technoteacher
TUG Member
Pick up the coupon books around town and you can save 10-20% or more at many restaurants and shows. Visit 1branson.com for up to date reviews and local information. They will tell you what is good and what to stay away from while you are there.
Restaurants:
Farmhouse Restaurant in downtown – great food and good prices. They serve breakfast all day as well. Their fried chicken and chicken fried steak is quite good too.
Billy Bob’s Dairyland on Hwy 76 – good milkshakes and burgers but service a bit slow.
Grand Country Buffet on Hwy 76– one of the best buffet restaurants. Everything we tried was good and the servers are friendly too.
White River Fish House at Bass Pro Shops – is right on the river at Branson Landing and serves good fish and other dishes in a nice atmosphere.
Hook & Ladder Pizza in Hollister – firehouse themed restaurant and good pizza. This is not far from the downtown and Branson Landing area.
Danna’s BBQ on Hwy 165 – we went twice it was so good! They have a huge combo plate with two meats that can be split. The beef was so tender and their beans and bread was great too.
We visited the College of the Ozarks for lunch at Dobyns Dining Room. The college students run the restaurant and the dining room was beautiful with a great view over the valley. The food was even better. Almost everything they serve is grown/raised/prepared at the school. You also can visit their working mill, jelly shop, and other agricultural buildings. They have lodging on site as well.
We ordered our Showboat Branson Belle tickets ahead of time as we wanted the Captain’s Row seating. You can’t get that through any of the discount ticket brokers. We were front row on the balcony and the meal upgrade was worth it. There is a pre-show during the dinner and you can’t see that if you choose the Paddlewheel Club seating. We had 16 oz. ribeye steaks that were of great quality and cooked just right – not an easy feat with the quantity served on a boat. We chose the 8 p.m. show and due to the dinner service, we missed the sunset. By the time they took a break before the main show, it was dark and there was not much to see.
We purchased our SDC tickets from the Branson Tourism Center. Beware of all the “visitor’s centers” up and down the strip. Most are timeshare sales centers and will pressure you to tour resorts. Branson Tourism Center does not do that as we learned on 1Branson.com. If you check out their web site first for pricing, we found a gas coupon that saved us on that too. We got SDC tickets with 2 days for the price of one that were much cheaper than what SDC sells on their site. If you are not doing a lot of rides, one day might work at SDC, but it was nice to go back the second partial day to revisit areas around the park. Make sure you try their flavored funnel cakes – we had never seen red velvet or oreo funnel cakes before. The oreo was wonderful , but plan to share as it was really sweet and rich.
We also purchased our Ride the Duck tickets from them. We got vouchers we could use anytime. The Duck location on Hwy 76 provides a better experience according to 1Branson and the Tourism rep. We thoroughly enjoyed our time on the Duck as it toured us around parts of Branson one would not normally see and then took us out on Table Rock Lake.
The downtown strip closes up around 6 p.m. which surprised us in the summer. Make sure you visit Dick’s 5 & 10 Store which does stay open later. They have every kind of novelty, remakes of old toys and games, and candy. You could spend hours there.
Branson Landing is an outdoor shopping strip with Bass Pro at one end and a department store at the other. The lighted fountain is cool. Shops are typical mall shops. The Factory Shoppes at Branson Landing on Gretna Rd. are dead. VF Outlet is there and a few other shops. Tanger Outlet off Hwy 76 was very busy but has all the typical outlet stores you find everywhere. We popped into a number of small shopping centers that indicated local crafters, but kept seeing the same commercially prepared things everywhere.
Restaurants:
Farmhouse Restaurant in downtown – great food and good prices. They serve breakfast all day as well. Their fried chicken and chicken fried steak is quite good too.
Billy Bob’s Dairyland on Hwy 76 – good milkshakes and burgers but service a bit slow.
Grand Country Buffet on Hwy 76– one of the best buffet restaurants. Everything we tried was good and the servers are friendly too.
White River Fish House at Bass Pro Shops – is right on the river at Branson Landing and serves good fish and other dishes in a nice atmosphere.
Hook & Ladder Pizza in Hollister – firehouse themed restaurant and good pizza. This is not far from the downtown and Branson Landing area.
Danna’s BBQ on Hwy 165 – we went twice it was so good! They have a huge combo plate with two meats that can be split. The beef was so tender and their beans and bread was great too.
We visited the College of the Ozarks for lunch at Dobyns Dining Room. The college students run the restaurant and the dining room was beautiful with a great view over the valley. The food was even better. Almost everything they serve is grown/raised/prepared at the school. You also can visit their working mill, jelly shop, and other agricultural buildings. They have lodging on site as well.
We ordered our Showboat Branson Belle tickets ahead of time as we wanted the Captain’s Row seating. You can’t get that through any of the discount ticket brokers. We were front row on the balcony and the meal upgrade was worth it. There is a pre-show during the dinner and you can’t see that if you choose the Paddlewheel Club seating. We had 16 oz. ribeye steaks that were of great quality and cooked just right – not an easy feat with the quantity served on a boat. We chose the 8 p.m. show and due to the dinner service, we missed the sunset. By the time they took a break before the main show, it was dark and there was not much to see.
We purchased our SDC tickets from the Branson Tourism Center. Beware of all the “visitor’s centers” up and down the strip. Most are timeshare sales centers and will pressure you to tour resorts. Branson Tourism Center does not do that as we learned on 1Branson.com. If you check out their web site first for pricing, we found a gas coupon that saved us on that too. We got SDC tickets with 2 days for the price of one that were much cheaper than what SDC sells on their site. If you are not doing a lot of rides, one day might work at SDC, but it was nice to go back the second partial day to revisit areas around the park. Make sure you try their flavored funnel cakes – we had never seen red velvet or oreo funnel cakes before. The oreo was wonderful , but plan to share as it was really sweet and rich.
We also purchased our Ride the Duck tickets from them. We got vouchers we could use anytime. The Duck location on Hwy 76 provides a better experience according to 1Branson and the Tourism rep. We thoroughly enjoyed our time on the Duck as it toured us around parts of Branson one would not normally see and then took us out on Table Rock Lake.
The downtown strip closes up around 6 p.m. which surprised us in the summer. Make sure you visit Dick’s 5 & 10 Store which does stay open later. They have every kind of novelty, remakes of old toys and games, and candy. You could spend hours there.
Branson Landing is an outdoor shopping strip with Bass Pro at one end and a department store at the other. The lighted fountain is cool. Shops are typical mall shops. The Factory Shoppes at Branson Landing on Gretna Rd. are dead. VF Outlet is there and a few other shops. Tanger Outlet off Hwy 76 was very busy but has all the typical outlet stores you find everywhere. We popped into a number of small shopping centers that indicated local crafters, but kept seeing the same commercially prepared things everywhere.
!