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This was our second stay at the Beach Club in Gulf Shores. We absolutely loved the first condo we stayed in, which was in building A. This condo was in building D (Doral).
This particular unit’s furnishings weren’t quite as nice, but it was still lovely and we had a wonderful time.
Room: We stayed at the Hampton Inn and Suites in Jackson – the 320 Greymont Avenue location. The room’s furnishings were, for a Hampton, well above average. This included the nicer desk chair, and the beds were very comfortable. Wireless internet is offered at no additional charge.
Lobby: Average; this one also had a guest reception from (I think) 5-7pm Mon-Thurs. The reception included cokes, chips, cookies, and a tap with Bud Light….we haven’t seen this at a Hampton before, but then again we usually check in much later in the day.
Service: Average.
Food: We didn’t try the breakfast that comes with the hotel stay, but the snacks from the reception area were okay.
Extra: This hotel is clearly going after more of a business clientele, which is great. When we checked in, there were several other business people milling around. Because of the location – so close to downtown, therefore the capitol, and right off I-55, it’s a good place to stay location-wise.
Chris’ Hot Dogs on Dexter Avenue in Montgomery
Av and I had lunch at a Montgomery institution: Chris’ Hot Dogs. Everything was good…honestly, not great – but for what they food lacked, the atmosphere more than made up for.
When you walk in, you may think that you’ve walked into a newsstand – but walk on to the back, where there’s a counter with stools, and to the right of that is a walled-off dining area with two- and four-person booths.
From a Huntsville Times article:
The hotdogs are special because of the ‘secret’ sauce they put on them. You can also spice them up with the Alaga hot sauce on each table (Alaga hot sauce is in its own category, because it sweetens regular hot sauce with cane syrup). Hotdogs are $1.70, special dogs are $2.20 (what makes them ‘special’ is that they use two doggies in the bun rather than one). A special hamburger is $2.20, and onion rings are $1.70. For $8, you can walk out with a quart of Chris’ famous chili sauce.
I have heard about McCarty’s Pottery for so long, and finally got there last week (and brought home three windchimes and some other things).
The best thing to do is to get the directions from their website – the entrance is covered mostly with bamboo (which I love), so it’s not something you would just see right off.
To shop at McCarty’s, park your car in front of the water tower
The shop is actually like a small cottage. The rooms are filled top to bottom with the pottery, mostly in browns, blues, and greens.
From their website: Another reason is the glazes used in the firing process. In the 1950’s and 1960’s the McCartys experimented with native clays and glazes resulting in a wide variety of colors. By the 1970’s, they had invented their signature glazes of nutmeg brown, cobalt blue, and jade. McCartys pottery can be identified by the trademarked “river,” a small black wavy line representing the Mississippi River on most functional pieces, and by the trademarked McCartys signature which is hand signed on the bottom or back of each piece.
Lee and Pup have come a long way since William Faulkner showed them a clay deposit in a ravine on his property and told them they could have it. In the early days, they insulated the Barn with cardboard, froze in the winter, sweated in the summer, and persevered. With their artistic vision and incredible work ethic, McCartys pottery has become known around the world.
Now, most Southerners have a special spot in their heart reserved for William Faulkner. McCarty’s pottery is just one more reason to love him.
Clarksdale Greyhound station
Last week, the Harrah’s Tunica became “Resorts Tunica”. Harrah’s sold their casino, and now the same (new to Tunica) firm owns Bally’s Tunica.
We went to the new “Resorts Tunica” first, to see if they had changed the interior, which is Mardi Gras-themed (they haven’t). We spent a little time at the Grand Casino, and finally the Horseshoe Casino. I was hoping there would be a show that we would want to go see, but there really wasn’t much going on. There is a blues museum at the Horseshoe that was really pretty good. We did really well at the Horseshoe, and had supper there at the buffet (which is 500% better than any of the others). Thing is, everybody else knows that the Horseshoe is the best place to eat! They have a reservations system so that when you go up to the desk, they tell you what time to come back (even when you come back there is still a bit of a wait).
Supper at the casino was actually the second meal we ate in Tunica that day. The first was at the Blue and White, a Tunica institution.
We had really good intentions of having a nice lunch at a non-casino, local restaurant.
The Blue and White has both a menu and a steam table buffet option for lunch. We ordered from the menu: Av ordered the chicken fried steak and I ordered the fried chicken livers. Both entrees came with two side dishes, so I had the onion rings (huge and good) and potato salad (I love potato salad but this was icky). Av chose french fries (good) and fried bell peppers (they were great!!).
Sadly, this was our last trip to the Blue and White.
There was a rather boisterous customer there who ‘had a deal’ with another waitress (other than the one he got) about being charged a lesser price for a special request meal. When the waitress (who didn’t know about the ‘deal’) gave him the bill for the cost that’s on the menu, he got loud and virtually everybody on our side of the restaurant knew about it. He went on and on and on about it, to the waitress, and to the other people at his table. The difference (this guy was so loud, everybody knew the details whether they wanted to or not) was a big $2. He said over and over again to nobody in particular “I’m never coming here again”. The waitress, who was really nice and apologetic, came back in tears, saying that the manager said that he got a good deal and that he wasn’t going to change the check. The angry customer kept asking for the manager, and she kept going back to the kitchen to get him, but he wouldn’t come out. This honestly went on for over thirty minutes. If it would have made things better, Av and I would have added the huge $2 difference to our bill, but we both knew that wouldn’t solve this guy’s problem. Finally – after thirty or forty minutes – the manager came out, and he essentially blamed the waitress for not knowing about the guy’s ‘deal’, although saying that the restaurant was losing money every time he got the ‘deal’.
I really don’t want to patronize any place that is managed by a person that lets servers take the brunt and the blame for something that is beyond their control. It just irritates me that this manager wouldn’t come out and face the problem (no matter how busy or crazy the kitchen might have been, who knows).
When I was in high school and college, I worked for a local fast-food place to save up for tuition and books, etc. and had a couple of occasions (and witnessed a few) where a customer would just come in on a bad day and take it out on whoever was behind the counter. Nobody deserves that. Sad.
We felt so bad for the waitress.
On the way out, even though she wasn’t the one serving us, Av said “nobody should have to take that” and gave her $20. She smiled and thanked him. Not everybody is crazy.
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