Want to buy the “world’s largest floating casino?”
Recently, I was driving around the old downtown part of Orange, Texas, along its harbor where the Sabine River makes its last oomph before forming the bay-like lake leading into the Gulf of Mexico. During the start of World War II it’s shipyards, turning out mass-produced warships like the destroyer USS Orleck, sent the population booming from about 7,000 to 60,000 almost overnight. Today, Orange has about 18,000 people and is the smallest city to form a corner of the so-called “Golden Triangle” encompassing Beaumont, Port Arthur and Orange, Texas.
Long after the war, even as late as the 1970s much more activity could be seen on the Orange waterfront as it was home to a Navy base housing an inactive ship facility, or mothball fleet. It was there I had my first glimpse of a destroyer. Some of those warships were much older and with twice the number of smokestacks (a total of four) than the one on which I served in the 1970s.
Today, the Orleck is back but is looking mighty old. Preservationists rescued the first destroyer built in Orange from the scrap heap in Greece and brought it back to birthplace with hopes of it becoming a floating museum. Its status is now in flux after it was damaged during Hurricane Rita in 2005, and repaired, only to have lost its berth at a park downtown.
The port commission likes to call Orange the “Greatest Small Port in America.” And it isn’t unusual to see a few ships in and out of the port. I was a bit taken aback during my recent visit though to see what appeared at first to be an ocean liner.
It turns out that the ship, the MV Ambassador II, is billed by some as the world’s largest floating casino and is apparently seeking a home.
The 440-foot former roll-on, roll-off ferry was based in Port Canaveral, Fla., until last summer. When under way it can carry about 1,800 passengers, with 1,000 slots and 50 gaming tables.
All three corners of the Golden Triangle have ports so it seems like some folks in these parts who see all that gambling money heading east on I-10 to Delta Downs in Vinton, La., the gambling boats in Lake Charles and beyond maybe should start getting their nickels and other investment money together. One would think people somewhere would want to put out to sea, have a cold one and feed the ever-hungry slots.
At the very least, it would definitely make one hell of a party barge.