Around the World in 365 Days – On the Road – Galveston to Charleston

Day 48, Dec. 4^th: We woke on the ship in port – no fog today to cause any delays. It’s funny watching the other passengers on disembarkation morning. A lot of people take all of their luggage to the dining room. Even if walking off, you’re not leaving until 7:45 at the earliest. You can get your breakfast, go back to your room to grab luggage and then leave. John and I wait in our room until our number is called. We’re Diamond level on Royal, so have a low number, but even then, we don’t disembark until 8:30 or so. We stopped buying alcohol on cruises when Texas started charging tax on it when you got off the boat – which is yet another line. Other than that, Galveston has improved their customs procedures, and using Uber/Lyft is much better now than 2 years ago with rideshares having their own pick-up area. On top of all that, the Four Points Sheraton let us get an early check in, so we were able to go to our room at 10AM. Gambling luck may not have been with us, but ease of travel is its own special luck. We found one-hour student massages at a massage school in Clear Lake, an area of Houston on the Galveston side for that afternoon, so we walked the beach, read and drove the hour to the massage school, trying to get back to Galveston before rush hour. We enjoyed “Linner” (lunch/dinner) at Miller’s on the Seawall. Back when I lived in Galveston, over twenty years ago now, they had a special with 16 fried shrimp, Texas toast, green beans and hush puppies for $8.99, they still have the platter – for $16.99 – which is still a pretty good deal. John had that and I enjoyed my new favorite there – shrimp and grits with gouda cheese and sautéed mushrooms.

Afterwards we had a sunset walk along the Seawall.

Day 49, Dec. 5^th: We started our day with a beach run – the sand was well packed and perfect for running. Afterwards we rewarded ourselves with breakfast at the “Bronco” (it used to be called the Donut Shop – they didn’t sell a lot of donuts, but had lines out the door for their breakfast burrito with 3-4 scrambled eggs, potatoes, cheese, beans, bacon and chorizo. It weighs over a pound). You can get the burrito with any component parts you like, and what really makes it is the spicy green salsa. John spent the afternoon by the pool, and I played music and blogged. We then headed down to the Strand area for Happy Hours. During the week, Galveston has amazing Happy Hours with really good, reasonably priced foods, topped off with discounts on beer, wine and drinks for those who choose to partake. I had a discount on Lyft for this week (it helps to be a 5-star rider) so we Lyfted to the Huli Huli Hut for crawfish, followed by my favorite – Willie G’s for seafood stuffed jalapeños, and my new favorite – seafood stuffed shells. We went back up to the Seawall, and enjoyed another sunset

 then worked our way to live music at B. Jiggers while watching the Cowboys/Bears game.

Day 50, Dec. 6^th: Another jog on the beach and breakfast at Denny’s for pancakes (by the way – AARP members get a 15% discount on the bill) before getting going for a long day in the car (there’s a reason we try to get in a lot of massages). A five-hour drive to Shreveport and we checked into the Travelodge near the highway – not one of the better Travelodges, but only a few miles to the casinos. We started at Margaritaville – since we’re Jimmy Buffet fans, we decided if anyone was going to get our money it might as well be someone we like. We spent over four hours there, and neither one of us ended up doing very well, but my last two hours I played on $10. We moved over to The Horseshoe

and still no luck, and none at Boomtown. I didn’t find any of favorite machines – no “Invasion from Planet Moo-lah”, no “Hoot Loot”; they did have “Shadow of the Panther” which is the one I played for $10 for 2 hours. John also had trouble finding his favorite table games. We stayed out very late – 11PM.

Day 51, Dec. 7^th: The breakfast buffet had biscuits and gravy, which was different. John’s stomach does not do well with cream, but he couldn’t resist. He regretted it later. I can’t do the sausage in the gravy, so had a biscuit (which was pretty good) with “whipped spread” and a muffin (they mainly had bread stuff). We drove eight hours to Montgomery, Alabama with good weather, and got into town a little after sunset.

Tonight’s lodging was a new Super 8 on the Southside of town, it was clean, and pretty empty (about 10 other guests), but it was 4 miles to downtown. We missed the Civil Rights Museum which closed at 4, but did make it in time to see the Legacy Museum run by the Equal Justice Initiative (barely. The website says they are open until 7:30, we did not see that the ticket office closes at 6. We got to the ticket office 5 minutes before closing and they were turning out the lights- since we were paying by card they turned the lights back on and we got our tickets.) It was very powerful. One of the greatest injustices in our country was continuing slavery after the rest of the western world outlawed it in 1807 to preserve the profits of the plantation owners. After the Civil War, the south rewrote history and perpetuated and further institutionalized discrimination which has continued to this day. No, Professor Johnson, the Civil War was not the “War of Northern Aggression” and “States Rights” is still just about slavery. All are created equal. Until we get over ourselves and start living this way, nothing will really change. We capped off our night sitting at an outdoor bar with live music by the Renaissance Hotel. A lovely couple – Tony and Yolanda – let us “pull up some fire pit” and join them near the fire. He is a truck driver and really has been everywhere. His favorite place in the US is Memphis. I’ll make it there someday!

Day 52, Dec. 8^th: We got up and headed up to the Civil Rights Memorial (the museum is closed on Sunday). The Memorial is outside near the capital building so we could get some photos and pay homage to all those who fought for the universal right to freedom.

Another long day of driving – 7 hours to Charleston, SC. Another beautiful day. This time we’re treating ourselves to a downtown hotel in the historic area – the Hyatt House on King Street. It’s beautiful, we even had a kitchenette in the room complete with a dishwasher. We walked around the hotel and found the We Are Warehouse which has local brews and good food – both of us chose the grilled Tuna burger. The thick cut slightly curled fries with seasoning were excellent. We roamed around and down King Street, passing bars, shops and restaurants in a vibrant downtown area, then turned back. We saw a park with the local Christmas tree made of lights – set up to walk through it.

We made it back to the hotel to catch the end of a football game and relax.