Hi all! We set out for Branson around 4 pm on Wednesday, March 21st. Our plan was to stop at Lambert's for dinner along the way. I really didn't expect the wait would be an hour and a half at 7 pm on a Wednesday night! There was no way we were waiting that long to eat, so we hopped back in the Nitro and headed on to Branson. Once there, we decided to eat at Montana Mike's on the Strip. Which is a place where we could have eaten at home, but who cares LOL. We did check Blue Man Grill first, but they were closed.
The food and service were both very good and we ended up with a lot of leftovers, which we saved and ate for dinner the next day thanks to the mini-fridge and microwave in the room at our hotel.
Speaking of which, we stayed at the Dutton Inn. I paid for our room through Branson 2 for 1 Tickets; it was 2 nights for $85 (so $42.50/night). I like this hotel. The location is good, and you can access it both from the Strip and from Green Mountain Drive. The rooms are clean, the beds are very comfortable, there's free wi-fi and a free breakfast that includes scrambled eggs, sausage, biscuits & gravy, pancakes and cereal. I didn't think to take a pic of their breakfast offerings, sorry! Branson 2 for 1 Tickets closes at 5, but I told them in advance we'd be arriving late so the Dutton Inn allowed us to check in and then go pick up our vouchers from Branson 2 for 1 the next day.
There's a coin operated washer and dryer on-site, but there's no pool. Obviously not a problem right now, but during the summer, I'll have to consider whether I want to stay at a place with an on-site pool or go to the pool at the Branson RecPlex if we stay at the Dutton Inn. The Dutton Inn used to be Boxcar Willie's, so there are metal trains on all the doors and the lobby floor has a design of railroad tracks on it. We're railroad fans, so this is a cute extra that we enjoy about the place.
After we got checked in and unpacked, we had some girl time doing our nails. I let the girls buy fake nails at Target and, as expected, spent almost more time applying them than it took for them to come back off again LOL. This was my alternative to Chesney's request for getting mani/pedis since that's so expensive and I wanted to use our money for other things.
After this we spent a little time reading and watching TV before going to sleep. Very relaxing evening. The next morning, we went to the Branson RecPlex. I walked on the indoor track for about half an hour while Katie and the girls played on the basketball court, then I played with the girls on the basketball court for a while. Just before we left, Chesney banged her knee on the bleachers and got a cut - bleeding and crying ensued. Fortunately, Band-Aid worked it's miracle cure and the world was made right again. This led us to a stop at Target to purchase more Band-Aids. In the Dollar Spot, Katie spied a snack option I'd never seen before:
No, Target. No thank you. We'll pass on the Anal Cookies. Even after passing on this tempting treat, I still spent about $100 there before we got out. After a quick stop at the hotel to change clothes, we went to Branson Landing. I love that place. Even if it did cost me $7 to park. We had lunch at Old Chicago. We used to have one in Lawrence but it closed. The closest ones now are in Topeka and Olathe, but I choose to drive to Branson to eat there instead!
Allie ordered the kid's cheeseburger and Chesney and I shared a salad and a pizza. A family came in with boy/girl twins so I had to invade their privacy and ask them if I could take a pic to send Kellen (because she may not have known anyone else in the world has ever had boy/girl twins besides herself). Their names were Alexandria and Grayson which is funny because those are names in our family, too. We showed off pics of our family's boy/girl twins as well.
On to Build-A-Bear Workshop, where we had $137.50 in coupons and gift cards to spend. Somehow we managed to spend all that and another $20, too. Don't ask me how...it's some sort of zone that sucks you in. Katie said she could picture herself ending up on TLC on one of their obsession/addiction shows with rooms full of Build-A-Bears. I suspect that she'll end up on one of their obsession/addiction shows for other reasons, but I digress. They had a display (unintentional, I think...hope...) of Village People bears.
Back at the hotel Chesney rounded up the animals for a photo shoot. That's still not all of the stuffed animals and dolls we had with us in that room. I'm going to have to book a separate room for them next time.
We ate some of our leftovers and got ready for the Haygoods show. I'll probably do a separate post reviewing the show but the short version is that we had a good time. Here's a link to my pics from the show on Flickr. They're not great pics, because they're taken with a little point-and-shoot Kodak.
Haygoods Show March 2012
We saw the show twice, once on Thursday and once on Saturday. That picture set includes pics from both.
It was pouring rain when we left the RFD TV theatre. We wanted to get custard at Andy's but the drive-thru line was clear out to the street, and I didnt want it bad enough to get soaked and order at the window. So we ended up at the World's Worst McDonald's (on the Strip) and after 20 or 30 minutes in line we got our order and went back to the hotel to have our ice cream and go to bed! I took this pic that shows a little tornado damage to their sign on the side of the building.
Next time you go to Branson Landing, don't pay $7.00 to park. You can park in the lot north of Belk's for free. Unless, of course, you want covered parking.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Diane! I actually figured that out and when we returned to the Landing on Sunday, that's exactly where we parked! When we'd been there before, we'd apparently never stayed long enough to pay more than $3, and $3 isn't that bad. But free is way better!
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