Casino Buffet

Every time we drive west, to Tulsa or further (usually toward Albuquerque), we pass through a little town in western north-west Arkansas called Siloam Springs.  I am not motivated enough to try to find an audio clip that accurately portrays the way this town name is pronounced with the local accent, but suffice it to say that we both adopt an accent for five seconds every time we drive through the town.

I have nothing against this town personally.  It just happens to be on the way to Tulsa.  But, because of the stop lights and lower speed limits in the town, Siloam Springs really cramps my style and makes the trip to Tulsa take a lot longer than it would if there were an actual, you know, interstate that connected Walmart Country with Tulsa.  Point being that we are typically trying to get THROUGH Siloam Springs and have never actually stopped there.

Right at the Oklahoma border, or really at the border of Arkansas and Cherokee Nation, there is a large casino.  The Cherokee Casino and Hotel, as a matter of fact.  Everytime we drive through town, we say "Hmmm, we should stop there sometime."  Well, folks, some time has finally arrived.

As you migh recall from my last post, we recently went to the Drive-Thru Safari, which is just up the road from Siloam Springs.  So, leaving the Safari at 4:30pm on a Saturday afternoon, going to the casino seemed the logical choice of activity.

The casino was crowded.  We caught a glimpse of a couple with matching M&M jackets as we walked in....which was too awesome to not take a picture of:

Then we went inside, and it was a typical smokey casino.  Initially we were going to play the penny slots, but it seemed as though one needed a card to play the games, or some kind of ticket/token system, and I felt stupid for not being able to figure out how that worked, so after walking around the casino a few times, doing some stellar people watching, we decided our money would be better spent at the buffet.

Buffets are dangerous places.  This one had stations from all over the world, with a Mexico station, an Asian station, an Italian Station, a salad bar, a BBQ station (which I think was called "Local Favorites") and a big dessert station.  We both loaded up our plates with grub and made it through only one round before we realized that the major pull of the buffet was, in fact, the dessert station.  So we abandoned "real food" and hit up the desserts.  Round 1 involved pie.  For Round 2, I visited the chocolate fondue fountain and got strawberries, cherries and marshmallows dipped in chocolate, as well as an "ice cream" sundae and chocolate pudding.  Doug got cream puffs, his own "ice cream" sundae and more chocolate pudding.  We skipped the cobblers, the jello, the bread pudding and the cupcakes (though the cupcakes looked fancy and delicious).

We left the casino in under an hour, maybe a record for a casino goer, and only $20 poorer.  And with enough dessert to get us through the next month.