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We had one more day in this lovely city that is located along the Colorado river and very close to two beautiful National parks.  We missed a couple of sights in each park yesterday and so decided to make quick visits to both this morning.  We went to Arches first and saw Double Arch.

We then traveled back to Canyonlands National Park to take a short hike to Upheaval Dome which is best appreciated from the air.  On a very windy day we were happy to settle for seeing it from the ground.

We then ventured back into the town of Moab.  This is a very interesting town.  There are about 5,000 residents but you wouldn’t guess that from walking the streets.  The reason for this is the number of tourists in this town.  Arches has over one million visitors per year and most stay here in Moab.  All the motels have their “No Vacancy” signs illuminated.  The main street through town (appropriately named Main Street) is very crowded and crossing can be dangerous since it is actually State Highway 191.  There are lots of fine restaurants and all sorts of interesting shops.

Tomorrow we leave this little hamlet and head back to Phoenix as our trip will be coming to a close.

Today was our day to explore Canyonlands National Park.  It is about 30 miles from the town of Moab, Utah (Arches National Park is only about 5 miles away from Moab).  Canyonlands, as the name would imply, is famous for it’s deep canyons that have been etched out by the rivers in this area most notably the Colorado River.

I hope you appreciate the great personal risk I go through in order to provide you with photos of these areas.  I walked all over this park and put myself at great risk being at the canyon edge in order to get the right photo.  Here are a few.

These are just a few of the photos I took (at great personal risk) to satisfy the insatiable appetite of my audience.  I had to drag along a very reluctant Patrice looking for the right photo.

I hope you are satisfied.  Let’s see some comments on the blog!   Just a very few are showing me their love.

Thanks all until tomorrow.

This is Patrice now, Robert has left his computer.  Don’t you believe a word from that man. He wouldn’t go a step near the edge of these cliffs.  Look at this candid photo I took of him.

And check out this photo I took.

And that nonsense about him dragging me around?  Well we only walked about 10,000 steps today so I am off to the fitness center to get in a little more of a work out.  Meanwhile look at your self-proclaimed warrior.

C’ya

Today was a travel day.  We left Monument Valley early this morning and headed north for Moab, Utah.  We were told that about 13 miles north of Monument Valley was something known as Forrest Gump Point.  You might remember in the film, Forrest starts running from coast to coast and after 3 years, 2 months, 14 days and 16 hours he finally decides to stop.  If you want to see that scene you can click on this link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKKmzmeU5-0 and you will see Monument Valley in the background.

Apparently tourists stop at this spot and take pictures of themselves with Monument Valley in the background at the same place you see Tom Hanks in the film.  The motion picture was filmed with the highway closed and Hanks was not in any danger.  What kind of fool would stand on the highway with cars traveling in both directions?  Only an idiot of course.

We next stopped at Mexican Hat to eat breakfast.  This is a very small town that is named after a local phenomena of the same name.  They have a hotel and a couple of restaurants.  I asked the waitress why do people come to Mexican Hat?  “They don’t” she replied.   Is there fishing nearby and people come for that?  “No”.  How about hunting?  “No”.  No one comes here?  “No”.  Okay, I will accept that.

One thing for sure we are in a Red state.  Trump should do well here.  The place is so Red they even think oranges are red.

We also stopped at Gooseneck State Park in order to see the San Juan River curving through the canyons.  There was a $5 entry fee to the park but Patrice saw a display of Navajo-made jewelry so the exit fee was much higher.

Well, we finally made it to Moab.  They put us in room #100.

We arrived in Moab early so we had time to visit Arches National Park.  The visitor center sells a CD that essentially gives you a tour of the park.  Fifteen thousand and one steps later we were on our way back to the hotel and ready for a good night sleep.

I took many more photos but I won’t bore you anymore than I have already.

Tomorrow we visit Canyonlands.

Today was our day to visit the classic formations known as Monument Valley.  Those of you who have followed my blog might remember that we recently traveled to Brazil and wanted to see Christ the Redeemer.  Unfortunately when we got to Rio the weather was awful and we could only view the statue from below the shoulders.  Well when we awoke this morning with saw this:

Our tour guide, John, tried to encourage us.  “Let’s go see some additional ruins, some other peaks and hopefully the skies will clear”.  We did see numerous interesting sights around the park and managed to do some walking and climbing that I didn’t think this old body could still do.  When we returned to the main attraction the weather had cleared somewhat and we did get a better view.  We left our guide and went for a late lunch.  After leaving the restaurant we noted it was much warmer and the skies had cleared significantly.  When we returned to the park we saw this:

After lunch we also saw this from the parking lot well above the valley.

We also saw this:

Tomorrow we leave for Moab, Utah.

We started our day with a tour of the Lower Antelope Slot Canyon.  For those of you who look to me for travel advice, if you have only time to do the Upper or Lower Canyons I would chose the Upper.  Both Canyons supply excellent views but the Upper Canyon is managed much better by the tour companies.  The Upper Canyon tour groups are smaller and less frequent, making the Canyon much easier to traverse, view and photograph.  The Lower Canyon tours are cheaper but have larger groups entering every 20 minutes.  This makes it much more difficult to get photos without someone else’s head or hands in the shot.  I did manage to get a couple of pretty good shots today but nothing compared to Leonard’s yesterday.

After leaving Antelope Slot  Canyon we headed north to Monument Valley.  I am sure many of you have been here.  If not in person, then certainly in the movies.  This has been the site of many motion pictures.  John Wayne was a regular here.  The hotel has a burger named for him and a salad named for his director John Ford.

Upon arrival we took the Majestic Tour company’s tour of the Mystery Valley.  This is not the main tourist area (that would be Monument Valley which we will tour tomorrow). Mystery Valley is the location of the ancient ruins.  We visited the remains of the Anasazi tribe.  The Anasazi’s were the ancestors of the Navajos and inhabited this area from about 400 – 700 AD.  We viewed ancient caves (man made) and petroglyphs.  The rock carvings have remained over 1000 years.  Some were paintings (see below).  How do these paintings last over 1000 years and Patrice and I need to repaint our home after 6?  I guess that is the price we need to pay for living near the beach.

Our guide is full blooded Navajo and his name is John (don’t you just love these traditional Native American names like Leonard and John).  He gave us a tremendous amount of information about the Navajo Nation.  I won’t bore you with details but I was totally enthralled.

Tomorrow to Monument Valley.

 

 

We awoke early in Phoenix this morning to find the temperature and climate fantastic. Apparently the secret of living in the Valley of the Sun is to be outside by 6AM and complete all your tasks for the day by 7AM.  The staff at the Springhill in Phoenix were fantastic and made our short stay very enjoyable.

As I mentioned yesterday, today we were going to Antelope Slot Canyon.  Good thing I posted a picture yesterday because the internet at the Courtyard by Marriott in Page, AZ is very slow and uploading a photo is not a possibility at this time.  I don’t know if things will pick up in regards to internet speed so I apologize for the lack of photos.

We were on the highway by 7AM heading north to Page, AZ.  We arrived in time to make one of their prime time tours.  First we were entertained by a young man who stated he was 100%  Navajo and he performed what he said was a Navajo hoop dance while wearing authentic Navajo garment.  I don’t think that would include the Under Armour board shorts protruding from his outfit.

Then we were off to the see Antelope Slot Canyon.  We were piled into vans similar to the ones used years ago to transport prisoners on chain gangs in Florida.  By contrast these had seat belts.  I guess they assumed you were traveling with a close friend because each belt was to be used by 2 passengers.

About 15 minutes later we arrived at the canyon.   Our guide was also of Navajo roots and his name was Leonard (what else would you expect form a native American?).  Leonard was very entertaining.  He spoke a variety of languages.  He spoke Navajo to the other guides but also conversed with tourists from China, Japan and India IN THEIR NATIVE TONGUE!. Leonard said he wasn’t fluent but he picked up a bit of the languages working as a guide the past 12 years.  I wish my Spanish was that good and I have been working on that for about 50 years.

Leonard also had an interesting manner.  He was very succinct in his direction (“no flash”, “no tripods”, “come here”, “stay”) and never used please or thank you but he didn’t seem rude or bossy.  He also commanded us to give him our cameras (“camera!”) so he could take pictures at the perfect angle.  It became very clear, very quickly, that this guy could take amazing photos.  After taking a few by myself I gave up and just became Leonard’s caddy for my camera.

That is probably more than you wanted to know.  I hope I can send some pictures tomorrow.

 

Time to say goodbye to Memphis and the BBQ Festival.  Today we flew to Phoenix to resume a tour that was interrupted last year.  Many of you know that in May 2015 Patrice and I were on the “National Park Tour”.  We had just left Austin, Texas and were about to tour a number of National Parks starting with Big Bend in southwest Texas.  Unfortunately I became ill with a kidney stone and we needed to go home.

Well now it is time to resume the National Park Tour and where better to start a National Park Tour than in Phoenix at Chase Field.  You might know that Chase Field is the baseball park where the National League Arizona Diamondbacks play their games so that meets my definition of a National Park.  The stadium is a marvel.  It has real grass (not artificial turf) and a roof that is retractable.  When the roof is closed and the air conditioning running (strong enough to control the heat in 2,500 homes of 2,000 square feet each) teams can play baseball while the outside temperature reaches over 100 degrees (today it only reached 93 degrees).  When the roof is open it is for sun light to enter the park to nourish the grass playing field.

I tried to take some pictures but you really need to be here to appreciate this place.

The game was great.  The SF Giants beat the Diamondbacks in a very well played 2-1 game.  I enjoyed the stadium and game and Patrice enjoyed her book.

Tomorrow we leave very early for Page, Arizona where we will tour Antelope Slot Canyon.  Below is a picture that I retrieved off the internet.  I am told by people who have seen it that it really looks like this.  I hope to confirm that myself tomorrow.

Robert

Today was the big day.  We arrived very prompt and early for our 8AM check in.

There was a little confusion yesterday when Patrice asked what time we needed to arrive and one of the organizers told us that, “Chicken’s at 8”.  Both of us were confused and asked for clarification, “Chicken?” to which she said, “No, chickin.  Judges need to chick in at 8”.  “OOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHH, you mean check in at 8?”  “Yes that’s what I said, judges chickin at 8”

So this morning we arrived promptly at 8 and received our assignments.  Judging is either “Blind” where you are given boxes of food and judge the quality or “On Site” where you go to the contestant’s booth.  On site seemed much more stressful to me.  Here a know-nothing like me goes to a cook site and meets someone who has been doing BBQ for 20-40 years.  Then I have to judge them?  Waiting for my name to be called I was praying for a blind judging assignment.  Well only fitting for a Jewish judge at a BBQ festival my name was called for on site judging of Whole Hog.

I nervously paced until my time for judging approached.  The teams spend large sums of money to produce these elaborately decorated booths and cook ribs, shoulder or whole hog.  I heard that some teams spend as much as $40,000 for equipment, supplies (including the pork), building and decorating the booth in addition to the entry fee.   One of the most popular booths was “3 Taxi Guys”.  This is their booth.

 

Finally my time arrived and I introduced myself to my first team, Rick and India from Macon, Georgia the owners of the “Dixie Que” booth.  They were very friendly and fed me some amazing pork.  It was easy to talk to them about their entry because it was incredibly tasty.  Rick asked me the question I dreaded, “How long have you been a judge”.   He didn’t seem to cringe when I told him this was my first year.  I returned the favor and asked if he owned a restaurant.  “No I sell toilets”.   At that point I didn’t want to hear any more about the cooking process.  As Jack Nicholson said in A Few Good Men, “You can’t handle the truth”.

I then visited the “Cotton Patch Cooking Crew” a team from Columbus, Mississippi who also produced some very fine pork. My final team was “PLP” from Nashville, Tennessee.  PLP stands for Peg Leg Porkers because their team leader, Cary, had a leg amputated as a teenager (due to cancer).  At first I couldn’t find their booth thinking that booth 237 would be located between 236 and 238.  Apparently there was a mix up and their booth had to be moved and they wound up in a non-booth area sharing space with the local news crew.  PLP didn’t spare any expense to decorate their booth.  Actually let me rephrase that, they didn’t spend anything to decorate their booth.  See below.

While they didn’t spend much on decoration their pork was fantastic.  After judging I took Patrice to meet the cookers and they were incredibly excited to see me.  Apparently they made it into the finals.  They could not stop thanking me.  They asked me to pose for a group photo.   The results of the final judging are still pending but I will let you know once I find out.

Tomorrow we have an early flight for Phoenix.  Enough talk about pig.  Now it is on to the National Park portion of our tour.

 

 

If nothing else goes right this trip it will still be a success. The reason for that is because Patrice got compliments today about her shirt, hat and pants (see below).

After checking in at the judges tent we received our Friday assignments:  1:00 pm Tomato Sauce Samples;  1:45 pm Seafood Samples.   Huh?  Where’s the pork?

While waiting for our tastebuds to be called to duty we ran into our friend, Lance, from the Tastin’ Round Town tour.  Last year Lance gave us our crash course into Memphis BBQ.  He also told us how to become judges and thus is responsible for us being here this weekend.  If you are in Memphis I would strongly recommend you take a tour with Lance.  A word of warning, do not eat before the tour and do not plan to eat after the tour.  Check out his website at http://www.tastinroundtown.com.   

Our judging time finally came.  Patrice and I first judged BBQ sauces which was a good introduction to the process.  The seafood judging that followed was amazing.  We were at different judging tables and thus judged different items.  Patrice had 6 dishes all of which she said were amazing.  I only had 4 items to evaluate and they were beyond description.

After our judging duties were completed we decided to visit the various booths.  The cookers were incredibly gracious inviting us into their cook areas and sharing their methods.   We got to see a variety of “Whole Hogs”.  If you have a weak stomach area you might not like to look at the pictures below.

Tomorrow we get to judge pork.  I don’t think my Grandpa Sam would have been very proud.  Good thing he is dead because if he heard his grandson was judging a pork cooking contest it would have killed him.

Until tomorrow.

Today we picked up our BBQ Judging credentials (see below).  I think our attempt to blend in with the locals is not working as planned.  As soon as we walked into the office a woman said to another woman “Their credential packet is on the desk”.  I hadn’t even said hello and she already knew who we were.  I think the fact that we had an umbrella was her first clue.  We are walking the streets in the rain and we are one of the few people using an umbrella.  That seems to be a clear tip off that we are from out of town.

The main festivities really don’t start until tomorrow but we missed an event on Wednesday, that we had hoped to see, “The Big Hog Run”.  The run requires male entrants to weigh at least 175 lbs and females 150 lbs.  The run is a 0.2K (about 219 yards) and we are told it is all downhill.  Runners have a mandatory hydration stop at the halfway point where entrants can choose between beer, water or sports drinks. Needless to say this is not a healthy week in Memphis.

Patrice is always on the lookout for things to do.  You might recall she had me spend $20 on a show in New York, a musical in rap about Alexander Hamilton. That worked out pretty well. Of course there are some things that have not worked out as well and for the sake of our marriage those activities don’t make it to the blog.  Well today she suggested we go to the Belz Museum of Asian and Judaic Art.  You didn’t misread that.  You don’t need go back and read it again. What?  You never heard of Asian and Judaic Art in the same museum?  I was less than enthusiastic with this idea but how can I say no to a woman who went with me to 3 baseball games (all extra innings) on our last road trip?  So it was off to the the Asian and Judaic museum for me.   Much to my surprise the museum was incredible.  I took pictures (see below) but they don’t do the place justice. There were multiple works of jade, cloisonné, cinnabar and ivory (sorry elephant lovers).  The Judaic portion of the museum was much less impressive.  That section had a small collection of art and a rather impressive dedication to holocaust survivors who lived in Memphis (a surprisingly large number).   The place is a definite “must see” if you come to Memphis.

Tomorrow is the big day.  More about BBQ judging in my next post.