But a few weeks ago, Debra got the golden ticket. And we immediately found a window to reserve on a long weekend, and this impromptu trip took shape. Saturday we got up around 4 and left at 5am...this whole caper was to fit within a 48 hour window, so a long couple of drives lay ahead of us. A week preceding of bad weather and school closures seemed to threaten cancellation, but by Saturday morning the roads were mostly OK, so we went.
The roads were very clear in eastern Kansas, and it was dark for a couple hours. I appreciated the sun coming up, because it lessens the haloes and starburst distortions afforded to me by my new internal lenses. Although getting deeper into Kansas the roads started being swept by snow.
It was pretty, but a little bit stressful as the sideways (north to south) motion of the snow could play with your mind a bit. Stopping off for gas the wind was brutal in combination with the cold.
Better seen in a video, for the effect:
Getting over into Hays. As I said, the side slipping rivers of snow were quite beautiful, and the roads did not at least "feel" slick at all.
More video...
The kids erupted in delight in seeing our absolutely favorite President being advertised as a roadside attraction. They begged to stop and see him for themselves but I told them no, our schedule is too tight, hopefully we can plan a stop off on our next trip on I-70, if he is still on exhibit.
Snow on the high plains! It wasn't bad though.
Pulling into Colby in west Kansas, we spotted the much anticipated Wheat Jesus.
Then into the travel center there, to get lunch at City Wok!
Loved the setup there, they cooked to order and had a large variety of woks ready and on hand.
We got orange chicken, which was straight out of the fryer and into the wok...pretty good. The accompanying fried rice was less exceptional...dark from too much soy sauce (kind of a one-dimensional flavor) and slightly mushy.
Had note yet mentioned, but the dog was with us! Seemed too little notice to get someone to take care of him so we just got a pet-friendly hotel. New experience for us (and him). At this point, he's trying to eat yellow snow and Debra is trying not to have her face freeze off. The temps are below zero, and wind chill far below that.
We got to Colorado eventually, and were immediately reminded of how much worse the roads are once you cross the border. We finally reached the outskirts of Denver and headed to our hotel in Aurora around one or one-thirty. I went to the front desk to check in, and was briefly concerned as they had no record of our reservation. I soon realized my mistake, having searched Best Western instead of Holiday Inn. I apologized to the clerk for my silly mistake and we hopped back on the road for a few miles to get to our actual hotel. The dog was mildly concerned in the hotel room, everything feeling very new/strange.
We kenneled him, and while still nervous, he wasn't barking...once we left we waited to see if he would start barking (normally devoid of humans or squirrels to interact with, he plops down and is out like a light), and then left for our destination...Casa Bonita!
Because we were there early, they wouldn't let us in immediately, so to keep warm we walked to the Dollar Tree next door and did some shopping...road snacks and a water dish for Odin, which we hadn't brought. I loved their "Crafts" section.
Then back into line with the excited masses. TSA style security awaited us.
It feels so much like it used to. I was slightly disappointed that you weren't hit with a musty wave of chlorine like in the old days...there was some of that smell, but more muted than usual...but honestly there are better things to smell at a good Mexican restaurant.
Waiting in line and trying to figure out what to order...
I think this was an Abuela's room diorama or something like that.
They seated us high in an enclave above the sopaipillas station. Debra got (and I was filled with Futterneid) the red and green chili enchiladas (Christmas style).
I got carnitas, with some lovely fresh corn tortillas and a green chile sauce. Very good, but I'd go enchiladas next time...I just wanted to try the corn tortillas in a pure taco style format.
Gretchen got taco salad with brisket / suadero, and Pete got chicken strips (the poor lad has very American tastes, and he's stuck with me as a cook at home). I mentioned earlier about this being a "good Mexican restaurant" and Casa Bonita aficionados might have seen that as a setup for a punchline. Casa Bonita being, historically, a purveyor of some of the worst warmed-over excuses for "Mexican" food you might ever run across, but the new owners, at great expense, restored the place, but not the bad food. The new menu is great and the food is delicious! If I have to pick on anything, the salsas are a bit on the odd side (the orange salsa provided with chips seemed almost like a bean dip and reminded me of Indian dal)...they may be traditional but not anything I know of, and were mostly just strange to me. The rice and beans are OK, not exceptional, but they are mostly there as filler. Otherwise, the food was great!
It isn't pink anymore, but Peter was happy to get his traditional lemonade at Casa Bonita.
Then, sopaipillas! They actually brought us a refill (we started to say "no thanks"...sopaipillas from Casa Bonita can do "magical" things to one's digestive system...but Gretchen enthusiastically requested seconds, so we allowed it...I think she had three, and Pete at least had two).
The redesigned flag to request service...
After finishing up, we were ready to head out into the place. You'll have to forgive my fuzzy camera...in selecting which pics to retain for the blog, if I have to choose between remembering a place with fuzzy images or just not remembering it all, I'm going to pick the former.
Pretty sure this was the table me and my friends sat at in, maybe 1997?
I couldn't find the pic I had of us all at that table (including with the original red flag!) but I found this pic of our group (coming back from high school church camp).
We went downstairs for the magic show "The Incredibly Mysterious Sorsoro!", which was a mostly funny little stage show...the magic was relatively simple, but little kids will be wowed by it, and old people like us will be amused by the 1970s / early 80s nostalgia. I wish I could find the disco version of "Pure Imagination" that was at the end of the show, the bassline grooved. No video or pictures during the performance though, like the puppet show.
Back out by the waterfall / diving pool.
Amazingly, given our previous history with Casa Bonita food, nobody had to use the restrooms. But this hallway to them, seemed pretty neat.
The mine and cave areas were, unlike on previous visits, actually in use with groups of diners.
Out near the front, a small museum...Chiquita the Gorilla mask on display.
Tales of the very expensive rescue operation from Trey Parker and Matt Stone. They were pretty honest about their just reputation for bad food, before.
That's the flag I remember! The new one is classier, and allegedly may have been the original design, but the red one pings my nostalgia receptors.
Crowded spot behind the waterfall for photos...
Cliff divers!
This guy really was the best advertising for this place you could imagine. Yes, I'd been before, but like a lot of people...seeing a distant memory from my past show up as the centerpiece of a South Park episode made me want to go back (and we did, most times we passed through Denver).
At some point we saw the puppet show...as mentioned, not allowed to photograph that. Then upstairs into the arcade. We got $20 on an arcade card. First stop the shooting gallery, which soaked up a surprising $5 in about 60 seconds...ouch.
Then Pete and I played a sort of Mario Kart (I barely eked out a win).
We played a couple different things...some kind of water jet arcade game maybe called Ice Walker (Pete won), maybe something else that slips my mind, and we played a few rounds of skeeball. Gretchen deigned not to participate as it was really warm up in the arcade area so her and Debra waited downstairs. Pete redeemed the 99 tickets accumulated in our $20 worth of arcade play by selecting an Icee fizzy candy, a single Army man, and a deck of cards.
Showing off his treasured winnings in the plaza below, while a guitarist serenades from the balcony.
Then we forced the kids into BLACK BARTS CAVE
Pete was genuinely scared, which at this point feels more funny and less cruel, but I prodded him through and refused mercilessly to go first.
The exit of the cave...once a dragon mouth, now a big skull.
The treasure room...
We spotted ManBearPig holding court in the downstairs area.
Then we got some souvenirs...a flag, two hats, and a coffee mug...and headed out. The sign was something we always got the kids pictured next to.
Given the cold I was surprised to see the fountain going at all, but it was throwing off a lot of steam.
A successful visit.
Once back at the hotel...dog got a short walk, and we noticed the Chiefs were on the lobby television (normally basic cable wouldn't have carried it in our rooms). So Gretchen stayed in the room with the dog, as was her preference...
And we went to the lobby to watch the Chiefs win, Mahomes break his helmet on somebody, etc. A nice chatty guy gave us (friendly) pointers on dog handling (which Debra only resented because she was being distracted from her Chiefs game). But nice to be able to watch it, something we thought we weren't going to be able to do.
Next morning we had tickets to MeowWolf Convergence Station...for which we had tickets last summer but for various reasons most significantly being my poor selection of an extremely dirty and disreputable hotel in Denver, we had to cancel/reschedule our tickets, and they were nice enough to let us keep rescheduling out until we were finally able to go again. Got there before 11am, and stood in line for 10 minutes or so outside hoping for a rope drop situation but they kept us out there until 11 on the dot.
Pictures won't do it justice, nor did the time we spent there seem sufficient, but it was impressive. This strange tentacle-headed cervid greeted us upon entry into the weird forest area.
I've had some trouble with my phone not flipping the images properly so I stared at this one for a few seconds to figure out if I needed to rotate it (the railing and Gretchen finally confirmed I had it set right).
Can't see it very well but a sort of Rockem Sockem game with street-fighting rats.
Rotating stairway/hallway.
Overall...a really cool place.
Center of the space ship / pod thingy, looking out over the room.
This area was surreal and almost disturbing, like a live action...stop motion. If that makes sense!
Knit eyeball stalactites. One of the few times those three words can be used together reasonably.
You pretty much spend most of the time thinking what am I looking at? The armed creature on the tree, delightfully strange.
The "city" portion feels very, very, very Japanese.
I wasn't sure if you could actually buy these items from this kiosk. Maybe at the Omega Mart in Las Vegas? "What Is Butter?" in the style of I Can't Believe It's Not Butter was fun. But honestly that may have been the only thing I read because we were rushing through this exhibit. We were trying to get to Kansas City that day.
Mechanical synchronized analog music in this room, just fantastic and weird. Loved it.
Some kind of vehicle...
Weird Crayola cathedral...
Kaleidogothic cathedral, I am told it is called.
Peter playing the pipe organ.
Little too Baphomet-ish for me thanks.
Pete trying to work out Song of Time from Zelda.
Then we piled into the car after buying some merch, headed back to our hotel where we had gotten late checkout, and collected our doggo. From there straight on to the Aurora In-N-Out.
This is one of the closest ones to us. Maybe the Texas ones are closer, but they are in, you know, Texas, so...
Then we started our return journey in earnest. Nothing much to report...the roads were fine, but it just took a long time when starting at 1pm or so.
We got home at maybe 11pm or so, with the next morning a holiday. (And the day after that a snowday, as it happens.) All in all a great short trip! Casa Bonita is every bit as good as it once was (in many ways much better...just too in demand right now, alas), and MeowWolf Convergence Station we had to visit too quickly but it left us wanting to visit again, with more time. And of course, In-N-Out is the best.
