Sunday, March 16, 2014

Crossing into the desert


Nearly two and a half weeks in California and one thing was for sure. There are a lot of fuckin people in California. Whenever there is an abundance in people, there is limited resources at exorbitant prices. We were feeling the brunt of that limitation in multiple ways.

Water: once free and accessible in rest stops in Oregon. Now, non existent or costly.
Free parking: Our usual nightly parking at trucks stops like Flying J and Pilot were suddenly unavailable do to the endless numbers of truck drivers driving anything and everything to and from the bustling, overpopulated and extremely productive state of California.
Dump stations: Again, often free or for a nominal fee. Now hard to find and unneccesarily expensive. (It's just poop!)
Gas: Expensive! Especially when you only get 8 to 10 mpg.
Beer/Entertainment: Apparently you are only allowed to have fun in California if you're rich.

Food: The only thing that wasn't unrealistic. In fact, it was at times down right dirt cheap and delicious. You just had to look in the right places. And those right places were Authentic Mexican places and Taco Trucks. Oh boy. We were in the heart of Mexi-Americana and the food was amazing.

We might have been broke, not buzzed, and sleeping on side streets hoping not to get busted by cops, but we were high on hot salsa endorphins, which was good because we needed the extra happy juice to get us through the stress of an impending lull in work. We were at a crossroads and unsure of our next step.

Luckily, we have good people skills or phone etiquette, or something, but we booked two gigs in Arizona that weekend, so we were high on life again with a plan for at least the near future. We knew two things, well three. One. We had money coming in. Two. In was in the direction of the Grand Canyon (which was part of the loose original plan.) And Three. We had a friend in Lake Havasu that we were going to see.

So, for the third time since we left we got to see a familiar face! Specifically, a familiar face from Daniel's home town and childhood. Joanna had been living there full time for the last several years with her now fiancee Roy and as it turns out, the two of them were a ton of fun. We partied for two nights straight, drank every bottle of liquor within our vicinity (Roy encouraged shots, lots and lots of shots) and ran around the house like children playing random games and laughing hysterically.

(On a side note, as it turns out, Lake Havasu was getting primed for it's yearly Spring Break Party, a fact we were unaware of until we arrived. Although it wasn't the main week for it, we got a fair dose of half naked, twenty something, extremely drunk and relatively annoying people congregated in the 100's on the lake shore.)

Desert sunset in the rear view, we're headed east!
We were scheduled to play Mike's Route 66 Outpost and Saloon in Kingman, AZ on Friday March 14th for their St. Patrick's Day Party. We were feeling a little rough after our Thursday night of random shot shooting, but excited about a new gig. The people were as nice as can be and excited to be having an out of town band in their middle of nowhere off of Route 66. It sat isolated in the barren desert landscape, halfway between two towns that most people have never heard of. The place was packed with locals, mostly an older crowd and they all were attentive and listened. Probably one of my favorite shows so far.
A highly recommended watering hole on Route 66.

The next day with came into Williams, AZ and it practically like being back in Red Lodge. A quaint little town on the brink of a National Park and a total Tourist-ville. It was kind of a disappointment in comparison to the wild nature of the preceding AZ towns and it's people, but it was nice to get a good cup of coffee and micro-brewed beer. The landscape was shifting from desert to forest and there were small patches of snow reminding us of our increasing elevation. The show went fine, although it was pretty slow. The owner/manager was a total meat head, asshole  and although I clearly explained that we were a two person band that did a variety of music, he booked us for this huge venue with no promotion except a sign that said "dancing tonight". Kinda misleading. Although the small group was into it, even danced and bought CDs the guy had the nerve to ask us to stop 30 min before we were scheduled to finish. We silently packed up, clearly upset by the figurative slap in the face, but then silently satisfied when the remaining crowd, including the bartender, was appalled at his behavior and proceeded to leave the bar with us. Their positive remarks and support were a nice lift, but the experience was still a little hard to shake.

Deflated and frustrated we leave Williams to head into wilderness, natural beauty and hopefully solitude for the next week or so. Perhaps connecting with nature will reset our internal struggles.

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