West Texas Oasis: Amarillo

Traveling east on I-40 you pass from New Mexico into Texas and before you know it, you hit Amarillo. No "Welcome to".... no "Howdy, Y'all". Just "Amarillo". Even the folks here say this is not a destination, but a one night stand on the road to someplace more interesting.

This is strip mall hell. Every franchise known to man is here, making me think that Amarillo is some sort of test market.

But oddly enough here in the start of the Baptist bible belt, Catholics can still hold their own. Whatever they're holding.

Even with the Baptists holding sway, thank God this is not a dry city or county. And as we mentioned in the previous blog entry, if you want a steak anywhere from six to seventy-two ounces, here's where you'll find it. By the way, the "Big Texan" restaurant has that heavily promoted 72-ounce steak which is free if you can eat in an hour. Makes you want to hurl just thinking about it.

On the walls of the Texas Roadhouse where we ate, pictures of a bunch of gay guys line the walls. But we suspect this is one of those white wine country singers who's never experienced an ounce of pain in his privileged life. One of those "all hat, no cattle" gay blades.

But if you're from a non-smoking state, like most of us are these days, you'll experience pain in Amarillo restaurants where smoking is allowed. What a crazy state. With a wacky governor with an anti-Obama bias. But don't they know Obama smokes?

This shot was a mistake but I couldn't take it out so on we go...

One of the two redeeming qualities we found in Amarillo was our RV resort called the "Oasis" just west of the city limits. An almost unbelievably good deal at $20 a night, with a concierge, a limo service, free laundry facilities and huge, well-maintained spaces.

I highly recommend it. Heck, it's worth buying an RV just to come here.

But the best thing about the Oasis is that right next to it, where we were able to let Daisy off her leash, is a spot called "Cadillac Ranch".

Cadillac Ranch gets its name from the rancher who, once he wore out his Cadillacs, planted them nose-down into the ground. Eventually, about a dozen of them all in a row. People stop and armed with cans of spray paint apply graffiti over other graffiti. The whole thing's something of a mess but ...it's Amarillo.

Daisy was not at all impressed by cars in the ground but rather some fresh cow pies on the ground. That's our dog.

Another shot of Daisy among the discarded paint cans. It's all about the dog.

Amarillo's other saving grace is not even in Amarillo but about thirty miles south. Palo Duro Canyon State Park was formed when over the course of millions of years the land eroded and sculpted this gorge in west Texas. That's what most people accept as the truth. Unless, of course, you're one of the many local born-again believers who claim that all of this took place over the last eight-to-ten-thousand years when man and dinosaurs co-existed. And man hunted the huge reptiles to extinction, not for food but for fun. Early man. What a guy. Yes, these yahoos actually believe such nonsense.

Confession: Even progressive Sedona has a band of creationists. A well-organized and seemingly well-funded "church" that claims the earth is no more than ten-thousand or so years old. And that modern man and T-rex co-existed. There's also a Sedona cult that says that Jesus came to earth on a spaceship and celestial aliens walk among us. So Amarillans aren't so out-of-this-world when it comes to this sort of thing.

According to the literature, Palo Duro is touted as the second largest canyon in North America, second only to the Grand Canyon. But compared to the Grand Canyon, Palo Duro, while somewhat impressive, is just a hole in the ground.

However, it does have a flock of wild turkeys which are hard to see in the Grand Canyon. (But then my sister in eastern Washington has wild turkeys in her backyard. They're not uncommon. In fact, so common was the wild turkey in colonial times that Ben Franklin suggested it be our "national bird", not the bald eagle.)

So now that we have completely dissed Amarillo, and as the sun sets in the west, Daisy bids you adieu and hopes you will continue to follow our ridiculous musings as we continue onto our next stop, the city and state of my father's birth, Prague, Oklahoma...settled by Czechs who called it "Prague" (prawg) but the locals pronounce it "Praig", as in long "A".

You know, if the higher-ups in the Recreational Vehicle Industry Association (who helped to sponsor our PBS RV-based travel show) ever read this, they're likely to take us out with a roadside bomb. But what the hell, if you can't have a little fun along the road to nowhere, then you might as well stay at home, watch daytime TV, and beef up.