(upbeat music) - [Will] This week on Wild Travels, an entire episode at one of the strangest festivals we've ever attended, Frozen Dead Guy Days in Nederland, Colorado honoring a very dead Norwegian who resides in a shed on a hill above town under 1200 pounds of dry ice.

The festival features coffin races, a polar plunge, a parade of hearses and a frozen t-shirt contest.

(upbeat music) - [Announcer] Wild Travels is made possible in part by Alaska Railroad, providing year-round transportation to many Alaska destinations, traversing nearly 500 miles of wild landscapes between Anchorage, Fairbanks, Denali National Park and more, AlaskaRailroad.com, by American Road Magazine, get your kicks on Route 66 and everywhere else a two-lane highway can take you.

American Road Magazine fuels your road trip dreams.

And by... - [Spokeswoman] It's a wild world, take care out there.

Wear a life jacket paddling or boating.

Learn more you otter do to keep you and the planet safe at mthoodterritory.com/otterdo.

(upbeat music) - [Will] If you look hard enough, go off the beaten track far enough, you'll find an America teeming with the unusual, the odd, the downright strange.

I'm Will Clinger and I'm your guide on a package tour we like to call Wild Travels.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music) Every March, tiny Nederland, Colorado plays host to thousands of revelers from all over the country, there to celebrate one of the most unique festivals in America.

Frozen Dead Guy Days honors a Norwegian immigrant currently residing on a mountainside above town under nearly a ton of dry ice.

We got the incredible story of how he got there from one of the festivals co-founders.

Teresa Crush-Warren, you're a voice of authority on this festival.

Just who was this frozen dead guy anyway?

- His name was Bredo Morstel.

- [Will] He died in Norway, but his family brought him over here to cryogenically freeze him in California, right?

- That is correct, he was actually cryogenically frozen in Norway and then his grandson Trygve had him transported to a facility in LA.

- But eventually to here where Trygve lived.

- Well, nobody knew that until 1994 when his mother, Aud, was trying to get a certificate of occupancy to live in this house that Trygve had started building.

Of course the town had to deny her the certificate of occupancy because there was no plumbing, there was no electric and when they said, no at a town board meeting, she turned to a woman sitting next to her and says, "But who is gonna take care of the frozen bodies?"

And at that point, chaos explodes.

The town had a knee-jerk overreaction.

- And there's all sorts of city ordinances against it, but somehow Grandfather Bredo got grandfathered.

The upshot is that Bredo is still frozen in a Tuff Shed here in Nederland.

And how long has Bredo, Grandpa Bredo been frozen?

- 25 years and he's thawed out a few times.

- How old would he be right now?

- He would 117 years old.

- [Will] And how did the whole festival get started?

- In 2002, I was president of the chamber of commerce and someone asks you, where are you from and you said Nederland, Colorado, they would say, "Oh, isn't that where that frozen dead guy is?"

- So why not take advantage of that by making it a festival and bringing people from all over the country?

Brilliant, Teresa, brilliant.

- So we have the frozen t-shirt contest, we have the frozen turkey bowling contest.

- There's a polar plunge.

- [Teresa] Polar plunge, the coffin races and the parade of anti cruises as well.

- Are they any closer to coming up with a cure for Bredo which would spell the end of your festival?

That's the purpose of cryogenics, isn't it, keep them alive until we come up with a cure.

- It is, but we haven't figured out how to reanimate them.

- [Will] After saying our goodbyes to Teresa, we hightailed it over to Grandpa's Blue Ball where the music was loud, the booze flowed freely and the presence of legally smoked cannabis was undeniable.

Here would be crowned the ice princess and the Grandpa Bredo look-a-like.

And all the contestants were doing their best to appear frozen.

(upbeat music) You're about to go up there, are you nervous?

- A little bit, there's a lot of good competition here.

- [Will] You look very icy, very frozen.

- I'm feeling a little stiff right now.

- I'm calling you a contender for the eyes only.

How did you do that, those contacts?

- These are contacts, yep, and they don't feel too hot.

- [Will] They look frozen, though.

- That's what I was going for.

- Is this your first attempt at this contest?

- No, I actually won the contest three years ago.

This is my medal that I won.

(upbeat music) - What's the theme?

- Dead bikers, cruising, the mountains, crash, froze.

- Well, you look very homogeneous.

- They drug my dead (blank) up here, I didn't have anything to do with it.

I was just chilling.

- You're a judge, what are you looking for in these contestants, what's gonna make a winner?

- What's gonna make a winner, enthusiasm and the ability to show up somewhat sober for the parade ride in the morning.

- That's a tall order.

- I know, I know.

- I would've done one half that way and one half that way-- - Yeah, we thought about that, but we're twins.

We're not-- - You're not attached at the face.

- Yeah, exactly.

- [Will] What are your chances do you think?

- I think our chances are slim to none.

- [Will] The twins were dead wrong as proven by their eventual victory walk in the parade.

(light music) The next morning, we drove up into the mountains with Brad Wickham, the caretaker of Grandpa Bredo's unlikely resting place.

This would be as close as we would get to meeting the actual frozen dead guy and seeing where he spent his days.

Brad Wickham, here we are at the residence... - [Brad] Of Grandpa Bredo, yeah.

- You're the guy that's put in charge of keeping Bredo frozen.

- [Brad] Right.

- You're part of a long tradition, how many people have done this before you?

- Well, there are only two, the first caretaker, the ice man, Beau, 18 years he did this.

- [Will] What year is this for you?

- [Brad] Three.

- So Brad, this is it.

This is where Grandpa Bredo is frozen.

- Right, he's frozen inside this shed inside a wooden sarcophagus.

- [Will] How often do you come and replenish the dry ice?

- Every two weeks has to be done, 900, 1200 pounds.

- Is that regular cryogenics, seems pretty basic.

- No, there's nothing regular about this.

(light music) - How cold is it in there?

- Negative 100, around there.

- [Will] Who pays for the upkeep of this darn thing?

- [Brad] His grandson, Trygve, who is the mastermind behind this whole cryonics experience.

- He's now back in Norway, he was deported.

- Right, overstayed his visa.

- It should be added, and this is not known by a lot of people, that Bredo wasn't alone here for awhile.

- No, there was another person that paid Trygve to store their loved one's body here too.

- A guy named Al from Chicago.

- Right, Al was first in this box on top of Bredo in a sleeping bag.

- That was cozy.

(Brad laughs) - Yeah, I hope it was an arctic sleeping bag.

- At least, that's even more basic cryogenics than we got now.

- Right, it's very basic.

(light music) - That's styrofoam there, huh, yeah.

When's the last time anybody's seen Bredo actually?

- When the box was sealed up and he was sent to California for the cryonics experiment.

- [Will] How long ago was that?

- 27 years, I believe.

This is his coffin.

- [Will] Looks like there's some chains on it.

- It is chained to the floor so we can discourage body snatchers.

Loading 10-pound blocks of ice on a metal casket causes vibrations and we're hoping he's not broken up in there.

- Are you a certified doctor?

(Brad laughs) - No, neither was Trygve a certified cryonics specialist either.

- There's a lot of amateur talent involved in this whole project.

- Right, wonder how you know feels about all this, but I guess we can ask him someday.

- You ever think, boy, they should just let Bredo rest in peace, give him a proper burial?

- Well, I sometimes-- - Then you'd be out of work.

- Well, no, I've got another job.

- This isn't your only gig?

- Yeah, this is not my only gig.

- At one point, we were joined by a fellow member of the media.

Stein, you're here covering Frozen Dead Guy Days for a paper in Norway.

- Yeah, I'm working for Aftenpoften.

It's the leading newspaper in Norway.

Approximately 50,000 people are visiting this town now during this weekend and because of this guy from Norway.

- So you're kind of proud of it?

- In a way.

- Brad, do you get a lot of people coming out here to pay homage?

- I do, we do sometimes get people that'll come up here on Halloween, on his birthday.

- [Will] Kind of macabre.

- Macabre things, yes.

(upbeat music) - Speaking of macabre, back in town, a slew of vintage hearses were lined up for a pre-parade display, but the main attraction may have been their owners.

Woman in black, hi.

- Hi.

- Is this your hearse?

- It is.

- You've definitely dressed the part.

This says death to me.

I don't know if it says frozen, it definitely says death.

- [Owner] Thank you.

- I'm the president of the Denver Hearse Association.

- Right now, you're just showing them off and then later, you're gonna be in a parade.

- We'll loop up around Nederland and come back here and park and then we usually hang out for about an hour and then go find something to eat.

- [Will] What's the fascination with owning a hearse, do you think?

- A lot of people get into it just 'cause they like the idea of the novelty.

- And they ride smooth, but they park hard.

- Well, you just have to get used to the dimensions of it.

- And they got plenty of headroom in case you have a tall mohawk.

- Yeah, that's one of the things I like about them.

- Zach, you own a very special hearse, one that spits fire.

- [Zach] That would be correct, that'd be my 1971 Superior.

- [Will] It's not here today though.

- [Zach] No, we just didn't have time to get it... We needed to do upper ball joints on it and we didn't get that done in time.

- [Will] I'm hugely disappointed.

Can we set something on fire?

- I don't have anything to set on fire today.

- [Will] That hairspray would probably go up in a ball of flame.

- Good guess.

- You take very good care of your hearse, sir, don't you?

- Yes, you have to take good care of them, yeah.

- Now, do you use this professionally or is it just for show?

- No, I drive them to and from work.

They're my work cars, yep.

- [Will] Oh yeah?

- Yeah.

- But you're not an undertaker.

- I'm not, that's pretty gruesome.

They ride great, there's just like a limo.

- [Will] This is your other hearse, the silver beauty.

- Yes, it's a 1988 Caprice.

In the back, we've got a couple skeletons.

That always gets people's attention driving down the road.

- You've even got a skeleton of a bird on the pirate's shoulder, that's thorough.

- That's very thorough.

- You're a guy with two hearses, that kind of marks you as eccentric.

- Well, one's my wife's.

- [Will] I am impressed with your hearse, sir.

It's tricked out to the max.

- When we put together this hearse, we did it with a theme of Phantasm.

If you notice the personalized plates, after the cemetery, all the stickers and everything on there are themed after the movie.

- My name is Demonica Rubber and my car's name is Doris.

She's a 1970 Cadillac Miller-Meteor.

- Looks like she's got a bit of the blarney.

- She does, we got a pot of gold here.

- Now, is it always dressed up Irish or do you change your theme every once in awhile?

- We change our theme every year.

Last year, we were killer clowns, the year before that, we were roadkill, the year before that, we were zombie prom queens.

- You're versatile.

- Yes, sir.

- What kind of action we gonna be in?

- Just talking.

- Okay.

Some bodies we could defile.

(upbeat music) - It was now time for the Frozen Dead Guy Days Parade, led off by a convoy of now familiar hearses.

- [Emcee] Is everybody having a good time?

(crowd cheers) (upbeat music) Ladies and gentlemen and anybody intertween, welcome to any Frosty virgins.

(upbeat music) - I am the grand marshal and the original co-founder of Frozen Dead Guy Days.

- Congratulations.

- Thank you.

- Hey, why don't you rev the egine, get the crowd worked up?

(engine revs) Yeah!

(crowd cheers) - Dead Man Days, Dead Man Days!

- Wait a minute, it's actually Dead Guy Days.

- Dead Guy Days, Dead Guy Days!

- [Will] The hearses were followed by our friend Teresa shilling for an upcoming Frozen Dead Guy TV series.

And behind her was a string of costumed pallbearers who would be competing in the coffin races later that day.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) You know actually it's Frozen Dead Guy Day.

- Frozen Dead Guy Day, Frozen Dead Guy Day!

(upbeat music) - [Will] Doggedly keeping to their theme, the festival organizers included such events as frozen turkey bowling, the newly dead game, and the frozen t-shirt contest about to take place.

- So they have to put their whole head through the head hole and then both arms through each of the arm holes.

- Your own head, your own body, the ground beneath you and your mind.

(upbeat music) - There's a bunch of different strategies, but the one you just saw was banging it on the ground.

- And thawing it.

- [Organizer] Thawing it on your body's a good strategy at first.

(upbeat music) - Don't give up, it's not easy.

(upbeat music) (crowd cheers) (crowd cheers) - You just won $20, you've gotta be excited.

- I am so excited, thank you.

- How did you do it?

- You know, I grew up in Northern Minnesota, I've been frozen half my life, so frozen hands, frozen body, frozen stomach, I was ready to do it.

- It seemed like the sleeve gave you the hardest problem.

- The sleeve, I had to get my foot in there to get some leverage to rip it open with my superhuman strength.

I put it on my stomach a lot.

- To defrost?

- Yeah, it almost made me throw up but I thought it was worth it.

- Next came the men's competition which would have a contentious ending.

(upbeat music) - One of the perks is you get your t-shirt, but who knows what it's gonna look like.

We don't make promises.

(upbeat music) (crowd cheers) - [Emcee] Oh, you're missing a sleeve.

- You said arm holes, you said arm holes.

You said arm holes.

(upbeat music) (crowd cheers) - Do you know somebody in the contest?

- Yes, Steven!

- How's he doing?

- Well, you're blocking our view, so we really don't know.

- Oh, sorry.

(upbeat music) Is that not against the rules, both on one sleeve?

- So they apparently said get your arms through the armholes, didn't say anything about sleeves per se.

- I took second place with style.

- Yes, exactly, yours is still intact, so I ripped off the sleeves, but apparently I had to get my arm through both.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music) - On the outskirts of Nederland, the freezing temperatures did not deter the participants in the polar plunge where the dress code was sparse and the style points for plunging even sparser.

What do you hope to experience there, nirvana?

- Yeah.

- Some hypothermia maybe?

- No, we're ready for this.

- We're pretty tough.

- Are you drinking anti-freeze?

- Bourbon.

- We're drinking bourbon.

(participants laugh) (crowd cheers) - It's patriotic and sort of nautical.

- Yeah, yeah, a little bit of column A, a little bit of column B.

- It's important to disrobe at the very last second, right?

- No not at all.

This isn't disrobing I showed up like this.

- Is this gonna be your costume to jump in?

- Of course.

- [Emcee] One, two, three, go!

(crowd cheers) - How did that feel?

- Invigorating, I feel great!

- You're making a huge mistake.

- Yes, agree.

- Yes.

- Not the first.

- [Will] What inspired these costumes?

- Well, we ran out of laundry, this is all we had this morning.

Said, hey, what the heck.

(light music) - [Emcee] Whenever you're ready.

- We saw you earlier, we didn't see you on crutches.

- A lot has happened since then.

(Will laughs) (participant laughs) (crowd cheers) - I think we're getting back in line to go again.

- Are you nuts?

- Yeah, yeah, no, I was nuts, now they're gone.

(crowd cheers) - [Will] Coming soon on Wild Travels, Whiting, Indiana's Pierogi Fest, Tombstone Arizona's authentic Bird Cage Theatre and Saloon, seized items at the National Wildlife Property Repository and the rowdiest spectator sport ever, unicycle football.

(upbeat music) What happens when you invite teams of six possibly inebriated coffin carriers and one pretend dead person to race through a muddy obstacle course two teams at a time, complete and utter chaos.

(upbeat music) The race course would test these competitors' strength, their stamina and their willingness to get really filthy.

It began with the mountain of death, followed by the hairpin turn of sorrow.

Then the coffin riders were required to exit their coffins and spin five times around a stick before encountering the dread log of shame.

If the coffin racers survive this, all that remained was the bubbling cauldron of mud before crossing the finish line.

- [Emcee] Looks like the winners are running for the next survivors.

- Very rudimentary coffin.

- [Mertz] Yep.

- [Will] Do you have a name for your team?

- We're the Mertz.

- You're the defending champions.

Do you expect to win this year?

- We'll see, we'll see, we're not getting our hopes up.

- [Will] What's the name of your team?

- Remains To Be Seen.

- I guess I should've figured that out.

- [Teammate] That's the bone zone.

- Now, who's gonna be inside?

- [Teammate] This is our corpse.

- Yes, I'm the corpse.

(upbeat music) (team cheers) (upbeat music) - [Will] Are you worried at all about taking a face plant or anything?

- I am worried about that.

- [Mertz] Yeah, that mountain there, you could get messed up.

- [Will] Calling it death.

- [Mertz] Oh wow.

- [Mertz] Seems appropriate.

(upbeat music) - You're getting a good foundation buzz before you start.

- I think you wanna be properly lubricated before jumping into something as serious as this.

- You know, it's kind of an obstacle course, you may get wet and dirty out there.

- I was wet and dirty when I got here, so we're all right.

- [Emcee] Team, you're almost home.

Oh, in the mud!

- You just finished, you're covered with mud, how does it feel?

- It feels great.

- It feels good.

- We came fresh out the mud, the mud.

- A cardboard coffin, that's about as cheap as it comes.

- We're trying to be eco-friendly in the way we do the races.

- [Will] Low tech, you sure that thing's not gonna fall apart when you start?

- We're not sure.

- [Emcee] Come on Team America.

- [Emcee] Chance to get even.

You have to use the stick, Rick.

- [Emcee] Come on, five times around, which is probably two times too many.

Team Awkward, Awkward, you can do it!

Don't fall off the balance beam.

(crowd cheers) - [Emcee] She's gotta do it again.

- [Emcee] Okay, this could be another upset.

(upbeat music) - [Participant] With tequila.

- [Emcee] It's a close race, oh!

- [Emcee] Wow, okay, these dead lawyers are beautiful lawyers, I like their theme and you know what?

That's a bunch of ribbon.

- [Will] Have you made it to the third round?

- No, we just got edged out by the doctor team.

- Any bitterness?

- Hell no!

(participant cheers) - [Participant] You're looking at the winners.

- We've already won, the other teams just don't know it yet.

- [Will] By process of elimination, the field of 25 was winnowed down to two finalists, Star Wars and Team Awkward and consistent with the rest of that day's coffin clashes, this race began with near catastrophe.

By the log of shame, the Star Wars team had taken a commanding lead.

Would they now successfully cross the bubbling cauldron of mud?

No, they wouldn't.

But they still managed to pull out a win, much to the chagrin of the vanquished Team Awkward.

(upbeat music) (crowd cheers) With the Ice Princess and the Grandpa Look-a-like crowned, the parade paraded, the polar plunges plunged and the winners of the frozen t-shirt contest and the coffin races declared, it was time to bid a fond farewell to Nederland.

Here's hoping that one day they'll manage to reanimate old Grandpa Bredo so that he can leave that shed and take part in the annual party that honors this very frozen dead guy.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) We're always looking for new destinations, the wilder, the better.

So if you've got an idea for our show, let us know and thanks for watching.

(upbeat music) - [Announcer] Wild Travels is made possible in part by Alaska Railroad, providing year-round transportation to many Alaska destinations, traversing nearly 500 miles of wild landscapes between Anchorage, Fairbanks, Denali National Park and more, AlaskaRailroad.com, by American Road Magazine, get your kicks on Route 66 and everywhere else a two-lane highway can take you, American Road Magazine fuels your road trip dreams and by... - [Spokeswoman] It's a wild world, take care out there.

Wear a life jacket paddling or boating.

Learn more you otter do to keep you and the planet safe at mthoodterritory.com/otterdo.

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