Remember When George Strait Kicked Off His Final Tour?

George Strait set off on the final tour of his career on Jan. 18, 2013, but those dates didn't turn out to be the final live shows of his career.

The country icon stunned his fans and the country music industry when he announced his The Cowboy Rides Away Tour in 2012. He planned the tour to run for two years so that he could perform one last time in all of the cities that had been most important to his career over the years, kicking off Jan. 18, 2013, with a show in Lubbock, Texas.

Then 60, Strait said he'd been considering packing it in when he reached that milestone age for several years. He took Martina McBride along on the road for the first leg of the tour, which saw him performing two full hours of hits from across decades. Strait has scored a total of 60 No. 1 hits over the years, more than any other country singer in history.

Strait continued the tour in 2014, and he played the final tour date of his career on June 7, 2014, at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, joined by an impressive roster of guest artists that included McBride, Jason Aldean, Kenny Chesney, Eric Church, Ronnie Dunn, Vince Gill, Faith Hill, Alan Jackson, Miranda Lambert and Lee Ann Womack. He captured that show for posterity in his The Cowboy Rides Away: Live From AT&T Stadium CD and DVD.

But it turned out that Strait wasn't done with the stage just yet. He had said he and his Ace in the Hole Band would continue to perform select dates when and where it made sense, and he made good on that promise by announcing a series of shows in Las Vegas in 2016 titled Strait to Vegas. Those shows were so successful that he has performed more Vegas show each year through 2021, with more booked in 2022. He's also given a few scattered performances elsewhere, including a 2019 show at RodeoHouston. He'll also return to RodeoHouston in 2022.