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"A Visit to the Produce Section"
Valley of the Dinosaurs book (Rand McNally)
Writer: Kathleen N. Daly
Artist: Phil Kantz |
An earthquake leaves Greg and Tana stranded
on the wrong side of the river.
Story Summary
Greg and Tana are out gathering greens,
with Digger and Glump tagging along, for that evening's supper
when an earthquake strikes, changing the course of the nearby
river directly towards them. The two pets are far enough away to
avoid harm, but the two humans are forced to jump onto and climb
a nearby tree trunk, only to discover it was actually the neck
of a Brontosaurus, which then moves and slopes down in
such a way as to deposit the two on the opposite side of the
river.
Digger and Glump run back to the cave to
bring back help. The Butlers and Gorok's family follow and see
the two stranded children. Gorok notes that the water is still
too rough from the quake to cross the river in canoes. Katie
comes up with an idea to use a tree to catapult a rope end, tied
around a large rock, over to the elevated promontory on which the
two kids are stuck. They successfully accomplish the plan and
Greg and Tana tie their end of the rope to a tree and propel
themselves hand-over-hand to the other side of the river,
narrowly avoiding the hungry jaws of a plesiosaur in the water
below.
Reaching the other side with Tana, Greg
quips to his mom, "Next time you want greens for supper, just
send me to the nearest supermarket!"
THE END
Notes from the Valley of the
Dinosaurs Chronology
Greg seems surprised to see a giant turtle
on page 2 of the story, suggesting it takes place some time before his
family's use of a giant turtle shell as a boat in
"A Turned
Turtle".
Didja Know?
This story does not actually have a title beyond the title of
the children's book,
Valley of the Dinosaurs. I made up the title
"A Visit to the Produce Section"
myself to distinguish the story from the overall series of
Valley of the Dinosaurs.
The pterosaur seen in the background on the cover of the
book appears to be a Pteranodon. The sauropod in
the water is harder to identify from a distance; it appears
to be quite large, even for a sauropod, and the top of the
head seems somewhat bulbous, suggesting it may be a
Brachiosaurus.
On the double-page title page of the book, there is a
one-paragraph introduction to the series which begins,
"After their boat is destroyed in the rapids of a river,
Professor John Butler and family are washed into the
unreachable Valley of the Dinosaurs, deep in Brazil's Amazon
region." This reveals for the first time that the
valley is within the Brazilian portion of the Amazon (about
60% of the Amazon rainforest lies within the nation of
Brazil). But, during the opening theme of the series, the
rubber raft on which the family travels down the Amazon
River is not destroyed; it emerges with them from the
underground cavern, seemingly intact, into the Valley of the
Dinosaurs, though it did apparently sink after the Butlers'
rescue from the water by Gorok's family, as it is seen at
the bottom of the lagoon in "S.O.S". Also, the paragraph's description of the valley
as "unreachable" is obviously not true since the Butlers
have reached it, however unintentionally!
Also on the title page of the book, the characters are all labeled with their names, except for the
hapless pets, Digger and Glump.
On page 4 of the story, Glump seems to be so terrified of
the earthquake that he appears to be shedding a tear!
On page 7, Tana refers to one of the local brontosaurs as
Pea Brain. It doesn't seem likely she or her clan came up
with this name herself; it sounds more like something Greg
or Katie would have said as a joke and it stuck.
On page 10 of the story, the plates on Glump's left-hand
side are actually emerging from just above his legs instead
of on his back!
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