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Beth and I began our honeymoon journey in Colorado. Landing in Denver, we picked up our rental car--our only permanent home for the next 28 days--and headed to our first of many temporary residences. For the first night we stayed at one of Denver's most prominent hotels, the Oxford, as a wedding gift from our old buddy and Denver local, Mike Thomas. Starting the ultimate road trip at the home base of a good friend helped kick it off on the right foot. Mike gave us a tour of Denver, pointing out the eateries, bookstores, camping stores, and bars that fit our tastes. |
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Above/below, the three of us went for a day hike in one of the hills surrounding Denver. Though the city skyline was visible in the distance, the immersion in nature was immediate. Ah, Colorado. I hadn't been back since my brother was attending CU Law School and I was just learning to snowboard in powder--in January 1998. Back in the city, Mike showed us his apartment, less than a block from the state capitol. The building reminded me of Olympia, Washington, during my first road trip with Bethy--in July 1999. |
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| Below, Mike shoots pool in one of the coolest bars I've ever been to. "A Place to Think" had an awing collection of music memorabilia. Two of the posters shown below hang on my kitchen wall. They had a gallery devoted to the best concert(s) of my life, the legendary Phil & Phriends shows at the Warfield from April 1999. A realistic painting of Jerry Garcia looked down at me from above the wall of urinals in the bathroom. Beers were cheap, and great music was blasted. |
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Beth and I explored the area surrounding our hotel while Mike went to work at CU's newspaper. Though we were staying in the shadow of Coors Field, the Rockies were on the road, and we had to do something more literate. (Beth wouldn't be so lucky with the Mariners in town during our visit to Seattle.) At left, Beth visits the Tattered Cover bookstore, an independent shop that had Bill Clinton in the store to autograph his autobiography only a few days earlier. I liked the book store but was upset that it failed to carry either of my newly published books: 145 Things to Be When You Grow Up or Know It All!: Grades 6-8 Reading. Boo. |
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Though we missed out on both the Rockies and former President Clinton, we managed to find fun in the Mile High city. Specifically, Beth and I took Mike to play some disc golf. Thomas had never frolfed before, so we decided to show him the wisdom of our ways. We checked the online disc golf course directory and found a wealth of courses in the general area. One course, in a suburb of Arvada, caught our attention with the following sentence in its description: "The Granddaddy of Colorado courses." Mike is shown below at two spots along the 18-hole course. |
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To say this course was challenging would be an understatement. Perhaps we should have paid attention to the
I x xwater... |
| Ralston Creek snaked throughout the course, and many shots were required to go over it. As the pictures below demonstrate, not every shot made it across the Creek. Even I was not immune from the wet grip of the flowing creek. Mike wanted to quit after the first seven holes, but he made it through and had a strong rookie performance. |
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Click to the left (or here) to see a funny video of Mike taking a shot during his first time playing disc golf. << This is the best reaction to hitting a tree I have ever seen. Our scores are shown below, showing Mike's strong performance. Mike called us a few days later when we were in Grand Lake to tell us he had bought his own discs and was on another course in Colorado, sharpening his craft. |
After the round of frolf we headed to Boulder to see
Sound Tribe Sector 9 at the beautiful Fox Theater. STS9 quickly established
themselves as a favorite band.
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1
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2
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3
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4
|
5
|
6
|
7
|
8
|
9
|
Front
|
10
|
11
|
12
|
13
|
14
|
15
|
16
|
17
|
18
|
Back
|
Total
|
| Beth |
5
|
4
|
6
|
4
|
4
|
4
|
4
|
4
|
3
|
38
|
4
|
5
|
5
|
4
|
5
|
4
|
3
|
4
|
4
|
38
|
76
|
| Russ |
6
|
4
|
4
|
4
|
3
|
3
|
3
|
4
|
4
|
35
|
3
|
4
|
3
|
3
|
4
|
3
|
4
|
3
|
3
|
30
|
65
|
| Mike |
6
|
5
|
5
|
4
|
5
|
5
|
4
|
5
|
5
|
44
|
3
|
4
|
5
|
4
|
4
|
4
|
3
|
4
|
5
|
36
|
80
|
After the powerful Sound Tribe show, Mike headed back to Capitol City while Beth and I hung around Boulder for a bit. Our hotel, the historic Boulderado, gave us the view below from our window. Boulder was a welcome change from the cities we'd traveled from--New York and Denver--though it ended up being the largest city we'd step foot in for nearly four weeks |
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Continuing with the trend of visiting friends, I located an old friend from college, Jen, whom I knew was living in Boulder. Jen was a colleague at Boston University's student newspaper (the Daily Free Press) and then a neighbor during my semester abroad in Sydney, Australia. Jen had moved to Boulder from Boston with her husband Trevor and had never looked back. Bethy and I met them for dinner and drinks, wondering if their decision to abandon the crowded northeast for the splendor of Colorado would foretell our own future. We met up with Jen and Trevor at the Mountain Sun, on Pearl Street, on the advice of the transplanted locals. Looking around, I realized Jordan had taken me to the very same restaurant when I visited him in '98. At the time, I was barely 21, and the thrill of partaking in the wares of a brewery was fresh. I relished in that thrill again--enjoying the locally made brews--reminiscing old times with friends from that golden era. Trevor and Jen, who actually met at the Boston University Daily Free Press, are shown in the photograph below, at a post-brewery stopover. |
| The end of our Boulder adventure found us at the Catacombs, a subterranean watering hole just below the Boulderado. Personally, I was just glad I didn't have far to travel after this night--upstairs was about all I could handle. Memories of Australia were unearthed, and accidental broken glass had the unintended affect of reviving thoughts of the wedding. All in all, a great night--one worth of a trip cross-country alone. And yet there was more. |
