At the end of Part III, I said I left Vegas around 1:00 pm on Sunday June 22nd and headed East and toward home. Well that wasn’t totally accurate, I made one more stop in Vegas after I left my friends Roman and Jeanette Delgado. I went to Norm Clem’s home and looked thru a couple of thousand roulette chips. I ended up buying over 400 of them – this was the biggest purchase of my entire trip !!! Now I was finally ready to leave Vegas. I went thru Henderson and Boulder City and back across Hoover Dam and headed toward Harrah’s Ak-Chin Casino in Maricopa, Arizona. I arrived around 8:00 pm. After having my favorite Mexican dish – sizzling hot fajitas and all the fixins, I went back to the room and got into my bathing suit. Ak-Chin has a really nice pool and there is nothing better than floating on your back across the very dimly lit pool and looking up at the starry sky. After a dip in the pool and the hot tub spa, I was totally relaxed and ready for bed.

The next morning I got up and headed toward Texas. I had not made a room reservation for today since I was not exactly sure how far I would get. I got on Interstate 10 and when I got thru Tucson, AZ, Deming, NM, Las Cruces, NM and was on my way to El Paso, TX I decided that I better make a reservation for tonight. I have been across West Texas several times in the last 7 years since I retired and started making my annual cross country trip to the Chip Convention. Invariably, I have always landed in the lovely and exciting town of Fort Stockton, TX and this year would be no different. After checking availability of rooms in Ft. Stockton, a couple motels were sold out and others wanted almost $150.00 for a one night stay I settled for a Super 8 Motel for $125.00 in this God forsaken town. This is really crazy, but there isn’t much you can do about it. On the rest of the 28 day trip,17 nights at various Harrah’s Casinos were either free or totally comped and 3 other nights I stayed at other Casino Hotels and only paid about $50.00 a night and these were some really nice rooms in Kansas City, Las Vegas, San Diego, Phoenix, Lake Charles, New Orleans, Biloxi and Tunica. Too bad there aren’t any Casinos in the desolate depressing and down right useless area know as West Texas.

Tuesday morning I got up early and couldn’t get out of Fort Stockton fast enough, then things got really interesting. About 100 miles East of Ft. Stockton on Interstate 10 a red light appeared on the dashboard of my “new” van that I had purchased a couple of days before leaving on my trip. The van began to jerk and buck and I pulled over on the shoulder to see what the problem was. I looked in the owner’s manual and discovered that the “Check engine” light had come on and note in the owner’s manual said – don’t worry – it’s probably nothing serious and the vehicle could still be operated – yeah right!!
I restarted the engine and the light stayed on but the van ran better, so I pressed on toward Lake Charles, LA. After a few stops for gas and food, I finally made it thru Texas, all 877 miles of it and crossed the border into Louisiana. I stopped at Delta Downs and a couple of other small Casinos before, I reached Lake Charles. I got into Lake Charles about 8:45 pm and headed straight for Steamboat Bill’s Seafood Restaurant. They serve one of the best and largest fried seafood platters that you will find anywhere in the country. Luckily for me they didn’t close until 9:00 pm. I was the last one out of the restaurant, but I left very happy and very, very full. I spent the night at the Isle of Capri and got up in the morning and headed for New Orleans.

I watch a show on TV called Bizarre Foods on the Travel Channel and they had a show on Southern food and highlighted a delicacy known as a “Turducken”. The home of the “Turducken” – a Turkey stuffed with a Duck stuffed with a Chicken and then filled with all types of stuffing – is Maurice, Louisiana. Maurice is about 7 miles South of Lafeyette. I was really looking forward to sampling my first “Turducken” and had planned on stopping in Maurice when I was first planning my trip back in February. I found the butcher shop that prepares the “Turducken” and the restaurant next door that had cooked the triple decker bird for the host of the Bizarre Foods show. The only problem was they don’t regularly serve the Turducken at the restaurant – they had only cooked one up especially for the TV show - and the ones at the butcher shop were raw!!! I was really disappointed, but settled for a nice lunch of fried pork chops and several local specialty side dishes.

When I got to Harrahs in New Orleans, I got a very nice surprise – I had been upgraded to a suite. The suite was incredible, with 2 flat screen TVs, a large dining room table, a Jacuzzi tub, terry cloth robes, etc, etc. The best part of it was the room was free and they threw in a $50 dining coupon. (what a difference form the Super 8 Motel in FT. Stockton, Texas). There was very little traffic in downtown New Orleans as they are struggling to come back from hurricane Katrina. The van was still running rough, so I called a Chrysler dealership in Biloxi, Mississippi and made an appointment to have things checked out on Friday morning.

On Thursday morning I headed for Biloxi – this would be the first time that I had visited this area since August 19, 2005 - only 10 days before hurricane Katrina demolished the entire Gulf Coast from Bay St. Louis to Biloxi. It was really sad to see the destruction the storm had done and all of the abandoned homes and vacant lots along the coast. A lot of the restaurants, motel and other businesses had been totally washed away by the storm. The only places that had rebuilt were the Casinos and they are still building more new ones. I spent two nights at the new Grand Casino and I visited all the other casinos and picked up new slot cards and lots of new Roulette chips. I took the van to the Chrysler dealership on Friday morning and they diagnosed the problem as a faulty fuel injector. Unfortunately they did not have the parts to fix it, but I found out that the parts were in a distribution center in Memphis. I was going to be going to Tunica for the weekend, so I called a Chrysler dealership in Memphis and scheduled an appointment for Monday morning. Maybe they could get the van running properly ???

Saturday morning I got up and got an early start as I headed for Tunica, by way of Vicksburg and Greenville and all the other points in between. Vicksburg was kinda uneventful, not much new and some of the roulette tables were gone or not open. Greenville was a different story. My first stop in Greenville was the new Harlow’s Casino. When I harvest roulette chips, I play roulette in the same manner that I would play if I was playing to win, just in case my numbers happen to hit. Well, I got Lucky at Harlow’s and when I left the table I had a stack of 20 nice new Roulette chips in one pocket and a stack of 20 $25 chips in the other pocket. I was happy to win $500, but with a little more luck I could have easily walked away with $2,000 or $3,000. I went to the other two older casinos but one no longer had a roulette table and the other one did not have a table open. I headed North on US 61 toward Tunica. .Even though I had well over a half a tank of gas, I had to stop and top the tank off in Cleveland, MS. Gas was only $3.69 per gallon – the cheapest I had seen on my entire trip!! I never thought I would see the day that I would be glad to pay $3.69 per gallon for gas. I was running a little late, so around 10:00 pm I called Harrahs to make sure my room would be waiting for me when I arrived. Everything was set and I told them I would be there in a couple of hours, that was before I hit the casinos and my plans got changed a little. After quickly hitting several of the Tunica casinos and harvesting several stacks of roulette chips, I landed in the Sheraton. Harrah’s owns the Sheraton, so I decide to sit down and play a slot machine to relax a little and to earn a few points on my Diamond card. This was around 11:30 pm. When I finally left the Sheraton it was 7:00 am. I had played two slot machines for almost 8 hours and earned 700 base points on my Diamond card and I cashed out with $650 more than I started with. When I got to Harrahs, the desk clerk asked if I was checking out. I said “No, I’m just a little late checking in.” I chilled out on Sunday and picked up a couple more stacks of roulette chips. I ate at the new Paula Deen Buffet at Harrahs and actually went to bed early – I had to get up early Monday morning to have the van in Memphis by 7:00 am.

When, I pulled out of Harrah’s around 6:00 am on Monday morning, I left a trail of smoke and fumes that probably killed every mosquito within a 5 mile radius. I got to the Chrysler dealership at 6:45 am and waited for them to open. I told them the problems I was having with the van and the service manager said “Go out in the lounge and we will check it out.”.– that was at 7:15 am on Monday morning. At 11:00 am on Tuesday morning, after having to spend the night at a motel in Memphis and taking the van back and forth to the dealership 3 times, I finally was heading East on Interstate 40 and the van was actually running pretty well. They had replaced a fuel injector and several computer components. Luckily the van was still under warrantee and the repairs had cost me nothing. About 20 miles East of Nashville, the dreaded “check engine” light came on again, oh well, I would be home in about 24 hours. I made a quick stop to see John Zoesch and to trade a few chips as I passed thru Nashville. I drove the rest of the day and got to Southern Virginia and spent the night Wytheville. On Wednesday morning July 2nd, I got up and drove the last 8 hours home. The “Long Journey Home” was finally complete !!!

Take care,
Jerry

P.S. I took the van to the local dealership on Monday July 7th and on July 16th they called me and said the van was ready to pick up. They replaced some more computer components and the catalytic converter. The van has run great since. I don’t know yet when the 2009 Convention will be held but I’ll be ready to make my 9th annual cross country journey to attend the Convention and to see more of this great country. Life is good!!!

P.P.S.
For those of you who may have missed the first three Parts of the - Trip to the Convention - they are shown as replies to this post.