Day 15, July 17: Greenville to Washington

Waffle House, again? Yep.  Waffle House is good.
 
The last day was, predictably, a day of drudgery and traffic and "Get the hell out of my way!"
 
Aside from the obvious reason, it was notable for a great food find at lunchtime. We were determined to have barbecue, and at Exit 191 on I-85, doggone it, we found it.
 
Bob's Bar-B-Q, in the Creedmore-Butner, N.C., metroplex, was just what we wanted. Friendly people and good food in a place with enough obviously local people to be authentic but enough cleanliness and spaciousness not to be scary. We had the sandwiches -- pulled pork North Carolina style, with a vinegar-cayenne sauce. Slaw on top for me, not for Jacqueline. Not my favorite style of barbecue, but pretty darn good.
 
Even better was the Brunswick stew. A hard dish to describe -- think of a slightly spicy of the best bean-with-bacon soup you've ever had, only with baby limas instead of navy beans and some sort of barbecued meat instead of bacon. Authentic versions use squirrel, I understand, but I think this was pork or chicken. Whatever it was, it was great. The sandwich was filling enough that I couldn't make much of a dent in the "small" portion, though, so I got a lid for the foam container and tossed it in the cooler.
 
Right outside Washington, we hit rain, and the coincident traffic. We hadn't seen rain since very early in the trip, so we couldn't complain too much.
 
The house was still there. Only one newspaper out front, but our hold-mail order didn't work, so we had a little trouble opening the door. But we were grateful to have the mail.
 
That's about it. Two weeks, 5,339 miles, many tanks of expensive gas. It was great. 

 

Day 14, July 16: Biloxi to Greenville

Now comes the unscripted portion of our trip. Biloxi was our last scheduled stop. The mission now was to get home as soon as possible.

First we had to get out of Beau Rivage. We got up early and had a very good buffet breakfast, comped because of Jacqueline's high-roller play. (Coffee was still lousy, though.)

The Southern hospitality that Beau Rivage showed us on our arrival did not extend to our departure. The first-class valet-and-bell-desk we had encountered had been replaced by surly incompetents. Oh, well.

There had been talk of ... oh, hell, I don't remember at this point, but whatever mini-plans we might have had were spoiled by the biggest traffic jam I've ever been caught in, just past Montgomery. We barely moved for about two hours, and we didn't even get the satisfaction of seeing what caused it, though evidence suggested that a truck carrying sand dropped its load.

The new lunch plan: burgers at Krystal, the White Castle of the South. Without too much further delay, we found a Krystal in Auburn. I didn't even know there was a city of Auburn in addition to an Auburn University, but there it was. And quite a pretty town, too. I'm not sure I could tell Krystal burgers from White Castle burgers in a blind taste test. I'll take either, thank you. For the record, our home is about four hours from a White Castle and about 5 1/2 hours from a Krystal.

We were behind schedule, but not so far behind that we would abandon our pilgrimage to Athens, Ga. Jacqueline the Gator is no University of Georgia fan (and no Auburn fan, for that matter), but we're both big R.E.M. fans from way back. And so we got on the long, slow road from Atlanta. I've never seen so many Jamaican restaurants (sample names: Jamaica Me Crazy, Kool Runnings) or legal centers for people trying to beat DUI raps.

Athens was nice enough, but it didn't exactly give us an R.E.M. vibe. I suppose getting out of the car might have helped.

The haul-ass portion of our trip was decidedly understated, thanks to hunger and fatigue. It ended up being an 11-hour driving day, after all. We planned to stop in North Carolina -- Greenville, Spartanburg or Charlotte. Greenville came first, and Greenville won.

Part of the fun of a night without destination was going to be the ability to choose among hotels that we had actually seen, but that, too, ended up being a bit of a bust. We chose a La Quinta, based on previous experience and a general feeling that the chain is a cut above many of its low-priced competitors. We were disappointed this time, but this was no time for lingering in hotel rooms anyway.

It was 10-ish, and even though it was a Friday, we didn't want to take any chances food-wise. So we hurried out and drove the main drag. I was resigned to something along the lines of Ruby Tuesday, and it ended up being Chili's. We had the baby-back ribs that they sing about on those obnoxious commercials. Not bad. The cinnamon apples that come on the side were an unexpected treat.
 

Day 13, July 15: Biloxi

Well, as it turned out, she hadn't lost. I learned the next morning that Jacqueline had hit a bonus four-of-a-kind on double-bonus video poker for $400 or so. That cemented it: We had to stay another day. Jacqueline made the arrangements, but our deluxe suite was no longer available. Movin' on down! The regular old losers' room wouldn't be available right away, so we headed down for breakfast. The line for the buffet was intimidating enough to send us out into the swelter and across the street to Waffle House.
 
To be honest, it doesn't take much to get us to Waffle House.   We were able to change rooms not long after breakfast. Nice standard room, about the same as the Bellagio standard room, but no more Jacuzzi tub, no more VIPs-only elevator, etc.  
 
The rest of the gambling at Beau Rivage is a bit of a blur. Suffice it to say we didn't come out ahead. Some ups but more downs at video poker. Some nice blackjack sessions, but not enough to offset the rest.  
 
While Jacqueline was doing battle with the machines, I decided to check out the beach. In Biloxi, it seems, the Gulf coast is not so much a destination as a part of the landscape. I had to walk under a series of freeway overpasses (crouching, in some cases) to get to a usable part of the beach. Lots of trash, quite a few visible jellyfish, one homeless guy. I finally got to a spot that people were actually using. There weren't many people, though, and I couldn't shake the image of those jellyfish. The cell phone rang as I was heading back. Jacqueline was done gambling, for now.  
 
I was already in swimming mode, so we decided to try the pool. It was more crowded and less atmospheric than at night, but it was nice.  
 
Beau Rivage has a great selection of restaurants, but the hours of operation leave something to be desired. For a late lunch, there were few choices. We wanted just a little something, to leave room for a good meal at one of those restaurants, so we headed to the snack bar. What caught our collective eye there was ... cheesecake. Pretty good cheesecake, but lousy coffee. (And such small portions!)  
 
There was more gambling. (See above.)  
 
Dinner was at Memphis Q, a barbecue-joint-and-steakhouse sort of affiliated with the adjoining brewpub. I tried the beer sampler, which included three amazing selections, one just-fine selection and one outright dud. When in Biloxi, avoid the "amber."  
 
I insisted on checking out the Thursday-night-only tiki-style nightclub at the pool. We were actually allowed in! We made one lap of the area and got back into the air conditioning.  
 
There was more gambling. (See above.)  

Day 12, July 14: Bossier City to Biloxi

Enough gambling. Now for more gambling. But first there's New Orleans.

We got a late start leaving Bossier City. Breakfast was in the same casino coffee shop. It was fine, but nowhere near as good as the previous meal. Substandard service, substandard coffee.

We stopped in Alexandria, La., to find seltzer and replenish the cooler. It wasn't easy to find a supermarket amid the gritty industrial stuff. I spotted an "A" on a sign and said, "Albertson's!" We got to the sign and found that it actually meant Alexandria Mall or some such. But there was also an Albertson's. Freaky.

I took the wheel, and Jacqueline got some much-needed rest. Around Breaux Bridge, La., I missed out on a Calvin Trillin moment by not stopping at the Texaco station whose billboard advertised boudin and cracklins.
 
It seemed to take forever, but finally we got to New Orleans. First time for me; Jacqueline had been before but hadn't really gone to the French Quarter. The Vieux Carre was as impressive as advertised. Because we hadn't really been sure when we would arrive, and we were pretty sure we wanted a meal on the informal side, I managed to screw up the food planning in one of America's foremost food cities. The only real plan was to get to Central Grocery for muffalettas. We didn't really plan far ahead enough to figure out where the place is, though, or to realize just how early it closed. Or that it's pretty much a carryout operation. After a mini-death march, we settled on Pierre Maspero's, which looked historic and informal and had a muffaletta on the menu and may or may not be a tourist trap but was in the right place at a time when we weren't eager to walk any farther.
 
My muffaletta was ... fine. As was Jacqueline's ham and cheese. The most notable thing about Pierre Maspero's was the presence of club soda as a beverage choice actually listed on the menu. 
  
Biloxi is only a couple of hours from New Orleans. We took the scenic route along the Gulf shore through Gulfport. No complaints. We've never seen such a concentration of Waffle Houses.
 
We had some inkling that Beau Rivage was a reasonable facsimile of Bellagio (for the uninitiated, that would be the Las Vegas casino where we got married), but we were in no way prepared for just how striking the resemblance is. The eerie wonderfulness of it all got even more eerily wonderful when the lack of a non-smoking room with a king-size bed led to our paying an extra 75 bucks to upgrade to a suite. We also started thinking about how we might be able to rearrange our schedule to spend a second night in Biloxi.
 
It wasn't quite the suite we had at Bellagio in early April of 2000, but it was close enough to put big smiles on our faces. Two bathrooms, whirlpool tub in one and luxurious shower in the other. Many TVs. Huge living area and separate huge bedroom. Floor-to-ceiling windows. His and hers bathrobes.
 
We headed downstairs to gamble but decided as the elevator neared the pool/spa floor to check out the facilities. It wasn't quite 9:30, and it turned out the pool was open till 10. In a rare moment of spontaneity, we hit "up" instead of "down" and hurried back to the suite for our swimsuits. There's nothing like a quiet swim after dark to really get that "I'm on vacation" feeling.
 
Relaxed and showered, we finally made it to the casino. This was no Horseshoe Bossier City-style disappointment in comparison to the rest of the hotel. No, this was ... Bellagio. The same smell, the same floral canopies. Unlike Bellagio, though, there were $5-minimum blackjack tables in prime time. We settled in and played for about two hours, and it was one of the most orderly winning sessions we've ever had. And we both won, both of us to the tune of about $100.
 
We headed to the coffee shop for a little something. I was ready for bed, and I went upstairs. Jacqueline was ready for some video poker. I was awake when she returned, and when she didn't mention her winnings or losings I assumed she had lost.
 

Day 11, July 13: Abilene to Bossier City

Breakfast was a simple visit to the hotel lobby for the free "expanded continental" bar. Then we were off to Dallas and Dealey Plaza, as close to a religious destination as these two non-religious people have. That required making our way through the fabled Metroplex, and just outside the area we were introduced to the ever-diligent Texas Highway Patrol. I had the Explorer on cruise control around 80 in a 70-mph zone, and that was apparently soooooo unsafe that it required a trooper to make a Dukes of Hazzard U-turn across the median and dart in front of highway traffic to stop such lawlessness. We got off with a warning, and then we saw the same guy stop the first guy he spotted once we went on our way. Between there and Dallas we saw at least half a dozen people pulled over, plus a lot of people driving a lot slower than you'd expect. The scare tactics must be working. You have to wonder what in the world this police state is thinking when it would rather have 100 cars doing 60 on top of one another than see somebody speed up and stay the hell out of the way.

I had already been to Dealey Plaza, but Jacqueline had not. It's surreal to be on a city street and see the familiar sight of the Texas School Book Depository and the grassy knoll and the triple underpass and the stockade fence and the Zapruder parapet. We really needed to find a restroom, so we paid 10 bucks each to go into the Sixth Floor Museum, as the depository is now known. It's an OK museum, but nothing special. You get to look out a window near Oswald's window, but the actual sniper's nest is behind glass. No photos are allowed inside, which is a shame.

We then made our rounds in the plaza itself, taking plenty of pictures. Then it was a quick walk to lunch with my blog friend Nicole, a copy editor at the Dallas Morning News. Good company plus good barbecue at the West End branch of Sonny Bryan's.

You don't really appreciate the Bible Belt-ness of the Bible Belt until you turn on the radio. Nothing but Bible. We listened to one Christian talk show that was particularly amusing. A particularly dim caller wanted to know whether there was any biblical basis for some stupid small-talk expression involving God that I had never heard of. The ultra-sincere hosts answered patiently, but the caller kept asking stupid follow-ups. We finally gave up.

The long drive to Louisiana was worth it. When we booked a room at the Horseshoe in Bossier City,we expected something gritty (like the Horseshoe in Las Vegas). What we found was luxurious by any standards, let alone Bossier City, La., standards. The room was nicer than the standard rooms at Bellagio. The three-level casino was a little disappointing in its video-poker selection and its low-ceilinged smokiness, but there was $5 blackjack and $5 craps, which we hadn't expected. The blackjack conditions could be among the best in the nation: It's a six-deck shoe, near as we could tell, but the dealer stands on soft 17 and you can resplit aces and you can double after splitting non-aces and, for those (not us!) who count cards, the "penetration" (how far into the shoe they go before shuffling) is very deep. We were about even after losing at video poker and winning at blackjack, but the craps session (again, good conditions -- 100 times odds!) tapped us out.

We had a late coffee-shop dinner. Again, at least as good as Vegas: We shared some spicy Louisiana meat pies. I had some very good fried catfish (lemon-pepper breading, I think), and Jacqueline had an open-face hot turkey sandwich made from what appeared to be real turkey.

Did I mention the excellent drink service?

Day 10, July 12: El Paso to Abilene

The HoJo included its own IHOP, but we have IHOP at home. So we went to a Village Inn. A branch of this chain was my gang's after-the-bars hangout back in Tucson. It's a high-quality chain with an extensive menu. I got a carnitas skillet -- marinated pork and green chili over eggs and hash browns. Jacqueline got pancakes. I had a bite. Mmmm.

Leaving El Paso meant gradually leaving the West. In between mountains-and-cactus and the greener side we crossed something called the Permean Basin, featuring the Odessa-Midland area. I'm sure Odessa is a fine place of fine people, but it gets my vote for the most godforsaken-looking biggish city I've seen. With some effort we found a restaurant district. We passed up on another Sonic run to add a new fast-food establishment to our repertoire. Whataburger is another oldie from my Phoenix-Tucson days. I remembered three things from Whataburger: (1) You can get jalapenos on your burger. (2) The burgers are pretty darn big in diameter. (3) It takes the Whataburger people forever to make your burger. All three remained true. I would add one more item to my Whataburger tip sheet: The buns are nothing to write home about. But all in all the food is pretty good.

In Abilene, a city that surprised us with its size and its nice neighborhoods, we stayed at another Comfort Suites. Pretty much the same as the one in Oklahoma City. We weren't all that hungry, but it was going on 9 p.m. and we knew our chances of getting a decent meal were waiting. I made a few phone calls and found out that Joe Allen's, a place I had learned about on Chowhound.com, was open till 9:30. We hustled on over. What a place. I can't believe it's not in the Roadfood directory. It looks like a scary roadhouse bar from the outside. It's still pretty rustic inside, but we felt right at home. You order your barbecue or your steaks and choose a bottle of beer from a metal tub full of ice. Just tell them how many you had when it's time to settle up. We were planning on barbecue the next day in Dallas, so we chose mesquite-broiled steaks. Good choice. Our "small" T-bones were huge and smoky and wonderful. One note from the side-dish bar: Ever hear of mashed potato salad? We hadn't either. It looked like mashed potatoes, but it was cold and tangy and full of sweet relish and vinegar and maybe mustard and mayonnaise. Wonderful.

Our total, with three beers for me and two for Jacqueline, came to less than $50. We would be at Joe Allen's a lot if we lived anywhere near.

Day 9, July 11: Phoenix to El Paso

Goodbye included breakfast with Mom, stepdad Gary and A.J. at Cracker Barrel. And then we stopped at Borders to pick up the Sunday New York Times. We had learned the night before that William Safire had led his column with a largely positive review of "The Elephants of Style"! We also finally picked up the August issue of Writer's Digest, which included an interview of me. Boy, I sure am a celebrity.

The bookstore run put us behind schedule, so there was no time for a stop in Tucson, my old college town.

More to come.

Day 6-Day 8, July 8-10: Phoenix

Family time in Ahwatukee/Mountain Park Ranch. This was the point of the trip: My infant sister, Jennifer, is turning 30. Jacqueline and I had always thought that summer was the worst time to be visiting Phoenix, but this time there was an epiphany: There's something very satisfying about staying somewhere with a private swimming pool when it's so damn hot that swimming is practically a necessity.

There was also a certain amount of Mexican food. My family, for the most part, is indifferent to the stuff, but I was able to drag siblings-and-such to Guedo's Taco Shop in Chandler. And, not too long afterward, brother Terence didn't have to be persuaded too much to accompany me on a green-chili-burro run. Serendipity: We were on our way to a good but slightly distant place, and at rush hour, when I spotted the name of a place I had read about in the New Times restaurant listings. It was a second location of Tempe's Casa Reynoso. It was good, once we got things straight with the waitress about how "green" doesn't mean "red." (I managed to sign a few books at the Ahwatukee branch of Barnes & Noble on the way back.)

And then there was nephew A.J., son of sister Jenn. He's almost 2, and very active. Quite a cutie. Mom says the serious look he gets when he starts positioning the Hot Wheels cars is reminiscent of a certain son of hers.

Day 5, July 7: Albuquerque to Phoenix

We got a relatively early start -- and, thanks to a recommendation on Chowhound.com, one of our best breakfasts ever. We walked a couple of sleepy-downtown-Albuquerque blocks from the hotel to the Gold Street Caffe, which looked a little on the dilettante-hipster-coffeehouse side from the outside but redeemed itself on the inside. The staff appeared to be entirely female (girl power!) and was most friendly and helpful. I (now that we both have the power to post, I, Bill, will use the first person) made a tough choice from a wonderful menu and chose a breakfast burrito. Jacqueline, already weary of eggs and hash browns, had oatmeal with all the fixins. Normally a breakfast burrito is not a good choice. There's so much stuff going on, the "chef" can get away with tossing it all in willy-nilly. Not here. Each component, from the wonderfully fluffy scrambled eggs and red-chile-cured bacon to the salsa on the side, was impeccably prepared in its own right. The coffee was good, too. Jacqueline had equally high praise for the oatmeal.

Back to the hotel to check out. You know how the people at La Posada de Albuquerque didn't have a record of our reservation? Well, it gets better. They presented us with a bill for the full amount, when Jacqueline was sure that she had already paid for the room through Orbitz. To their credit, the desk clerks allowed Jacqueline to commandeer a computer and go online to verify that the credit card had, indeed, been charged. Turns out the July 6 reservation from Orbitz had become a June 6 reservation in the hotel's hands and we had been charged for a no-show. With that all cleared up, we owed just $3.75 for phone calls. OK, fine. We start to pay cash but then, prompted by one of the staff members, decide to leave it on our credit card. Running that charge through becomes a 10-minute ordeal, and finally Jacqueline mutters, "Ya know, maybe you could just swallow the $3.75 for the trouble you caused us?" Nope. Whatever.

The way out of New Mexico included a great Route 66 swing through Gallup. We were seduced enough by the signs for the El Rancho hotel that we actually stopped and went inside. Great Old West decor, kitschy in a pre-Route 66 fashion.

Somewhere not long after we crossed into Arizona, it occurred to me that the planned route would take us from the northern tip of the sprawling Valley of the Sun to the southern tip of the sprawling tip of the Valley of the Sun, all in the evening rush hour. I mentioned that it would be great if we had the time to take a detour, and Jacqueline said we should have the time. We did. After a little deliberation, we settled on a route that took us through the length of the Petrified Forest National Park, which includes the Painted Desert. This was the best impromptu decision of the trip. In my 10 years as an Arizona resident I had never seen Show Low or Globe or Miami or Superior, and I got to see them all. But the highlight was the Salt River Canyon. I was impressed, but what do I know? Jacqueline was impressed, and she does know. Not an easy drive, but what scenery!

Lunch was supposed to have been at a place called Joe & Aggie's in Holbrook, but our detour meant Holbrook was no longer in the picture. Second choice was a Route 66 Cafe in no-name, Arizona, but what we found when we followed those directions was little more than a mobile home with a Magic Market "Route 66 Cafe" sign. Maybe we missed some great grub, but we had reached the limit of our adventurousness. So we suffered a little and toughed it out until we came upon a Sonic in Show Low. Mmm, Sonic.

Globe and Miami and Superior produced more magical mountain moments. Globe reminded us of my birthplace, the coal-mining town of Pottsville, Pa. Not long after these towns we came upon the eastern terminus, for now, of Phoenix sprawl. A community called Gold Canyon has sprouted so far east that it's in Pinal County, not the Maricopa County that is traditionally associated with the Valley of the Sun. When I lived at Warner and McQueen in Chandler in the late 1980s, it seemed like the edge of the universe. Now it's pretty darn mainstream.

Day 4, July 6: Oklahoma City to Albuquerque

The trip's macabre theme continued with a visit to the Oklahoma City National Memorial. It's a striking memorial -- a shallow reflecting pool next to a field of empty chairs representing each of the victims. We actually went into the museum this time, and it was worthwhile.

Oh, and before that we hit our first Waffle House. Mmm, Waffle House ...

This was the longest driving day yet, but mostly because we mellowed out a little and stopped more than usual. Still in Oklahoma, we hit a Cherokee "trading post" (souvenir shop)in Clinton and the National Route 66 Museum in Elk City, which was nice enough but not very substantial or educational.

Then the Texas Panhandle. The lunch goal was Amarillo's Big Texan Steakhouse, home of the "free" 72-ounce steak. (You finish it, and all the side dishes, in an hour or less and it's free.) We didn't attempt that, but we did have a couple of monster chicken-fried steaks. Bill finished his; Jacqueline barely made a dent -- leaving room for strawberry shortcake. You'd expect such a gimmicky tourist trap to be subpar, but the food and the service were first-rate. It's a cavernous dining hall, reminiscent of the Hofbrauhaus in Munich. The attached souvenir shop is also excellent.

A couple of dozen miles before the New Mexico border, the terrain changed. Grass gave way to sagebrush and, presto, we were truly in the Southwest.

We were just now realizing that this was the 25th anniversary of a similar drive made by Bill and his family in their move from Detroit to Phoenix. In 1979, Tucumcari, N.M., struck Bill as the most godforsaken place on earth -- and only partly because of that horrible meal at the Tastee-Freez. Today, even with a new appreciation of all things old, it's still pretty crappy. We got off the interstate and drove through on the old Route 66. Lots of wonderful old signs, but most of them in a state of disrepair and in front of abandoned businesses. If somebody somehow did for Tucumcari what they did for South Beach, the town could be a living museum.

The leg to Albuquerque seemed to take forever, with the generous 75-mph speed limit alternating with bogus construction zones that threatened quadrupled fines or some such if you exceeded 54 1/2. We saw maybe one cop in all of Texas and New Mexico, though.

Our stop for the night, La Posada de Albuquerque, is a well-preserved 1930s hotel downtown. The lobby was impressive but empty. The desk never got our Orbitz reservation, but they found us a room -- a huge one, with two beds (they said queen, we saw double) and room for a sitting area. We've seen New York City apartments smaller than this.

After checking in, we hit the computer (dial-up connection, alas) to figure out just which Mexican place to hit. We found a bunch and called a bunch -- but it was after 9 p.m. (and that's with the change from Central to Mountain time) and they all closed at 8. Eight? Eight. Unreal.

Roadfood.com saved the day with its listing of the Frontier, a 24-hour hangout near the University of New Mexico campus. Quite an impressive place, but no beer. So we got carryout and, with some difficulty, found a six-pack, and we ate on the coffee table in our huge hotel room.

Day 3, July 5: Memphis to Oklahoma City

We got an early start because Bill forgot to switch the travel alarm to Central time. Lucky break! Good thing, too, because there was at least a little sightseeing to be done in Memphis. The one interesting-looking breakfast place close to the hotel turned out to be a block away from the National Civil Rights Museum, aka the Lorraine Motel, scene of the ugly April 4, 1968, events involving the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., James Earl Ray and possibly a mysterious man named Raoul.

First, breakfast. The Arcade is a treasure. The food isn't all that special (though the combination of too-salty country ham and too-flat biscuits becomes something greater than the sum of its parts), but the frozen-in-time aesthetics are a don't-miss. Jacqueline's exterior picture is below; I'll post my interior shots once we get to Phoenix, where Canon.com should be delivering another copy of the cable I forgot to pack.

It was already hotter than hell around 10 a.m. as we walked over to the Lorraine. Again, frozen in time. Again, photo below. We should have visited the museum, but the road beckoned.

Across the Mississippi, a historic moment: Arkansas was the only state in the lower 48 that Jacqueline had never visited. Mission accomplished! The Arkansas side of the Mississippi is oddly undeveloped. You'd think West Memphis would have a building or two, but no.

We listened to a little more local radio than we had been sampling, and the Forrest City police-blotter reading was a hoot. The radio guy pretty much read every little crime that had occurred in the past 24 hours. Our favorite:

"A Forrest City man was shot in the leg yesterday. Roosevelt Franklin ..."

Still in Arkansas, at the Atkins exit, we did our best to stay low-carb in our first-ever visit to a Sonic drive-in. Mmm, Sonic. We tried the cherry limeade (well, at least the diet cherry limeade) at a Roadfood.com message-board poster's suggestion, and, boy, was that good. The food was a cut above the usual fast fare as well.

We did not visit the historic Sonic location in Altus, where Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie rearranged the sign to advertise "1/2 price anal salty weiner burgers." But we did note the sign for the Altus exit.

It was a long driving day, and a construction-plus-accident-plus-volume delay right before Oklahoma City didn't help.

We were unsure about a lot of our restaurant choices for this trip, but one was firm: We would have steaks at the Cattlemen's in Oklahoma City. As it turned out, the place just happened to be two or three exits away from the hotel that Jacqueline had booked.

Two or three exits and a hundred and some years. You take a little bridge on the outskirts of OKC and suddenly you're on a main street from a much smaller Old West town. "Historic Stockyards City" is the name of the place. Jacqueline got wistful that, contrary to appearances, she wasn't in Wyoming. More photos to come.

The highlight of the interior is a couple of backlighted photo murals. The back wall in our room was one of cattlemen on horses. In another room, there was one of a herd of cattle. Otherwise, the surfaces and the light level and the typefaces ... it finally occurred to Jacqueline: This is Binion's Horseshoe! The Las Vegas casino actually does have a fine and atmospheric steakhouse, but Cattlemen's was what you would have if you turned the casino into a steakhouse.

The restaurant was as good as it looked. Salads and fries weren't great, but the steaks! And the dinner rolls! Here's the freaky part: Bill was disappointed there was no draft beer, but one of the bottle choices just happened to be the custom-brewed Cattlemen's Double Deuce (22 ounces), an unfiltered wheat beer. Very nice.

Back at the hotel, more problems with the wireless connection. Again, it worked fine the next morning.

Day 2, July 4: Knoxville to Memphis

This morning in Knoxville, the wireless connection worked fine for Bill. Go figure. At this point you may be asking why in the world we need two computers even on vacation. You must not know us.

Another Wimbledon final -- and a great one, we understand -- but we had to leave just as the third set was getting under way. First stop: Nashville, where we had lunch, as planned, at the Belle Meade Buffet Cafeteria. The Roadfood people were right: This is a gem. A time warp (born in 1961, the same year as Bill) in a strip mall on the edge of a breathtakingly tony enclave. Bill picked up liver and onions, pickled beets, Waldorf salad, a yeasty dinner roll, and a slice of chess pie. For Jacqueline, fried chicken, creamed corn, cornbread stuffing and peach cobbler. All very good, though where Bill's family's Waldorf salad uses mayonnaise, this one used whipped cream. Mmm, whipped cream.

Then to Kroger, a supermarket chain we don't get to see much. There's a history there, though: Back in Michigan, Bill's mom worked at a Kroger in the early 1970s. It was there that she met Gary, who became her husband. Our goal was seltzer, and the Big K store brand was excellent.

Middle Tennessee. You have to love a place where the word "central" is considered too highfalutin'.

But we weren't much smarter as we headed west to Memphis. The less said about this the better, but the holiday and the need to valet-park the land yacht and our essentially laziness combined to turn what could have been an evening of world-class barbecue and revelry into a small, not-so-good early dinner and hours of hotel-room TV. The few allegedly decent barbecue establishments downtown, close to the hotel, were closed for the sabbath or the Fourth of July or both, but Bill found some kind words about one nearby barbecue place as well as a Roadfood endorsement of a burger joint a block from that, and so we made the quick walk to the legendary Beale Street. Quite a street scene, though we really didn't fit in with the NASCAR crowd. The barbecue place looked crowded and hopelessly touristy, and so we went with Roadfood and tried a burger and a fried-bologna sandwich at Dyer's.

Let's just say Roadfood isn't always right. We'll console ourselves with the probability that the best of Memphis's barbecue places were probably closed.

The next-best attraction, an 1800s dry-goods emporium still in business, wasn't in business on Sunday, July 4, and the museum at the Lorraine Motel, the site of Martin Luther King's assassination, was just afar enough away in a scary-looking area that we didn't walk it. The Mississippi River was far enough away that we wimped out on that too. We'll get them in the car tomorrow. The rest of the evening was notable mainly for Bill's continued problems getting wireless access to work.

At least there were fireworks (see below).

Day 1, July 3: Washington to Knoxville

On the road about 11:30 a.m., after we watched Maria Sharapova's amazing victory over Serena Williams in the Wimbledon final.

The usual trip out I-66 at first, until the switch to I-81. The drive takes us past James Madison University and Radford and VMI and Virginia Tech. As the Tennessee border nears, the roadside scenery shifts to ivy-covered rocks.

First new-career ephiphany, somewhere around Bristol, Tenn.: We could be consultants to cheap motel chains, designing something for their billboards and logos other than that horrible Quality Inn-knockoff with the Cooper Black typeface.

First gas stop: The Koala store in Wytheville, Va. Seventeen gallons, 30 bucks. Disgusting restrooms. Driver switch: Jacqueline moves to shotgun, and Bill takes the wheel for the first time. (The huge Explorer was made for cruise control.)

The first six or seven hours passed quickly. Then, when we realize we're only an hour away from our destination, every five minutes seems to take an hour.

Jacqueline observes that Tennessee is surprisingly tidy. The hotel billboards all seem to trumpet high-speed Internet access, something we have made sure to secure on all our stops. Bill is skeptical; these things never work. "I'll believe it when I see it."

The Comfort Hotel in Knoxville is right on the freeway, surrounded by pits of red clay as some sort of construction proceeds. It's a '60s-era building that has been rehabbed recently. Not great, but not bad.

Shirl -- Jacqueline's mom, the cats' grandma -- procured subs for us from Italia in Silver Spring, and Bill had his during the Wimbledon final. Jacqueline had half then and the other half early in the trip. We're kind of hungry, so after check-in we immediately set out to get dinner.

Litton's seemed like a great choice. An old-school burger joint endorsed by Roadfood.com and many reviewers. It's about seven miles from the hotel, and the trip is fine. Knoxville has a lot of vintage roadside architecture and signage.

We get there, and ... the staff is on summer vacation. Drats! So we're stuck miles from our hotel without our restaurant-finding resources. And we're determined to avoid chains (for obvious reasons), barbecue (Memphis and Texas are coming up), and Mexican (New Mexico and Arizona are coming up).

So we drive. Through the down side of town. The streets are deserted. Eventually we get to the university and the river. We pass the Ye Olde Steak House, which was my second or third choice, but it looks crowded and we have a lot of steaks in our future.

On the river are abandoned and decrepit factories. New-career ephiphany No. 2: We need to move to Knoxville and go into real estate.

Further exploration finds that not everything of that vintage is decrepit. In fact, downtown Knoxville is breathtaking. I never thought I'd be typing those words, but this is a well-preserved slice of the '60s and earlier. The brick buildings, the signage. Maybe times were tough in the '70s and they couldn't afford to ruin things the way most cities did.

Say what you will about the "Carnies" of the University of Tennessee (as Jacqueline and her fellow Florida Gators call the Volunteers), but this is a heck of a lot nicer than Gainesville, Fla.

We see a sign pointing to the "Old City" and it gets even better. Here, there actually are people. This seems to be a nightlife district. We park and look for food, but ... this seems to be a nightlife district. Note to Knoxville planners: You need a healthy mix.

We had seen a wonderful vintage rooftop sign for a place called Regas. It looks like a time-honored old-people special-occasion place, and essentially it is. It's pretty crowded, too, and we're told there might be a long wait. How long? "Twenty to 25 minutes." They must not have the Cheesecake Factory around these parts.

Drinks at the bar as we flirt with hypoglycemia. There's a help-yourself cheese display, but we're wary. Finally we're seated, in the shielded booths apparently reserved for those not dressed for a special occasion.

The food is fine but not great, and we eat way too much. Bill: fried calamari and a prime-rib sandwich. Jacqueline: a salad and then filet mignon. And then there's dessert -- a complimentary sliver of red-velvet cake for both (the place is celebrating its 85th anniversary). Bill has that plus blueberry ice cream; Jacqueline barely touches her cake because the strawberry shortcake (really strawberry pound cake) she ordered is so big.

On the way out Jacqueline hels a nice couple with another anniversary, taking a snapshot of them. She then takes the wheel. We're under a spaghetti bowl of freeways, but the entrances are nowhere to be found. We drive around in confusion for a while, but finally we retrace our steps and find some signs.

Back in the room, we fire up the laptops. The advertised free wireless Internet is remarkably hassle-free, but the service is spotty. Jacqueline eventually settles in for uninterrupted access, but Bill's computer gives up. ("I'll believe it when I see it.")

The Real Blog Begins

Everything before this is preparatory.

Gallup, N.M.

El Rancho

The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza Home Page

The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza Home Page

AOL CityGuide on Cattlemen's Steakhouse

They like the "chicken friend steak," among other things, at Cattlemen's Steakhouse in Oklahoma City.

Gennie's Bishop Grill in Dallas

Roadfood.com

Dealey Plaza and the Grassy Knoll

Dealey Plaza and the Grassy Knoll

Homer

The Big Texan Challenge

More Amarillo weirdness

Amarillo, Texas - Huge Pair of Legs

Cadillac Ranch

Classic Cadillac Web Site - Cadillac Ranch Main Page

Dallas picks

From Doris ...

Cattlemen's Has a Web Site!

Cattlemen's Steakhouse - Oklahoma City Stockyards

Abilene

SMARTpages.com - Abilene, TX City Guide

Albuquerque water park

About.com: http://www.beachwaterpark.com

Oklahoma City water park

About.com: http://www.sixflags.com/parks/whitewaterbay/parkinfo/?id=parkinfo

A Little Rock water park

About.com: http://www.wildrivercountry.com

A water park near Nashville

About.com: http://www.nashvilleshores.com/

Day 1 lunch, Christiansburg, Va.?

Dude's Drive-In

Stone's Cafeteria

Sunrise Cafe in Woodstock (earlier)