Morning Coffee

I enjoy visiting new and different coffee houses when I'm on the road.
It's almost as much fun as visiting book stores! (My name is Tom, and
I'm a geek....(crowd yells, Hi Tom!). Anyway, I digress. Let's turn back
the clock and pretend it's 1997 again. Lynn and I were opening a small
Internet coffee house in Estes Park, Colorado. We had chosen our roaster,
but were approached by a small company from Denver, named Dazbog.
Yes, it's a unique name, because the family that owns the company fled
from Leningrad in the former Soviet Union and settled in Colorado. We
were very close to choosing Dazbog, but eventually did not. They still
hold a special place in our hearts, especially since I might be working and
living in Russia sometime in the next few years. They make wonderful
coffee and their employees are always very friendly. I've never had a
bad cup of coffee at Dazbog.


After I dropped Lynn off at the office for her orientation, I needed a
place to hang out for the morning until lunchtime when it would be
time to take her to the airport. I did some research on Yelp! and
found that the highest rated coffee house in the area is Kunjani Coffee
in Parker. The staff was really friendly when I arrived, the Americano was
well-made and the breakfast burrito from Aspen Delikatessen was tasty.
Even the wifi was fast, and easy to use. All of this in a cozy, living room
type atmosphere with an option to sit outside on a nice patio.
However....this was all ruined by a group of about a dozen 40-something
women who descended on the place and spent the next two hours
talking over each other. They meant no harm, obviously, and I'm not
trying to play the role of "cranky guy", but it was really disturbing. I
searched my bag for headphones or earplugs to no avail. As a former
coffee house owner, I know there's not much that the staff could do to
quiet them, without alienating them and risking the loss of future
business, but it was just plain silly how LOUD they were. It's not a

library, but I wish people would be more conscientious of their actions.
I will come back here again. I just hope the loud ladies stay home.

Sausalito

We really hadn't planned on visiting Sausalito. It's a small,

touristy kind of place near the Golden Gate Bridge, across the

bay from San Francisco. However, I wanted to get some good

photos of the bridge and since the fog was socking in the

bridge (as usual this time of year), we had time to kill while we

waited for the fog to lift. We visited Sausalito over ten years

ago and it really hasn't changed a lot. Lots of little shops, some

interesting and some not. However, there's lots of pretty

scenery and photo opportunities. Lynn even found a really nice

yarn shop. Go figure! We found some good coffee, a fun book

shop and generally has a good afternoon of hanging out.

Powell's City of Books

I don't have enough superlatives to describe Powell's City of Books
in Portland. It takes up a whole city block in the Pearl District, and is
is the largest independent bookstore in the world. It covers 1.6 acres
and they have over four million new, used and rare books in their
inventory. It's also my favorite bookstore...ANYWHERE!


You can literally (ha) get lost in this place. Each section of the

store is color coded (like a subway system) and stairways go

everywhere (visualize Escher architecture)

I could spend days in the travel section alone. While most stores
have the typical titles, Powell's has some pretty obscure stuff as

well.


World Cup Roasters is their coffee supplier and their cafe is a fun
place to be amongst other readers, enjoying a good cup of caffeine.


Yes...I am a geek. I bought a Powell's T-Shirt. Who else would
wear a T-Shirt advertising their favorite bookstore besides me?

Coffee in Boise

We had every intention of doing our usual grab everything and drive
out of town quickly, heading to our next destination. However, Lynn's
sister Kristi, called ahead to Thomas Hammer Coffee in downtown Boise
and bought us a credit for coffee. Good coffee, friendly baristas...I give
it a good review.






Since we went downtown, and away from the highway, we also decided to grab
some breakfast. Tripadvisor (which I trust emphatically) suggested Goldy's as
a great place to eat. I have been eating bad, institutional quiche for so long on
the Ice, I had almost forgotten what good quiche tasted like. Really tasty and
good coffee too. I thought the folks at Thomas Hammer were a bit friendlier,
but overall, a good experience at Goldy's as well.

I'm sure there are dozens more good (and not so good) coffee places we didn't
visit in Boise, but these two represented the city well. Maybe we'll hit the others
next time.

Fruita Farmers Market

Yesterday, we made the short drive to Fruita, Colorado to visit their
weekly Farmers Market. Although there wasn't a lot of produce because
it's still early in the growing season, it was a lot less crowded than our
more local Market in Grand Junction and is held on the weekend instead
of Thursday evening. The people were really friendly, some good music
was being played by Huey Plumleigh and everything had a good, laid back
feel. We didn't end up buying anything, but Lynn had a good time looking
at the products that two different alpaca farms were offering, and it was
fun to see two of the alpacas here at the market. After we left the market,
we strolled on the main street of Fruita and ended up at Aspen Street Coffee.
My goal at the beginning of the summer was to try more local coffee houses
and I really liked this place. Good coffee, roasted by Colorado Legacy
Coffee, friendly helpful baristas and really clean. Lots of neat historic photos
of Fruita on the wall as well. I'm pretty sure we'll go back some day. We
capped off the morning by stopping at the new Fruita Library for some
DVDs. One doesn't always have to go a long way to check out new things.
Sometimes, they can be in your own neighborhood!

Sioux Falls

Traveling from west to east, we spent the night in Sioux Falls, South
Dakota. We've driven through before but had never stopped. We were
very impressed! It's a nice small city that seems to be trying to be a
bit more cutting edge. There's a great downtown area, full of shops,
cafes, etc. and a wonderful park near the downtown that hold the falls
that give the city its name.


On our way out of town, we stopped at a really good coffee house,
named Black Sheep Coffee.


A few days ago, we watched an interesting documentary called, "God
Grew Tired Of Us", about the Sudanese refugees that were forced to
flee their country and go to other parts of Africa, and then the United
States to avoid persecution, and sometimes death. There was a small
group of Sudanese men gathered in the coffee house, enjoying conversation
and their coffee. I had no idea, but apparently Sioux Falls has a very
large Sudanese population and I'm glad we had watched the documentary
so I knew why they were in Sioux Falls of all places. It really is becoming

a smaller world.

Enstrom's

A Colorado-owned business that is really popular among locals and
increasingly around the world is Enstrom's. Enstrom's is in Grand
Junction and is famous for their Almond Toffee. We're trying to watch
what we eat but we still visit once in a while to drool and enjoy their
coffee in their small cafe that overlooks the candy kitchen. Unfortunately
we picked a bad time to visit as the candy-making crew had just gone
to lunch.


This is the finished product. Of course one doesn't get this much in a
box and I'm pretty sure a diabetic coma would ensue, but it sure looks
good!


This is one of the reasons the candy is so good. I don't think I've ever
seen so much butter in one place before!


This is a view of the cafe. It's a nice setting, overlooking the shop
on one side and the candy kitchen on the other.

Luckily for those of us that are watching what we eat, there's a
sugar-free selection (at the bottom) available as well.

Headed Home

Two days in Vegas is fun, but anything more than that is a
bit much for the senses. Add to the fact that it would get to
be 107 degrees, we were ready to head to the relatively
cooler Grand Junction. Our stay at Excalibur was nice as
we expected but we basically just slept there so we didn't
use much of the facilities.


A place we drove by while we were driving around town was
The Cleveland Clinic's Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health. I'm
not sure if I like the architectural style or not, but it's
certainly different.


Before stopping for lunch at In-N-Out Burger (which is basically a
mandatory stop!) we went to a Trader Joe's grocery. We stop at one
any time we're in an area there is one and sadly, this is the closest
(or Albuquerque) one to our house. There aren't any in Colorado and
I've heard that the reason is because Colorado won't serve beer or
wine in groceries on Sundays and besides all of the other groceries,
beer and wine are big sellers at Trader Joe's. However, I was able
to find my favorite New Mexico Pinion Coffee and stocked up on it.
Lynn also bought some yummy hummus.


Just north of Las Vegas, on the way home, we passed through a tiny
part of Arizona. This section is totally cut off from the rest of the state
by the Colorado River and the Grand Canyon. Interstate 15 cuts
through this section, called the Arizona Strip and also climbs onto
the Colorado Plateau here at the Virgin River Canyon. All very
pretty and interesting to know that the Colorado Plateau stretches
all the way from here to just east of Grand Junction...500 miles
away!

Cups Coffee House

This morning, we visited the Cups Coffee House, here in
Grand Junction on 12th Street. It's located in the historic
Miller Homestead, which was built in 1889. Operated by the
Hospice & Palliative Care of Western Colorado, all proceeds
from Cups directly support the Hospice Child & Teen Center.
They've done a great job of restoring the inside of the house,
and it was a comfortable place to enjoy our Americanos.

I Won a Bagel!

My years of gleaning thousands of bits of useless information
and storing it into my brain came to be a benefit today. Lynn
and I were out for our walk and we stopped at the new Main
Street Bagel location on the Mesa State College campus. it's
in a great location, right on North Avenue and on the first
floor of one of the new dorms that have been recently built.
Anyway, we were ordering our drinks and the barista asked
if I wanted to play their Trivia Pursuit game for a chance to
win a free bagel. Silly silly Barista! I chose the Geography
category: Q: What Middle Eastern city is the center of the
Muslim religion? A: Mecca. Duh. I've known that since
Junior High. The other barista commented that more
Americans probably know that answer though now than
they did fifteen years ago since our country has had more
of a presence in the Middle East. I shrugged my shoulders,
and then Lynn and I enjoyed our free bagel!

A Trivia Win

Tonight I played trivia with some friends and some
folks I just met and we won. I wasn't thrilled with
all of the questions...I mean really...20 questions
devoted strictly to Thanksgiving???
However, I was pleased with myself for knowing the
answers to the following questions:

Where is the Gaspe' Peninsula - Canada
What country was Chopin from - Poland
What two countries have square flags - Switzerland
Vatican City

So as a result, each team member won a half pound
of Starbucks Coffee. And it hasn't even expired
yet! A rarity in these parts.

Frothy

I pride myself on my Barista skills and I
especially like making coffee for everyone
at work. So when one of the flight crew
offered to send down something from
Christchurch, I asked them to send me milk.
I don't drink milk, but I figured people in
the office would like it in their cereal and
coffee, and the rest I would put in the instant
pudding mix I have in my room. We don't get
real milk here...only the powdered variety.
I forgot that I had packed my milk frother
that we bought a few years ago in Krakow and
since the powered milk doesn't froth very
well, it would be the perfect time to use it.
So this morning and afternoon, everyone who
wanted one, got a latte or a mocha...with
real milk!

Mixed Emotions

It was nice to be able to sleep in a bit today as I knew
I wasn't going to be flying. I've been going to be pretty
early though as I'm trying to catch up from the lack of
sleep I received on the plane ride across the Pacific, so
I got up around 7:30am anyway. When I turned on the
television, I learned from One News that there had been
a 7.9 earthquake off the coast of Samoa and that a
tsunami had occurred. Tsunamis are taken very seriously
in New Zealand since it is an island nation and reports
stated that a wave from 1-3 meters was headed this way!
New Zealand also has very strong connections to all of
the other nations of the Pacific, no matter how small since
many of it's residents live on these islands and vice versa.
New Zealand is the 'big city" for many of these islands.
The time came when the waves would be arriving on one
of the North Island's capes and it turned out that the wave
was less than 1 meter, causing no damage, or loss of life
by the time it reached NZ. There were no reports of any
waves on the South Island but I'm guessing that the damage
in Samoa was considerable.

I decided to spend the day at the Borders Store in Riccarton
Mall since I wanted to do some research for some traveling
we want to do after I get off the Ice. Little did I know that
there is a school holiday going on and the mall was packed
with screaming kids. Ugh. I grinned and bore it, trying to
keep a "half full" attitude. One nice thing about Christchurch
is there is a very Asian culture here so you can find Asian
food almost everywhere. And at this mall, it's no exception
as I enjoyed good, cheap Sushi for lunch. YUM! I did my
research at the bookstore, drank some coffee and headed
home to the hotel. There I received a very nice surprise!
The plane scheduled to go down to the Ice had a small,
non-life-threatening mechanical problem and had to turn
around (called a boomerang) after an hour in the air. This
meant that I would not be flying tomorrow either! YAY!
The note also said that I would have to go back out to the
CDC in the morning to get more per diem money (about
$60US/$80kiwi). The earliest I'll be leaving for the Ice now
is on October 2nd (October 1st in the States)!

Crossing The Desert

Of course this photo is staged. If it wasn't, someone else would
be writing this blog entry as Lynn and I would be too busy
counting our money!


Our hotel, the Red Lion Hotel and Casino in Elko was awesome!
Really really nice and although we aren't gamblers, it was fun to
have a casino in our hotel. It also had a Starbucks right inside
the casino (we did take advantage of this). I guess they want their
gamblers to stay wide awake so they can gamble longer.


Elko is a nice town. We're not looking for a different place to live,
but if we were, Elko seems like it would be a good place to live.
We stopped at the Visitor's Center which is actually an old ranch
house built in the 1800's that was moved into Elko and now
besides serving as the visitor's center, also doubles as a small
museum to the family. Very interesting.


As we crossed through the last 2 hours of desert and mountains
of northeast Nevada, we came to the towns of West Wendover
Nevada and Wendover Utah. This big sign of "Wendover Will"
greeted us as we entered West Wendover.


These towns struck me as being rather odd. Pretty much the only
reason West Wendover exists if for gambling. I could not see a
single house in the town. Only casinos and other service related
businesses. Crossing into Wendover Utah there doesn't seem to
be a lot there either except Lynn said she did see a few houses and
there is a school, firehouse, etc. I'm guessing Wendover was a tiny
place until they decided to build West Wendover to lure gamblers
from Salt Lake City.


After leaving Wendover, we began the crossing the the Great Salt
Lake Desert. Almost immediately we came to the Bonneville Salt
Flats. What a cool place! Definitely middle of nowhere, it's also
a destination in it's own right. Bonneville is a huge flat expanse
of...Salt! For miles and miles. It looks just like the Ice sheet at
McMurdo in it's stark whiteness. It's also a place where every year
land speed records are set by very fast cars. It was fascinating.


In about an hour, we came to the Great Salt Lake. We'd been to
Salt Lake City before, but never had a really good view of the lake.
it reminded me of an odd combination of a Great Lake and an Ocean,
although it's actually 3-5 times saltier than the ocean. We did see
a sailboat out in the distance, but I read later that there are no
fish since it is way too salty.


We like Salt Lake City. It's a city that has great parks,
transportation, friendly people etc. etc. If...we wanted to
live in a big city. We took a drive through downtown since
it had been almost 10 years since we've been here.


We missed our turn off of I-15 to shortcut it to I-70 and as
a result drove though one of the most beautiful interstate
drives in the country. The San Rafael Swell, west of the town
of Green River, is truly amazing. Huge red rock formations,
great vistas and just plain interesting scenery. We plan to
go back and explore the area further.