When you finally have an address… 

We spent just under 3 weeks in England, Arkansas… on the tower site… with no neighbors… and limited cell service.  Continue reading

Stateline, NV/South Lake Tahoe, CA trip!

I’ve never seen views like we saw here. It was literally breathtaking! I’ve never been to a mountain town before and I was impressed. Everywhere you look you just see amazing natural beauty.  
We checked into Harvey’s Casino Resort on Friday afternoon and then hit the casino. We played some video poker and took a free craps lesson. There was a camera crew making a commercial at the video poker bar and then also at the craps lesson so I guess we will be in two commercials we will probably never see!

The craps teacher

The hotel was right on the corner, at the line between California and Nevada. So we technically lived in Nevada for two nights.

After that we headed outside to daylight (very shocking to our casino adjusted eyeballs!). We got some drinks and food at Mc P’s Taphouse Grill. Then walked around a bit to check out the area.   image1-3
We went to a comedy show after dinner. It was pretty good. I’ve seen funnier. It’s the second comedy show we’ve been to together. The first was somewhere in Florida a couple of years ago.

After the show we stopped at this sports bar in the casino. The bartender was from Cincinnati (like us!) so we chatted with him for a bit and had some beers and late night pizza. He suggested we go to Emerald Bay to scatter some of my brother’s ashes. It turned out to be a great tip!

the bartender’s map for us

an actual map

 

Saturday morning we had breakfast at Artemis Lakefront Cafe (crappy, slow service but delicious food-especially Allen’s biscuits and gravy!).  image1-2

 Then we headed over to check out Emerald Bay. It was about a 25 minute drive from the hotel but traffic wasn’t too terrible. Once you get close to the bay, the road gets super steep and winding and I get super nervous and nauseous.

 We finally found a place to pull over and get out. Completely breathtaking! We scattered my brother’s ashes, most of which blew back on us -oops- and took some pictures then headed back down.

  
We hit the pool for some recovery drinks and suntanning then got dressed and went looking for dinner.

Here we are looking all fancy

We checked Friday’s Station on he top floor of Harrah’s (across the street from us). The least expensive steak on the menu was a 6oz filet for $70! What?!?! So then we walked back over to our hotel and checked the menu at the top floor restaurant of Harvey’s, 19 Kitchen and Bar. Same thing, just a wider selection.

We checked a couple other places but weren’t impressed so we headed to Stateline Brewery up the street. It’s a brewery, in a basement, and the average entree is around $25 so it’s more our style for sure! Allen tried the Acclimator IPA which was pretty delish! We ordered the artichoke dip. It was a big loaf of Sourdough bread with half the loaf hollowed out and filled with dip, then the top was brushed with super yummy garlic butter. Yum! So the artichoke dip was the entirety of our dinner! We had a couple more beers and called it a night.

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Looking up the mountain, at the ski lift… No way could I have handled that! Allen said it’s about 9000ft elevation at the top… Yikes!

This morning we had a couple of breakfast burritos from a cafe up the street, spent our last $20 in chips, cashed in our tickets and checked out.

The obligatory huge chair vacation photo

On the way home I saw my first California grass fire (there was one in the campground in Oklahoma City but this was a lot bigger).

 Overall, our Tahoe trip was really fun, and the best part was sharing the experience with my love. Now I’m just happy to be back home with Charlie! We missed her! And, a special thank you to Carmen for puppy-sitting!

Taste of Dallas

We went to the Taste on Saturday. I was surprised that it wasn’t bigger actually. (The Taste of Cincinnati was bigger)  But we had some good food. Allen and I met up with Cletis, a guy he works with. I love Cletis. We parked by he tower so therefore got in free. Sshhh…

 We had alligator on a stick, a brisket sandwich, shrimp and crab on a stick, ribs, and chicken. Yum!

        

On our way home we stopped by Randy’s Farmers Market. We picked up some tomatoes, potatoes, green beans, onions and plums. We found some local honey too. I’ve heard that if you eat local honey it’s supposed to help with allergies. I hope it works! We also got some bbq sauce and some chips and salsa. The salsa is no joke-SO spicy! And we like hot and spicy, but this is off the charts!

  

When we got back we went to the pool to hang out. Allen has been teaching me how to swim and I think I’m getting the hang of it. I mean, I can doggy paddle and survive but I’ve never been able to swim on top of the water. He was a lifeguard and taught swim lessons when he was younger and he’s been pretty patient with me.

        

Towards the end of the day I went and got Charlie and brought her up to the pool. She’s done a lot of swimming in the last week! The other night she was running around with a pup named Tater and she ran INTO the pond and swam back out!  She’s a brave little thing!

View from Above

Allen has an awesome job. Few people get this view from their “office” every day…

The Cotton Bowl

 

Downtown Dallas

 

Fair Park

 

A drop zone type of ride at Fair Park

 

I think these tents are for “Taste of Dallas” this weekend

 

a platform on the tower

Meanwhile, I’ve been reading and relaxing by the pool…

“The Street Lawyer” by John Grisham

 

the pool

 

Charlie thinks it’s too hot for anything.

Doggy Paddlin’

Charlie can swim! She was so cute! I think she loved it. Allen thinks she was just surviving. But her little tail was wagging all day long and she seemed like a happy puppy.

    

We had a great time with Karen and Bob and their friend Kathy yesterday. It was a much needed relaxing Saturday. Allen doesn’t get many of those!

This morning we took the truck and camper to the truck wash next door to Abe’s RV Park. The guys at the 5 Star Travel Plaza did an awesome job. It’s a new truck wash, just opened in March, so it wasn’t crazy busy like most of them are. It was $45 for the camper and truck. I don’t think that was bad at all.

       One thing Allen noticed was that since we had the DEF Sytem removed, we are going to have to watch the front of the camper and keep it clean because now the exhaust pipe blows a little black smoke.

Now we are on our way to Dallas for a couple of weeks…