I started our annual letter with a story about traveling to the national parks in Utah. I compared notes with Gordon and he’d written about the same stuff–except his was cuter. So we used his version. But I hate to toss anything so here’s my version. The full Christmas letter will follow in a few days.
Christmas 2023
The Christmas letter is late this year but we have a good excuse—we’ve been on the road. We’ve been wandering around all year; down to the San Diego area to see various visiting relatives. It’s funny that everybody comes to SoCal to spend time and I’m trying to talk Gordon into leaving before Los Angeles turns into Detroit. He asks me where I want to go and I don’t have a good answer. So, I guess leaving isn’t in the immediate future. But it gives me something to bitch about and that always takes the pressure off Gordon.
We decided we should see American national parks while we can still walk so we booked a trip to Utah. We flew to Denver first to have dinner with Billy and Dawn Williams. Billy is an old band mate of Gordon’s and Dawn is a hoot. We had a great dinner after an eventful flight through thunderstorms. We spent the night at the Boulderado, an historic hotel in Boulder (duh). Boulder was a rich mining town so the facilities were built to impress the rich folks. Our room was decorated with antiques. The whole place was really cool. We enjoyed historic downtown Boulder and surrounding mansions then hit the road in our rented Suburban. We could have invaded a small country in that thing but all the small cars were out. It was take the Suburban or wait three hours. The Suburban was a gashog but it was comfortable and our luggage fit. Actually, we all rattled around like a BB in a boxcar but it got us around. Next day we drove straight through to Moab. It took six hours but the drive was interesting. We drove from Alpine settings to prairie to desert. It was gorgeous. We got to the Hampton Inn in Moab and were ungraded to a suite. I felt like royalty. We went to a local restaurant for Italian. I was surprised that I could order wine, you just can’t watch them pour it. That’s done in the kitchen. They call the booze policy the Zion Curtain. I didn’t care. I could have beer with pizza in Utah! We went to bed early.
We had choices as to outdoor activities. We looked at the river rafting options but there didn’t appear to be any white water; it was just drifting down the Colorado. Boring. I’d just get a sunburn. So we decided to go boulder surfing—at least that’s what I called it. We rented an off-road ATV, The guide told us to leave it in ‘high’ until we got to the hills. The engine screamed as we followed; I thought we were burning up the engine but the guide said it was normal. When we got to the hills we were told to drop into first gear and leave it there. We took off. The first twenty minutes were sheer terror. We were told to keep our hands and feet inside the cage and trust the machine. We roared straight up and plunged straight down. We almost tipped over a few times and I’m convinced that my butt clenching the seat saved us. Gordon, of course, had a ball. We surfed rocks for two hours. We watched another guy almost dump his truck so it can be done. Our guide said it happened all the time. He asked me why I didn’t scream. I told him Gordon (and my butt) was the only thing keeping us alive and I didn’t want to distract him. He laughed. We survived. I told a cousin this story and she asked how many years ago this happened. I said, “Last May.” We may be old be we refuse to grow up. Anyway, Gordon has life insurance. Of course, it’s not worth much…
We drove through Arches and Canyonlands the next day. An Australian mother-and-son unit commented at dinner that night that the landscape looked lunar to them. The mother said they’d traveled from Maine and were on their way to San Francisco. They loved the USA. I think they wanted to emigrate. I hope they don’t change their minds when they see what a mess San Francisco has become. I supposed we should have warned them.
We left our lovely suite and drove through Capitol Reef Park next day. We saw the petroglyphs of a lost native civilization. The story is: they were abducted by aliens. Really. Hey, maybe it’s true, I don’t know. The Mormons tried a settlement but gave up. They left all the fruit trees so the area is truly lovely. We took a few pictures and started the drive to Salt Lake City. We stopped half-way at a small-town Motel 6 or 8 or whatever it is these days. It was Sunday so the only things open were at a truck stop. We ate at Arby’s with the truckers. It reminded me of my childhood. Our room at the Motel whatever smelled of some anti-bacterial, anti-bug product. It almost killed me. I really missed our Hampton Inn suite but you take what you can get. We got to Salt Lake City and stayed at an historic hotel (forgot the name of it). We went across the street for a beer and chili and watched the Lakers get swept by the Nuggets. The locals were all Nuggets fans but they were nice. I think they felt sorry for us.
Next day we toured downtown and attended an organ concert before driving out to look at the Lake. It’s really low. The locals say agriculture takes so much of the winter runoff the lake is drying up. They’re working on fixing it. It was a nice trip but it was time to fly home. I was worried that Maggie, our cat, would be lonesome since her brother disappeared. She was fine. She’s a survivor. I wish I could have said the same about her brother.
Our next big trip was a Christmas Rhine cruise. I’m in Gordon’s space already so I’ll let him talk about it. I just want to say that we were unprepared. We found the only restaurant in Cologne (Koln) that didn’t take credit cards and the waiter didn’t speak English. We used up all our ‘toilet frau’ money paying the bill. Which meant we had to be careful about fluid consumption. We didn’t want to use a bush and cause an international incident because we ran out of 50 cent pieces for the bathroom. We’re ridiculous. Have a Happy and a Merry etc.