Retired Virginia couple visits their 507th Texas Roadhouse in Concord

When Robert Michael “Mike” McNamara and his wife, Judy McNamara, visited the Concord Texas Roadhouse last week, they came prepared.

Decked out in the restaurant merchandise that’s been gifted to them over the years, Mike wore a hat from Billings, Mont., a T-shirt from Zanesville, Ohio, and a belt buckle from Fort Campbell, Ky. Judy wore a blue T-shirt from Louisville, Ky., and a matching camo hat.

Texas Roadhouse earrings, which Mike made for his wife from pins, dangled from her ears.

As they walked inside the restaurant – the 507th Texas Roadhouse they’ve visited – and a handmade chalk sign on the floor greeted them. “Welcome Mike + Judy,” the sign read, inviting in the couple whose goal it is to visit all the Texas Roadhouses in the United States.

“They’ve got probably more Texas Roadhouse gear than I have, and I’ve worked for the company for 18 years. So we wanted to give them something a little bit different and give them some locally made New Hampshire items,” said Hannah Elliott, the managing partner of the restaurant, whose team laid out a basket filled with maple syrup, maple sugar candy and other goodies. At their table, golden foil balloons representing “507” awaited them. “We’re store number 809, and we’re their 507th visit to a Texas Roadhouse, and we’re just honored that they decided to come on by.”

Elliot worked at the Texas Roadhouse in Newington and met the McNamaras in 2022 when they visited their 273rd restaurant.

“We talked at the time about me potentially having a store in Concord. So it just seems full circle,” said Elliot. “It’s really nice to have them visiting us here today.”

In Concord, a team of six waitresses prepared a special line dance to the song “Sideways” by Dierks Bentley while the McNamaras waited for their dinner. Despite visiting hundreds of Texas Roadhouses, Judy still found something new to try on the menu: the country-fried sirloin steak paired with familiar sides, the house salad and green beans.

Her favorite entree used to be the roasted half chicken, which was discontinued years ago. Since then, she tries to order something different at every restaurant.

Mike’s favorite meal is a 6-ounce sirloin with a house salad and a sweet potato. After they graduated from Texas Roadhouses local to their hometown of Franklin, Va., Mike began to try different things on the menu as well. In Concord, he ordered a pork chop with a house salad and a sweet potato.

“There’s some times we eat at a Texas Roadhouse 20 days in a row,” said Judy. “I’ve always switched it up.”

On weekdays, most Texas Roadhouses operate from 3 to 10 p.m. The McNamaras tend to get there when the restaurants open, which for them means an early dinner, but in a good way.

“If you eat the roll and eat a meal, the average person is done,” said Mike. “I can’t eat it all here. So, of course, I’m carrying it home for the dog anyway.”

‘It’s just become a quest’

Mike and Judy’s love of road tripping dates back decades. The couple met in third grade, started dating in 10th grade and got married in 1971. They lived in a small town where they “had to drive 40 to 50 miles to do anything,” Mike said, and shortly after, they began exploring tent camping.

“My dad had a ‘69 Mustang coupe, and he let me drive it when he didn’t need it for work. In a year and a half, we put 20,000 miles on that car, dating,” he said with a chuckle. “It was a manual transmission car. I’d push the clutch, and she’d shift the gears.”

In 1983, they bought their first RV camper, and the long-distance trips began. In 1985, they drove from Virginia to California, and 10 years later, they camped in the most northwestern part of the country.

When they retired from their decades-long work at the Union Camp paper mill – Mike in 2009 and Judy in 2017 – they reserved more time for their cross-country trips and visiting Texas Roadhouses.

The McNamaras’ love for the restaurant transcends just visiting and eating the food – their license plate reads “TXRH FAN” and their 5-year-old puggle, Andy, is named after the mascot, Andy Armadillo.

They have been visiting the restaurant since 2003, and in 2017, when they realized they had been to many, Mike went through their credit card statements and tallied them up. At that point, the count was 37.

“All of them are pretty much the same as far as the food, the service, the people. So it’s just become a quest,” he said. “Some people will go: ‘I’m going to go to all the baseball stadiums,’; ‘We’re going to go visit all the state capitals.’ We’re visiting all of the Texas Roadhouses. So today is 507, 49 states. We’re having a good time with it.”

507 and counting

Texas Roadhouse, which first opened in 1993, now has over 790 locations across 49 states, Puerto Rico and 10 other countries, according to a 2025 release.

Mike and Judy hope to visit all of them.

“As they’re building new ones or we venture further out from home, we choose which one we’re going to go to and we usually try to go out with the camper two or three times a year,” said Mike.

Since they had not been to the New England area in a while, they decided to switch things up. From May 27 to last Monday, they’ve passed through Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Maine, eastern Canada and New Hampshire, visiting some Texas Roadhouses along the way. They will have completed their trip by driving through Massachusetts, New York and Ohio by June 29. Once they finish, they will have added 14 more Texas Roadhouses to their Excel spreadsheet and have visited dozens of tourist attractions, such as national parks and lighthouses.

“It’s not all Roadhouse, but a good portion of it is,” he said.

The McNamaras may go to the restaurant in Puerto Rico, but they are not seeking to go to the international ones due to the distance.

“They’ve got enough of them in this country to keep us busy,” said Mike.

Yaa Bame can be reached at ybame@cmonitor.com.