Illinois' Route 66 Red Carpet Corridor-- Part 3: Braidwood to the Old Riviera

In Braidwood, we got stopped by police as a lot of people were crossing the road between the Polk-A-Dot Drive-In and where they were having their festival grounds.  We didn't stop.

Driving into Gardner, it was very sad to see the site of the old Riviera.  You'd never have known there was a building there.  This is the first time we'd driven by it since the fire.  We always thought it was suspicious and just this past few weeks we read in the Route 66 News that it had been arson and by the last owner, as we expected.

We are sure glad we got the opportunity to go there a lot.  What a unique place with the kitchen upstairs, restaurant and bar downstairs and the dumbwaiter.  And then... those super high toilets.  As they had a wooden plaque "Al Capone Passed Gas Here in 1932."  Great food and fun people, and, of course, Bob Kraft, the luckiest man in the world, holding court behind the bar.

He was "The Luckiest Man in the World" because he could get dressed, go downstairs, drink in his bar, eat in his bar, and go upstairs at the end of the day and sleep.  And he never had to go outside and never had a drivers license.

We Sure Miss Him and Peggy and the Riviera.  --RoadDog