Texas Royalty

The Stops

Family-run, one-of-a-kind, and not on any chain's roster — the stops road-trippers detour for on purpose. Kolaches, brisket, fruitcake, and the ice cream that started it all.

Czech Stop

• Czech Stop / Little Czech BakeryI-35, Exit 353

  105 N. College St. · West, TX 76691

  A gas station on I-35 with a Czech bakery attached, open around the clock, and the reason a hundred thousand people a year know the word kolache.

  The second reading prefixes a P.O. box onto the street line. The street, the town and the ZIP match character for character. Both readings are pages of czechstop.net — no chamber, city or county record naming this address was reachable, so this is two pages, not two publishers.

  Their own site

Hruska's

• Hruska's Store & BakeryOn TX-71

  109 W State Hwy 71 · Ellinger, TX 78938

  A general store that has been in one family since 1920 and now sells kolaches to most of the traffic between Austin and Houston.

  Character-for-character match, and both readings are pages of hruskas-bakery.com. Ellinger is not in any chamber that publishes a member address. There is a Hruska's Kolaches in Salt Lake City; it is a different business and is not a second location of this one.

  Their own site

Slovacek's

• Slovacek's WestI-35, Exit 353

  214 Melodie Dr. · West, TX 76691

  The other Czech bakery at Exit 353, run by the sausage family from Snook, about twenty miles north of Waco.

  The chamber spells the street Melody; the business spells it Melodie. The business's own spelling is what this site displays. The chamber's record is corporate-level — its phone is the Snook line and its website field points at slovacek.com — so it confirms the number and the street and not much else.

  Their own site

Collin Street Bakery 4 stops

• Collin Street Bakery, Corsicana SouthI-45, Exit 229

  2035 S I-45 · Corsicana, TX 75110

  The I-45 stop, and the one most people mean. Fruitcake since 1896, a deli counter, and ten Tesla chargers in the lot.

  The exit number is the bakery's own, not inferred.

  Their own site

• Collin Street Bakery, Downtown Corsicana

  401 W 7th Ave · Corsicana, TX 75110

  The original, on 7th Avenue, which the company still calls home. Not on an interstate — you turn off for this one on purpose.

  Same address, different abbreviation. The two sources give different phone numbers — a cafe line and a main line — which is ordinary and not a conflict about where the building is.

  Their own site

• Collin Street Bakery, LindaleI-20, Exit 552

  17044 I-20 W · Lindale, TX 75771

  The I-20 stop, between Dallas and Tyler.

  Their own site

• Collin Street Bakery, BellmeadOn I-35

  701 N I-35 · Bellmead, TX 76705

  The I-35 stop north of Waco. The bakery labels it Waco; the address is Bellmead.

  The only one of the four the bakery does not give an exit number for. This site shows the town on the address rather than the name on the sign, because the town is what a map resolves.

  Their own site

Woody's Smokehouse 2 stops

• Woody's Smokehouse, NorthboundOn I-45

  947 W St Mary's · Centerville, TX 75833

  Jerky, smoked sausage and a barbecue counter, halfway between Dallas and Houston. Open at 5:30 in the morning.

  Both readings print the street with no suffix at all — 947 W St Mary's, apostrophe and everything. That is the business's own spelling, not a truncation, and it is what this page shows. The street itself is W St Marys St. This store publishes no I-45 exit number, so none is printed.

  Their own site

• Woody's Smokehouse #1, SouthboundI-45, Exit 164

  1021 St. Marys St · Centerville, TX 75833

  The other one, on the other side of the road, open 365 days a year. Different owners, different phone, different website — same name and the same exit.

  The chamber writes a W on the street and the business does not; both readings give the same phone number, so both are reading this store and not the other one. This is a second, separately operated Woody's about two tenths of a mile from the first, and neither one's website mentions the other.

  Their own site

Blue Bell Creameries

• Blue Bell Creameries Visitor Center

  1101 South Blue Bell Road · Brenham, TX 77833

  The creamery, the observation deck over the production floor, an ice cream parlor and a country store, all at one address in Brenham.

  Confirmed a third time by Visit Brenham, the county's own tourism office. The visitor center and the plant are one address, which is what makes the observation deck possible. Blue Bell's consumer-relations P.O. box is a different ZIP and is not a place to drive to. The visit is self-guided — there are no guided tours.

  Their own site

Worth Knowin'

• Centerville has two Woody's Smokehouse. They share a name and a town without sharing an owner — two websites on two different domains, two phone numbers, and neither one's site mentions the other. One faces northbound traffic and one faces southbound, so which one you want depends on which way you are pointed.
• West has 2 of them, from 2 different families. Czech Stop and Slovacek's sit a few blocks apart off the same exit. That is not a data error — it is a rivalry, and it is the reason this exit is worth taking.
• 2 of the 10 rest on a single publisher. Czech Stop and Hruska's publish their addresses themselves and nobody else does — no chamber, no city, no county record this site could reach. Both readings are pages of one site, which is a thinner check than any chain on this map gets, and the table below says which rows it applies to.

Find More in Texas

• Where these 10 addresses came from two readings each, and every disagreement between them
• Texas roadtrips every stop along a drive, in the order you pass it
• How It Werks usin' the map, and what stays on your device