Unfortunately our plan to visit in Dallas Fort Worth was not to be. Unexpected events prevented the visit, but I get way ahead of myself.
We left Denver, with a much improved route provided by Den's oldest son, roaring down I 25. Out of the corner of Den's eye he caught the Shepler's sign on the left. As we pulled off we saw a good price Phillips 66, fueled, coffeed, and soda'd ( I'm the soda or is that pop in CO?) Our adventure at finding Shepler's turned to a real comedy of errors. See in CO, it is mostly impossible to back track along the outer roads. We just could not locate Shepler's. So having found I25 south again we roared back south. But wait ... we see (both of us) Shepler's (did I mention Shepler's is a Western wear shop?) and this time are successful at locating Shepler's. But wait ... it is 9AM CO time and Shepler's opens at 10AM.
On the road again, south on I 25 passing through Trinidad CO continuing to Raton NM. There was a lure to turn right and go to Taos NM and visit a casino there. That would have added at least 2, maybe 3, hours to the day. The decision, a hard one, was to turn left on US 64 & 87 East towards Amarillo TX. We did stop at Pappa's for lunch, soup and a prime roast beef sandwich, we did fuel up, and buy a trinket or 2 for the brides waiting so patiently at home.
We found the $39.99 Travelodge with our reservations. The clerk recommended a place called Macaroni Joe's for dinner that turned out to be very good. Chicken marsallis over pasta and lasagna with Italian sausage, all very good. We returned to our cheap motel and settled in for the night. Of all the places we've stayed, this qualifies at the bottom. We wanted to get to bed early because we assumed a long trip on Tuesday due to plan changes. We had decided to run along I 40, cutting out Natchez, and going directly to Tunica MS, so the reason for the Headline.
Look at the map, see how I 40 runs through the pan handle of Texas directly into Oklahoma (look left to right)? After a while on I 40 in OK we spot casino signs, grab our trusty Casino's of the World book circa 2005, but the ones on the signs are not mentioned. The stars aligned just right, we pass through Oklahoma City and about a half hour East of the city is a brand new one called Firelake Grand Casino, it is about 12:30. We pull in. If you sign up for the players card your given a $10 credit on slots and $5.00 off the buffet. The catch is, to play blackjack, you must ante $0.50 per hand. I joined a table that was just beginning and the shoe was HOT. Before the end of the shoe I had doubled my money. I colored up and we went to lunch for less than $10.00 total for both of us.
We passed several additional casino's along I40 but did not stop, we were winners for the day. We stopped for the night in Little Rock, Arkansas, had a lite pizza at Shotgun Dan's, across from Don's Weapons, a fine repast. Our waitress had prison tats, go figure.
Mel
