Most Scenic Dairy Queen

Yes, it's the most scenic Dairy Queen in the world, located in Hinton, West Virginia. Above is a panoramic view of the dining room which overlooks the famous New River near it's confluence with the Bluestone River. If you click the picture you can see it in larger splendor. If you think there is a more scenic DQ, I want to hear about it.

Also notable at this DQ is table service. You order at the window, but they bring your food out to your table and call your number. The menu is somewhat expanded also. On a previous trip, I had the fried oysters. Why I thought that was a good idea in the middle of remote WV, I can't tell you now. The oysters were amazingly uniform in shape, parallelograms as a matter of fact. Oyster-llelograms is what they became known as. My advice is to stick with the staples that would normally be good at a DQ.

I visited on this trip on Friday night and it was nice scene of Summer. The sun was getting low and pretty after a beautiful warm day. One of those crisp West Virginia days with low humidity and long clear views driving on the beautiful back roads. Sliding right through little towns and people's front yards, catching fleeting glimpses of what's important to them, and what isn't. And there at the DQ were a variety of people ending their day and week with a little outing. There was a group of 10 or 20 people in one dining room ending a dinner of some significance with hugs and some people still lingering and talking. Well dressed white haired couples ask what kind of fish they serve, and cause confusion behind the counter while research on the fish is done. The young woman comes back and answers, "Cod?" in a question, as she apparently has never heard of a fish with that name. Older teens in rugged 4wd pickup trucks that look like they actually go off-road congregate and chat non-threateningly. A few bikers come and go with loud revving engines.

So I did a little audio recording while I was there, with my ISDV2+ and I'm going to try to edit it into something so you can get a flavor of the scene there at the most scenic DQ in the world on such a pleasant Summer Friday evening. One of the most interesting things I heard there was one of the young women behind the counter. In an effort to keep people flowing through the ordering process, she frequently said, "can I help someone?" Nothing too strange about that, but it was the way she said it. She had one of those naturally strong voices that carries way down the road. And her intonation had a pleading quality to it, like she REALLY, REALLY wanted to help someone. The other thing to listen for is the retro musak playing in the dining room, and the excited patron who lets out a YeeHaw when his order number is called. OK here it is, an mp3 file about a minute long.