Quoted from Methos:You should be coming up to the new soda museum/shop
You mean Pops in Arcadia?
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We went there last time. Cool place. Sodas by the thousands!
We have left Route 66 now, we are heading south west down to Roswell.
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We are out of Texas now, back in NM.
Just stopped in Clovis for a coffee ... not much happening in Clovis, just quietly ...
rd
Quoted from rotordave:So, if you find yourself around Amarillo anytime soon, be sure to check out the Big Texan Steak Ranch.
You may be foolish enough to try the 72oz Steak challenge, where you have to eat all this in under an hour ... a Shrimp Cocktail, Baked Potato, Salad, with Roll, Butter, and of course the 72 oz. Steak.
I struggle with a 16oz ribeye, but somehow a little 125 pound lady ate all this food in 4 1/2 minutes - that’s the record so far. Crazy.
[quoted image]
[quoted image]
Always good times at the Big Texan!
rd
[quoted image][quoted image][quoted image][quoted image][quoted image][quoted image]
That 125 pound lady also ate 3 of those 72 oz steaks including the sides in less than 30 minutes.
Quoted from Pinless:That 125 pound lady also ate 3 of those 72 oz steaks including the sides in less than 30 minutes.
That is simultaneously one of the grossest and most fascinating things I have seen.
That boggles the mind. It took me 30 mins to eat a 16oz last night, just with a few fries and some coleslaw. And I was struggling ... she ate over 200oz plus a heap of other stuff ...
rd
Quoted from TenaciousT:Maybe she was from Roswell ?
Maybe! But I haven’t seen her as yet.
The town certainly has got onboard with the alien thing!
Little green Aliens everywhere. Even the McDs is a flying saucer.
rd
8A8ABCC0-595A-46EC-8DE5-F42B1815B3A8 (resized).jpegEAA01134-819E-4B79-973A-70491483BDF5 (resized).jpegEF5F4008-E9FC-4B4B-8C18-3421608AB20E (resized).jpegQuoted from Pinless:That 125 pound lady also ate 3 of those 72 oz steaks including the sides in less than 30 minutes.
It looks like she doesn’t even chew just rip and tear and swallow. Crazy
I’d like to know what happens afterwards and the coming days. I get it that she has trained and stretched the stomach but the body still has to digest
Quoted from lancestorm:I’d like to know what happens afterwards and the coming days. I get it that she has trained and stretched the stomach but the body still has to digest
I’d predict a long period of constipation ... 
rd
Next time you’re in Texas, come through Austin and we can show you some great places to eat, drink, catch a concert and play pins.
Quoted from Pinless:Next time you’re in Texas, come through Austin and we can show you some great places to eat, drink, catch a concert and play pins.
Thanks! Austin is a cool town. Bats!
We went there two years back after TPF. We did a lap around Texas ...
rd
Quoted from Pinless:That 125 pound lady also ate 3 of those 72 oz steaks including the sides in less than 30 minutes.
.. must put a visit to Roswell on the list after a TPF one year.Roswell is a lot bigger than I expected.
It has a population around 48,000.
I’m pretty familiar with the “Roswell thing” that happened in 1947.
This History Channel page summarises it pretty well.
https://www.history.com/.amp/topics/paranormal/roswell
Interestingly, the “craft” crashed about 75 miles out of Roswell in Chaves, not in Roswell at all. But the Roswell Army Air Force was dispatched to clean up the mess, so I guess that’s why it’s all about Roswell.
The actual crash site was on a huge ranch owned by Mack Brazel. The site was inaccessible until about 6 months ago, when the new owners organised visits to the place. The price, $200 - $250 per each.
The “aliens” have bought a lot of money to Roswell.
We will explore around the town tomorrow.
rd
697B0D96-0DA4-40FD-B666-713BDE5B67C1 (resized).jpegQuoted from mrWol64:I also want to track down the Texas diner that was in Pee Wee Hermans Big Adventure with the dinosuars outside!!
That Pee Wee movie scene was shot at the Wheel Inn Restaurant in Cabazon, California. Just a stone's throw from INDISC in Banning.
It looks like the restaurant has been torn down, and only a sign remains. But the dinosaurs are still there.
Quoted from mooch:That Pee Wee movie scene was shot at the Wheel Inn Restaurant in Cabazon, California. Just a stone's throw from INDISC in Banning.
It looks like the restaurant has been torn down, and only a sign remains. But the dinosaurs are still there.
Quoted from mrWol64:Ah well,.. side trip to Cabazon then ,.. need a good road trip excuse
I’ll find it and post some pics in a week when I’m there.
rd
Quoted from rotordave:I’ll find it and post some pics in a week when I’m there.
rd
Quoted from Jackontherocks:I believe the Flintstones place is for sale for those interested.
So, we were talking about this today - Fiona was getting all jazzed about how cool it would be if it was all done up ...
So I did some research - it went on the market in 2015 for a crazy $2 meeeellllion doolaaaaarss. I said today it’d be cool if we got it for nothing lolll
The only catch, you 99.9% won’t be able to use any of the Flintstones likenesses. Which makes it worth $0 really. As far as I could find out, the Arizona one is still for sale.
I found a really well written piece on the history of the Bedrock parks - there were originally 4 of them - well worth the read if you have a spare 5 minutes.
https://www.theawl.com/2016/03/amidst-of-the-rubble-of-bedrock-city/
rd
36110617-F5F7-475C-906F-C1373C5E2997.gifHad a good look around Roswell today.
They’ve really adopted the Alien thing which is cool.
Take that away - there’s really not much else going on.
Every street lamp has some $1 Alien eye stickers on it, which really works for the theme ... genius!
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Here’s the Courthouse .. nice building.
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The Main Street has an office building with no windows. That must be good to work in ...
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There’s a nice statue of John S Chisum, who was one of the founding ranchers in the area. Info on the sign!
Quoted from rotordave:So, we were talking about this today - Fiona was getting all jazzed about how cool it would be if it was all done up ...
So I did some research - it went on the market in 2015 for a crazy $2 meeeellllion doolaaaaarss. I said today it’d be cool if we got it for nothing lolll
The only catch, you 99.9% won’t be able to use any of the Flintstones likenesses. Which makes it worth $0 really. As far as I could find out, the Arizona one is still for sale.
I found a really well written piece on the history of the Bedrock parks - there were originally 4 of them - well worth the read if you have a spare 5 minutes.
https://www.theawl.com/2016/03/amidst-of-the-rubble-of-bedrock-city/
rd[quoted image]
We camped at the one in South Dakota in 1976. It was an incredible place back then, lots of people all the buildings were really cool. I saw it three years ago when we visited Custer and it was a dump.
That article really points out how The Flintstones is a dead franchise. Even the Yogi Bear/Jellystone brand is doing better.
Quoted from Methos:That article really points out how The Flintstones is a dead franchise. Even the Yogi Bear/Jellystone brand is doing better.
Like anything though, I think if it was done well, the people would come there. The Arizona location is near the Grand Canyon, there were a heap of people filtering through the other day, even though it needs a bulldozer through it to be honest.
Like Roswell with the Alien thing. Heaps of people at the Museum today, and around town, just on the strength of Roswell promoting the Alien story. It’s not like you can see an alien (there weren’t any!) ... or even the crashed balloon/craft, or the crash site ... they’re just here because it’s “a thing” they saw in a book or a tv show or on the net.
There’s heaps of examples of that on Route 66. Make it, and they will come! (Hopefully). Lol
So, on to Roswell ... the town promotes the Alien story well, like I said. It’s the only thing drawing people to the place. They town pays for the Visitor centre, which was small but very proactive.
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The guy in there had free maps, stickers, frisbee things, all free for the visitors. They have a couple of aliens you can pose with, he takes three photos and prints you out free colour prints and you can email them to yourself, again, free ... really good promotion for the town. Other places could really learn from these guys.
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They organise events like the Roswell UFO Festival to draw in visitors .. check out the green dog ...
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rd
We left Roswell and headed to El Paso.
We decided to go via Carlsbad, to check that out.
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As Icey said earlier in the thread, there are famous caverns at Carlsbad but they’re closed by the government shutdown at present.
Carlsbad itself wasn’t too exciting, I checked out the pawn shop - lots of guns, but not so many guitars ...
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It was funny on this drive - every vehicle was a F150 type truck. Hardly any cars on the road, all trucks. And none had anything on the back. Just an observation ...
The drive to El Paso (as was yesterday’s drive to Roswell) was 1000s of acres of amazing nothingness. There is just so much land out there with nothing on it. A bit like driving through Nevada.
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After Carlsbad, you hit the Guadalupe Mountains National Park - up the top it was very frosty.
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rd
Quoted from rotordave:As far as I found a really well written piece on the history of the Bedrock parks - there were originally 4 of them - well worth the read if you have a spare 5 minutes.
https://www.theawl.com/2016/03/amidst-of-the-rubble-of-bedrock-city/
rd[quoted image]
Thanks for posting the link!
Quoted from rotordave:It was funny on this drive - every vehicle was a F150 type truck. Hardly any cars on the road, all trucks.
Quoted from rotordave:The drive to El Paso (as was yesterday’s drive to Roswell) was 1000s of acres of amazing nothingness. There is just so much land out there with nothing on it. A bit like driving through Nevada.
So what do you do if your last meal isn’t settling so good and you are in the middle of that vastness? Squeeze the buns and gun the rental?
Quoted from lancestorm:So what do you do if your last meal isn’t settling so good and you are in the middle of that vastness? Squeeze the buns and gun the rental?
Road side poop?
There was a rest stop at the top of the mountain road (where the frosty trees were) and then you’re on your own for the 114 miles into El Paso. Clench tight!
rd
2796854D-32FB-46A9-9DA4-986DE303B5D4 (resized).jpegQuoted from rotordave:Road side poop?
There was a rest stop at the top of the mountain road (where the frosty trees were) and then you’re on your own for the 114 miles into El Paso. Clench tight!
rd[quoted image]
You’re no where near a Buccee’s, you’re SOL.
Quoted from Pinless:You’re no where near a Buccee’s, you’re SOL.
RD if you haven't already for sure stop at a Buccee's if you see one.
Quoted from PoBoyPinball:RD if you haven't already for sure stop at a Buccee's if you see one.
Pretty sure I went to one when we drove around Texas 20 months ago ...
None this far west, unfortunately...
rd
61F2C9E6-037A-4260-930F-3C852F5F9308 (resized).jpegPure gold in this thread Dave... I’ve seen a lot of this country, but still wonder sometimes if you haven’t seen more.
I think we are at 42 states? The boss knows ...
Today we had a good look around El Paso.
We drove up to the top of the hill where they have a lookout.
El Paso (USA) and Juárez (Mexico) are separated by the Rio Grande river.
This is what a piece of water can mean ...
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(2017 figures ..)
Panorama!
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Oh yeah, the weather was much nicer today - clear skies, no sign of snow, and temps around 50F.
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Then we cruised around town for a while and drove to the El Paso ballpark - the home of the El Paso Chihuahuas!
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They play in the minor league Pacific Coast Legaue. No big deal, but the Mrs had seen the logo and formed the opinion it was “cuuuuuute!!” so off we went to get some merch.
The stadium was brand new, and there was a fan store open every day for fans to buy stuff, even in the middle of winter.
Then we set off on the long drive to Tucson, Arizona.
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First stop (for coffee and a leak!) was a little town called Deming. Good coffee, cute little buildings in the Main Street.
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Back on the highway, we went off at a real ghost town, called Steins.
This was a wagon stop town, established in the 1850s, and then gold was discovered nearby, bringing more people to Steins.
The railway followed soon after, and Steins was away! Only one problem, Steins had no water source, and it all had to come on the train.
After WW2, the train company decided it didn’t want to run water to Steins anymore - but offered to take the residents to wherever they wanted on the train as compensation. Pretty much everyone upped and left overnight - thus creating a ghost town.
In 1988 a guy called Larry Link bought all that remained, and operated Ghost Town tours at Steins. He was murdered in 2011 (I don’t know the story there ...) and the place has been fenced up since then. As it was today when we visited.
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EDIT - curiosity got the better of me and I dug up some info on Larry Link.
https://www.abqjournal.com/85647/ghost-town-to-reopen-as-murder-stays-unsolved.html
rd
Quoted from MrBally:El Paso, the home of Gottlieb Pinball circuit boards at 6 Butterfield Trail.
Take a trip to J-Town if you dare, especially after dark.
I was keen to go to Juárez... the girls not so much.
Especially after Danni read this ...
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rd
America has great road side rest areas for truckers and motorists (and their pets) ... as discussed yesterday, there are vast areas of nothingness, and all that Coca-Cola needs to come out sometime ....
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This one in New Mexico was a slight concern though ... don’t veer off the footpaths ..
AD41E6FD-964C-4DA5-9B58-01884F3EADE8 (resized).jpeg
And these toilet cubicle doors were clearly designed by Seabass ... you can just look over the top of them. “Hello, Lloyd Christmas ....”
Hit Tucson ... checked into the hotel, and headed out into the city to check it out.
The historic downtown area has all been restored, it’s all looking very trendy and full of hipster shops.
It’s all pretty cool ... it’s been done by a non-profit formed by the local government and businesses, and by the looks of it, they do pretty much everything. They will even sort you out a building for your business.
https://www.downtowntucson.org/invest/available-commercial-properties/
Downtown is where you’ll find D&D Pinball. We popped our heads in the door to check it out.
It’s in a cool renovated building that possibly used to be a workshop of some kind, by the looks of it.
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Inside, brick walls and exposed timber beams have all the hallmarks of a cool hipster hangout!
They had a good range of pins, around 30 in total, ranging from 1960s EMs like Buccaneer through to SW and BM66. Good to see a wide selection of pins!
Quite a few people came in while we were there. Nice!
Had a great day today. We headed off to Bisbee down near the Mexican border.
First stop was Tombstone, the famous western mining town, and scene of the famous “gunfight at the O.K. Corral”.
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The Corral was basically the transport hub of the 1800s - if you were visiting the town, you could park your horse there, and locals could hire a horse or a buggy if they needed to go anywhere. Most townsfolk didn’t own a horse, so they needed to hire one if they needed one.
Corrals were sorta like the Avis of the day. Haha!
There were around 8 Corrals in Tombstone in the late 1880s.
This isn’t the original O.K. Corral - that burnt down in 1882 but was rebuilt soon after.
And here she is!
We decided to pay the $10 and get the full O.K. Corral experience, including a live show and a very good 30 minute video/animatronic show (narrated by Vincent Price!).
The show was your normal hammy sort of thing, on the lot next to the Corral, but they played through the shootout story nicely.
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The famous 1881 shootout wasn’t actually in the O.K. Corral! It was a few doors down from the rear gates, next to Fry’s Photographic Studio. There was another recreation of the shootout in this area, with some recorded commentary and the occasional movement from the animatronic figures.
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In Fry’s studio, they had copies of his 1800s photos there, which were great! He had pics of Geronimo the Native American leader, and all his guys, as well as heaps from around the area. Very interesting.
After that, we watched the 30 minute video which had an interactive model behind the screen, it was pretty interesting. $10 well spent!
They had this period hearse there. It would take a while to do Route 66 in this baby!
rd
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Quoted from zerbam:that hearse could be your new pin hauler
“Can you deliver that pin to me? I’m only 50 miles away ...”
“Yep, I’ll leave now and be there next week some time ...”.
rd
Tombstone was cool to walk around.
The street was much wider than the other old towns we have been to.
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Tombstone was a major silver mining town in the 1870s-1890s. At the height, there were around 12,000 people living there.
However, it all went pear shaped when they struck water down in the silver mines, and they couldn’t reliably pump it all out.
Eventually when the silver price dropped, it all got too hard and almost everyone left town.
The only thing that saved Tombstone was that it was the seat of government for the region - later that was given to Bisbee and the population plummeted- until someone decided to bring in the tourists, spurred on by all the western movies inspired by the area and tales of Wyatt Earp.
Most of the buildings are from the 1880s - 1900. Pretty cool!
rd
2F5E6D35-338D-4ED2-950D-4754FA4D5DB3 (resized).jpeg5AC635BE-B0F9-4BE2-9D5B-27B547F8B62E (resized).jpeg9912FAEC-907F-44D4-BF95-5795AF4D81E5 (resized).jpegC3219E6E-8C4C-4B1C-BFA3-8BFD135E3A80 (resized).jpegQuoted from rotordave:.
They had this period hearse there. It would take a while to do Route 66 in this baby!
rd
[quoted image][quoted image]
No problem though, if that’s your ride you have all the time in the world
Around 2pm we decided we better have a beer, so we went to the famous Big Nose Kate’s Saloon.
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The original building here was the Grand Hotel, which burnt down in 1882 fire.
Now it is named after “Big Nose” Kate, a Hungarian immigrant and prostitute, and eventually Doc Holliday’s wife. The name of the place suggests that Kate owned the hotel, but I can’t find anything that says that she did. She may well have run a brothel there though.
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The place was cool, there was a guy playing some classics on his keyboard and sax, and cracking some bad jokes as well. Some of the folks got up for a dance.
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Nice big beer ...
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I can’t believe I haven’t seen other pubs urinals done like this ... clever!
Tombstone - cool place!
Then we headed 30 miles down the road to Bisbee.
Bisbee is another mining town, mainly copper.
Click for the panorama!
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Bisbee was incorporated in 1902, a lot later than Tombstone, which you can see in the much more modern turn-of-the-century mainly brick buildings.
Mining ceased here in the 1970s, but it started up again in 2013, mining copper and gold.
Cool place! Well worth a visit. A lot different to Tombstone, with way more of an arty hippy vibe to the place, with art galleries and vintage clothes stores.
rd
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Highland Charter Township, MI
Moe