July 24, 2006

Steal my sunshine

Calvin and I spent the weekend in Flagstaff. The reasons were severalfold. For reason #1, I refer you to the Phoenix area extended forecast:

And now, the Flagstaff forecast:

The weather was the only reason we *needed*, but then there was the annual Made in the Shade Beer Festival. And you all know how we love us some beer.

Reason (really, we're on excuses now) number three is that my 32nd birthday was on July 20th, and I wanted to get the heck outta Dodge.

Excuse number four? Calvin and I really, REALLY needed some alone time. We love having all of the family around us, but... well, it's okay for us to want to be alone once in a while.

And reason number five... HOTEL SEX. Yeah baby.

We left on Friday afternoon and drove north, hitting a thunder-and-lightning storm north of Phoenix (we saw, and reported, the start of a lightning-caused wildfire, but by the time we got ahold of the 9-1-1 operator, it had already been reported). The miles rolled by, the mood improved, the music was good (though my iPod transmitter birthday present didn't work the way I was hoping, so we had to depend on CD's), the company was good, and we had a cooler of beverages stashed behind my seat. We watched the temperature drop by degrees the further we drove (we have a temp-and-direction indicator on the rear-view mirror), and by the time we hit the 80's I was practically bouncing in my seat.

We stopped at an Albertson's in Flagstaff proper long enough to have a potty race (my 33 seconds to Calvin's 67), then found our hotel. Which wasn't the three-star that was advertised, but what the hell. We weren't planning on spending a lot of time in the room anyway. At least there weren't any bugs (poor hotel memories of Castaic, California come to mind). It was strategically placed about a hundred feet away from the VERY BUSY railroad tracks, so that was fun. Flagstaff has one of the busiest railroad hubs in the nation, and we were literally feeling it as we tried to sleep. We would have been in the same circumstance no matter what hotel we chose in that particular area, so moving around wouldn't have really done us any good.

We paused in the hotel room long enough to freshen up, then took off in search of food. Calvin, being very familiar with the area because of his many business-related treks, took us to Buster's for some truly excellent steaks.

Mmm... meat.

Then it was back to the hotel for some truly excellent sex.

Mmm... (hah! I won't do it).

We were up at about 10:00 the next morning, after a night of sleep interrupted by train whistles. We drove to downtown Flagstaff (cool webcam) and wandered around before stopping for lunch at Maloney's. We had another hour or so to kill after lunch before we could legitimately head over to the fairgrounds for the beer festival, so we drove around town looking at the different houses and neighborhoods. Flagstaff is so similar to Maine in feel and appearance (and hippy freaks and rednecks - and I don't mean either of those terms in a bad way, so you hippy freaks and rednecks close your e-mails) that I felt really at home. If moving out of state doesn't happen, I would settle with little complaint in Flagstaff.

We were still a bit early, so when we reached the fairgrounds we parked and listened to music. We observed a painfully obese bulldog wheezing around (the Beer Festival mascot - I would say it was apt, but I'm neither obese nor wheezing... well, much), whose owner tried in vain to prevent him from oof-ing down on his tummy every three steps.

We observed some folks being let in, so we got out our own VIP tickets (oooh.... ahhh...) and went through the gates. We were greeted by cheerfully flustered event coordinators, and were handed our tasting mugs (twice as large as the mugs given to non-VIP ticket holders), drink tickets (like, a hundred of them between the two of us), and a ticket for a free event cap. The young lady who put my event bracelet on was very careful to prevent arm-hair depillitating, but Calvin was not so lucky and swore periodically and randomly as his wrist was de-haired.

The crowds were very sparse at this point, so Calvin and I went over to the VIP tent to see what it was all about. We nabbed our first beer of the day - Sierra Navada - and sat for a few minutes enjoying the cool weather and watching some storm clouds roll in (it never did rain - maybe spat a little bit - but the cloud cover and breeze was JUST what we were in the mood for, weather-wise). After draining our beers we went over to the Reaper Ale tent and got some AWESOME red. Seriously, this stuff was like a party in my mouth. Theirs was our favorite beer by far, at the festival. Judging by the unbelievable lines that particular tent experienced throughout the rest of the day, I'd say the rest of the crowd felt the same way we did about their beer.

Other brewers we sampled from:

Anchor Brewing
Asatti Beer
Big Sky Brewing Co
Four Peaks Brewing
Gordon Biersch
Mogollon Brewing Co
Moose Drool
Mudshark Brewing Co
New Belgium Brewery
Papago Brewing Co
Pinnacle Peak
Pyramid Brewery
Prescott Brewing Co
Reaper Ale, Inc
Rock Bottom Brewery
Santa Fe Brewing Co
Scottish & Newcastle Importers Co
Steamworks Brewers

Indeed, beer loving fools that we are, this festival was our idea of Mecca.

We grabbed some food at one point - a fried potato concoction called a "Tornado", which looked like the cook took a potato, kept it intact and peeled it in long spirals, then deep-fried it and seasoned it with some salt and herb combination. It was So. Good. People kept stopping us and asking where we got it, so I'd say that particular booth made out like bandits.

After leaving the beer festival (and adroitly avoiding the police waiting just outside the fairgrounds - entrapment, much?), we went back to the hotel and grabbed a quick... nap. When we awoke it was fairly late, and dark outside. We opted to walk next door to the Museum Club, which is a country-western bar with all the flair to satisfy your rodeo soul. We sat and sipped (more) beer, and listened to the country music. We watched the couples dancing, and attempting to do something that looked kind of like dancing sort of, and talked about where we'd like to be in the next year.

We hung out for a couple of hours, by which time Calvin was P.L.O.W.E.D. So I drove us through the Taco Bell drive-through (Calvin didn't remember doing that the next day), ordered some stellar nosh, and went back to the hotel to eat and crash.

The following morning we had breakfast at the Crown Railroad Cafe (who has the best home-fried potatoes I've ever had, by the way). The restaurant was a cramped, crowded affair, but the model trains and electric train sets running around everywhere were charming. We then headed back down "the hill" for the two-hour drive back to the valley. My reaction as we watched the temperature climb on the thermometer was the exact opposite of my reaction headed up to Flagstaff on Friday. Sigh. I HATE summers in this state.

The quick weekend excursion up to Flag was so easily and painlessly executed that I think we may make a regular thing of it. I'm always looking for more options to escape the heat.

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©Laura Charon 2000 - infinity.