwaite stumbled upon a banana in a gas station. For him, it changed his life.
“I pick it up; I’m studying it, and I’m like, ‘The wheels would go there, the windshield, the bumper, the seats,’" Braithwaite said. "The lady behind had to tap me on the shoulder; they all must have been thinking, ‘Oh, my God, is that the first banana he’s ever seen?’”
The idea was set in stone. He began working on the Big Banana Car in 2009, working Sundays and, occasionally, weekdays to get the job done. The Big Banana Car has been on the road since 2011 and was built from a 1993 Ford pickup truck.
The rest was history, serving up smiles by people who got to ride on a fruit with wheels.