A Perfectly Acceptable ....

A Perfectly Acceptable Substitute for No. 4: Performance at Red Rocks


While I am not taking No. 4: Performance at Red Rocks completely off the table, I am willing to acknowledge at this point that some of the things on my list just may not happen in the next -EEK!- 4 months.  So Saturday night I did something totally in the spirit of the list and of going to an outdoor concert and of No. 25: See a concert- live music.

Possibly No. 4 will end up being put on the 90 by 90 list.   Yes, that's probably going to be a thing.

But.

Last weekend the tiny little town of Salida (population about 6000 really cool people) hosted the Gentlemen of the Road Stopover.  I've been hearing about this since last January. At the time I thought "Cool. I want to go. But. I will be back in Texas."

Fast forward and my days of not knowing where I will be next continue. Turns out I will be in Colorado. And the preparations for the Stopover are coming together and tickets go on sale. Urk! Tickets are $200 each for the whole weekend, including camping. No one day tickets are being sold. Hard to justify that.
But...but... Mumford and Sons are headlining. I love them. I want to see them. But... but... $200.00.  Just for one ticket.

The last few weeks before the show and instead of the 30,000 tickets that the promoters thought would sell,  only 20,000 have been purchased.  So one day tickets go on sale.  Saturday night will be $125.00.  Still quite a bit but maybe.  But who will go with me? I don't want to go by myself. (Whine.)  I've pretty much burned Bunny out on Mumford just by constantly playing their Babel CD.

Last Friday no tickets have been purchased, no plans have been made. Bunny and I head into town for dinner and to just see how crowded and entertaining it is. The stores are all decked out with signs and British flags are everywhere and there is a party atmosphere. Bunny says "We should go tomorrow night. I have a couple of friends going."

Home again, we go onto Salida Swap, our local buy/sell/trade/find a lost dog FB spot.  "ISO two one day tickets for Saturday night".

By Saturday morning I have two discounted tickets, just have to go pick them up. I feel like I'm doing a drug deal. First stop is a house in town. I hand over $70 cash and get a sole red wrist band. Assured that is all I need, I go on to my second stop: a Shell station in the next town over. There I get an info packet and a black wrist band in exchange for 3 twenties.Wait! What's the difference? Why is one red and one black.  No one seems to be able to tell me. Did I just buy a ticket for Friday? The wrist bands need to be registered online and I get "Success!" after entering each one so ...fingers crossed...they both must be good.

Hmmm. One of these is not like the other.

Turns out one was a weekend wristband, the other was a day wristband.

Bunny and I head into town about 5:30. Mumford and Sons plays at 8:15.  Parking is easy although we have about a mile to walk to get to the stage area. Tents are everywhere. It's all so...organized. Clean.  There's a tiny security check with no wait. And ... no one ever looks at our wristbands. The instructions said they would be scanned but no.

Within ten minutes Bunny has abandoned me. O wait! She let me buy her (and me) a T-shirt first. Then she scampered off to meet up with friends.

No worries. I realized I had a choice.

I could do something I really, really wanted to do and enjoy the entire experience or I could sit at home  and whine about missing something I really wanted to do but didn't because I didn't have anyone to go with.

Guess what? I'm pretty good company for myself.

I grabbed a taco and as it got closer to 8:00 I edged my way up to the stage, picking a spot near the sound booth/VIP area because there was a low fence to lean on which also gave me a pretty good view. Somewhere along the way I realized how short I am. And how many 6 feet tall guys there are out there. With their 5'8" girlfriends.

Jenny Lewis was playing. Never  heard of her but totally enjoyed her music.  A group of exuberant twenty somethings was gathering next to me. A cute thirty something (maybe 40?) couple leaned on the fence next to me. One of the 20s asked me "You here by yourself? That's cool. How in the world did you do concerts when you were a kid without cell phones?"  Half of the couple asked if I was alone and did I want to meet them in Moab to go mountain biking next month.   Um. No. I don't even know your name but thanks for the offer.

And then.... the main course.

Mumford and Sons.  They were great. Awesome. Did I notice one bit that I was alone? No.
Would it have been nice to have someone there to ooh and aaahh over the band with?
Sure.
But better to be alone than to have someone with me that didn't care about the music or the experience.

The best part of the night? The four band members singing together around one microphone with just one guitar. Marcus Mumford asked everyone to be quiet and you know what? Everyone was. Twenty thousand people quit talking/singing/yelling and just listened. I videoed a bit of it but of course, not a very good video. I was too busy listening myself.


                    

(If you can't see this, go here.)

And when it was over I walked alone to my car with 20,000 of my new bestest friends that I had never met before.   And here's the amazing part. Not a care in the world. Not one second thought about walking alone to my car a mile away surrounded by strangers at 11pm on a dark night. Once in my car it took me exactly 4 minutes to get out of the parking lot and on my way. Like I said, everything was very well organized.

So while it wasn't Red Rocks,
which is its own experience, this huge outdoor concert was definitely an acceptable substitute for now. Red Rocks may still get done before December but it may not.
No worries.

FIBArk: It's a Party!

FIBArk: First in Boating the Arkansas 


Today is the start of FIBArk.

What's FIBArk, you ask?

First in Boating the Arkansas (River) is the nation's oldest whitewater festival. And it's held right here in my backyard of Salida, Colorado.

From the official FIBArk website a brief history:

The FIBArk boat races started June 19, 1949 when six boats entered the Arkansas River in Salida on their treacherous 57 mile run to Canon City through the vertical cliffs of the Royal Gorge Canyon. Fueled by the spring snow pack runoff from the mountains of the Continental Divide and 5 or 6 feet above normal level, the river water ripped down the canyon creating tremendous currents and boiling rapids where the valley walls narrow and the river floor drops.

Only two boaters finished the race that year and the following year the course was shortened to 45 miles. Only one person finished the second year.  In the interest of keeping the contestants alive, the race was shortened again to 25.7 miles for the third year. It is still the longest whitewater race in the U.S..

And probably the most fun. The entire town turns out for four days + of races, parades, beer, and music. And maybe just a little pot.

Thursday evening is the Tenderfoot Hill Climb.  Remember my drive to the top of S Mountain last week? Runners start at the base of the mountain and run STRAIGHT UP, then back down again.  And they do it in less than 12 minutes. It's amazing. I get out of breath just watching. 

Runners heading STRAIGHT up to the top of Tenderfoot/S Mountain.

Photo by Matt Kroschel/The Mountain Mail

Friday starts with a Pancake Breakfast, followed by races in the river, a carnival and live music in the park.  At night there is dancing on the grass in front of the bands.

Saturday morning there are 5 and 10k running races followed by the parade down F Street. I LOVE a small town parade. Candy is thrown to the kids. There are firetrucks and police cars, the mayor and the Shriners. So much fun and it makes me feel like I am in 1950's America.

 Veterans proudly march.

People line the street for the parade down F Street.

All day long there are more water races and then at 5:30 there is the Hooligan Race. Anything that floats (and lots that don't) can "race" down the river in front of a screaming and cheering crowd. O yea- no actual boats are allowed. Most contestants end up in the water, most floats end up disintegrating. 

 River Rat

 There's a very large bridge support in the middle of the river these guys are trying to avoid.

A prison break? 

Nope, just a Hooligan float.

Then more music in the park. And dancing. The air is heavy with smoke...a contact high is possible. 
Beer and wine are served. Babies dance.  Gray haired couples dance. Teenagers dance. All are welcome. As the night goes on, the girls get prettier, the guys get more handsome, the party gets louder.  Last year we wisely took a hotel in town just so we wouldn't have to drive home with the rowdies. Don't have one this year but I figure the girls have friends in town to stay with and I won't be out late. 

Music at Riverside Park.

Not even dark and already the photos are blurry.

The actual downriver races are on Sunday. There's a river dog contest. And more music. 

By 6pm, things are wrapped up, the whole party is over. 

This year I confess to seeing it more from a local's point of view than in previous years. I went into town today and stocked up at the grocery and ran all my errands. I'm not interested in trying to fight the crowds over the next four days if I don't have to. And already I am weary  of the drivers not familiar with the canyon road that I drive every day. It's a narrow road, river on one side, mountain on the other. Each direction has one lane.  Nervous drivers tend to straddle the middle yellow line. That would work if it were a straight road, but it isn't. Not at all.  I dodged two cars today-both coming at me in my lane- on my way into town. 

Nevertheless, I am still excited for the fun to come. 


An Update:

Taylor Stack, 15 and the current owner of our baby chicks, won the Tenderfoot Hill Climb with a time of 10 minutes, 39 seconds. The second place runner came in at 11 minutes 7 seconds which means Taylor was hauling butt up and down that hill. Even more impressive, he didn't even look like he had broken a sweat doing it. Just came running across the finish line like it was a stroll in the park. Amazing. Especially when you consider he was running at an altitude of about 7000 feet. 
Wow.
(And he was only 7 seconds off the all time record speed of 10 min 32 seconds set back in 2006.)

No. 25: See a concert-live music

No. 25: See a concert- real live music with real live musicians.

No. 25 is DONE!

Last week I journeyed into Salida for a show at the SteamPlant.  This is a lovely, intimate venue with about 200 seats, a bar in the lobby and great music on the stage.

Salida SteamPlant

on the Arkansas River

At least there was great music the night I was there. 

Baskery, a group comprised of three sisters from Stockholm, Sweden, was there. They describe their music as Swedish blues/Southern rock which is pretty accurate. They were definitely rocking.  People were dancing in the aisles, little girls were tumbling at the foot of the stage and everyone was clapping. 

I did not have the presence of mind to video any of the songs. Silly me. 

I did snap a pic:

Stella, Greta and Sunniva Bondesson

a.k.a. Baskery

I am competent on YouTube though and did find you a song or two.

(I may not be totally competent on Blogspot, though. If you don't see the videos, please click over to the main Project Sixty by Sixty website. They are definitely there. But they aren't showing up in some of the emails. Sorry.)

Baskery performing their song NoNo

back in May. 

(Video by countryrock93/YouTube)

See? Really fun country punk.

And their encore was stunning. Beautiful harmony on a traditional Swedish drinking song from the 1700s.

C.M. Bellman's "Bort allt vad oro gör" performed by Baskery

(Video by Shelley54/YouTube)

It was dazzling, these three amazing voices filling the tiny theater. 

A perfect end to the evening.

I'm so glad I went.

And..... completely unrelated but never the less fun.... a photo of where I blog is on the blog "Where Bloggers Blog". (duh!)  Click here if you want to see where I sit to write.  But please don't tell the hubs. He thinks this desk is his for fly-tieing. And it is. I just haven't gotten a chair for the computer desk so I can't use it. Yet.
Soon enough.
And if you just want to be voyeuristic and see where other bloggers sit, click here.