San Diego Great Dane named world's tallest dog

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Only one animal got credit for a record Thursday, the same day Norway registered the world's largest gingerbread man; the most people hugging in one minute were in the U.K.; Italy set the mark for the fastest consumption of a bowl of pasta; Finland had the most nationalities in a single sauna; and a team from Mexico assembled the world's longest paper clip chain---...More

World's first camel-milk chocolates going global

DUBAI (Reuters) – Dubai's Al Nassma, the world's first brand of chocolate made with camels' milk, plans to expand into new Arab markets, Europe, Japan and the United States, its general manager said Tuesday.

Martin Van Almsick said the United Arab Emirates company planned to enter Saudi Arabia first, followed by Bahrain, Qatar, Kuwait and the United States within the next few months.

The company plans to enter the Saudi market in a month through a partnership with a Jeddah-based distributor, said Van Almsick, adding the company plans to deliver the first ton of chocolates to Saudi Arabia soon.

Al Nassma is also in talks with British department store Harrods and San Francisco's Chocolate Covered to sell its products.

Al Nassma was formally established in October last year and aims to produce 100 tons of premium camels' milk chocolate a year.

In partnership with Austrian chocolate maker Manner, Al Nassma manufactures the end product at its Dubai facility.

With 3,000 camels on its Dubai farm, the company sells chocolates through its farm-attached store as well as in luxury hotels and private airlines. It plans to launch an online shopping facility within a month, Van Almsick said. The farm is controlled by the Dubai government.

The company is set to open its second store in the UAE in one of Dubai's large malls and is in talks with mall operator Majid Al Futtaim and others, he said.

"We aim to be the Godiva of the Middle East," Van Almsick said in an interview. "It's a luxury product, so we will never be in supermarkets. The plan is to be in one mall in each UAE city."

Al Nassma is also looking at the possibility of setting up a store in Japan, where demand for the product is high, he said.

All chocolates are produced without preservatives or chemical additives with a range of locally popular spices, nuts and honey, the company says.

Camel milk contains five times more vitamin C than cow milk, less fat, less lactose and more insulin, making it a good option for diabetics and the lactose intolerant, Van Almsick said.

(Editing by Will Waterman and Paul Casciato)

The World's Tallest Stuff

The World's Largest Man-Made Islands

Perhaps no structure on this list more embodies the original impulse behind the tall building — pure human hubris — than Dubai’s Palm Islands. Composed of three separate islands, Palm Jumeirah, Palm Jebel Ali and Palm Deira, the entire construction will add nearly 330 miles of beach front to the city of Dubai. Parts of Palm Jumeirah are currently open for development, with the remaining islands to be completed in the next 10-15 years. When finished, the three islands will contain over 100 luxury hotels while Palm Deira itself will be almost as large as Paris.


The World's Tallest Dam

Construction began on the Nurek Dam (984 feet) in 1961 while the central Asian nation of Tajikistan was still a republic within the Soviet Union, and was completed an efficient 19 years later. The dam provides 98 percent of Tajikistan’s electrical needs and was one of the first to be constructed with an asphalt central core of cement forming an impermeable barrier along the Vakhsh River.



The World's Tallest Hotel Not in Dubai

Though eclipsed both by Dubai’s Rose Tower and Jumeirah Emirates Tower, the Baiyoke Tower II in Bangkok, Thailand, nevertheless boasts 88 floors and 673 guest rooms. The 997-foot Tower is located in Bangkok’s Ratchathewi district known for its shopping and its 1.5 mile long artificial lake.


The World's Tallest Monument

Commonly known as the “Gateway to the West” the St. Louis Arch, designed by renowned architect Eero Saarinen, marks the starting point of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. The arch is surrounded by a 91-acre national park along the Mississippi River and stands 630-feet-tall. Visitors can take a four-minute tram ride up one of the “legs” of the arch to the observation deck at its center for spectacular views of St. Louis.


The World's Tallest Hotel Never Actually Completed

Destined for greatness, the Ryugyong Hotel in Pyongyang, North Korea, stands at 1,083 feet, was supposed to boast 105 floors and 3.9 million-square-feet of floor space, and was meant to have seven revolving restaurants. Not surprisingly this towering pyramid’s construction was put on hold in 1992 when North Korea confronted more pressing matters. What remains is the pyramid itself, but it lacks windows and fixtures and has been deemed unsafe for human occupancy.


The World's Tallest Casino (sort of)

Unsurprisingly located in Las Vegas, the Stratosphere Hotel & Casino boasts a 1,149-foot-tall observation tower and restaurant, making it the tallest free-standing tower in the United States. While you can be shot straight up 160 feet in the air, or ride a mechanical arm over the Tower’s edge, there are no actual games in the tower itself.


The World's Tallest Bar

On the 87th floor of Shanghai’s Jin Mao Tower–literally “Golden Prosperity Building”–is the appropriately titled Cloud Nine. In February 2001, cocktail-sipping patrons observed Han Qizhi, a 31-year-old shoe salesman, climb the 1,214 foot tower barehanded.