Well, it was awesome!!! We had six days on the road with four shows lined up and 1,778 miles round trip! Our shows started in Santa Fe with HoneyMoon Brewery and our first tour lesson...check the traffic!!! Almost every city we went had road construction...even in the mountains before we were even out of AZ! This put us arriving in Santa Fe with about 30 min to check into our hotel, get "show" ready then off to brewery. We were very grateful for a warm reception from their Wednesday night guests as this was our first one! The next morning we had delightful food in the cozy local of Sweetwater Harvest Kitchen. After breakfast we headed to Boulder for a show at the Laughing Goat at their Pearl St location...they have a few locations in Boulder... Andy and I have played a few coffee houses so this one came with a nice familiarity even though we'd never been there before. What was great about it was they had an actual performance stage like they actually planned on having performers...not all coffee places do... We joined a night with two other touring musicians, Matt Cox and Izzy Heltai. Andy and I were up last on a Thursday night, and like a Wednesday night in Santa Fe (and Phoenix, truth be told), it was lightly attended. BUT we had dancers and that is always a win! And like Wednesday night, we met interesting folks that we would never had met otherwise so there! We didn't have far to travel for our third show at High Hops Brewery in Fort Collins/Windsor, so we adventured to Longmont for lunch. What a beautiful town! On Main Street, we found two guitar stores with Jensen Guitar Company the one we spent the most time in. After lunch in Longmont and surviving our drive in a hail storm, we were off to High Hops...in the rain and wind which meant no patio show. A bummer, BUT they are inside a greenhouse for a fun win! The brewery was packed and because of that, we were moved to the Heart Distillery which as right next door and next to all of the flowers...why we didn't photograph that, I don't know!!! On this day, I chose not to take our sound gear and I forgot my gig back at the hotel, so that combined with our placement in the back corner threw off my "show game" a bit. Andy was our sound hero and worked his magic on what we had, so all in all, it turned out okay. We had a request for Janice Joplin music...I really should learn one or two as we've had that request a time or two. Best part of show was a fellow walking in while we performed Add it Up. He rocked along, dropped a tip in our basket then headed out! Baddaboom, baddabing! BTW, the cocktails there...have them all!!! Sooooo good!!! The next day we drove south down to Colorado Springs which, if pressed, I would move there, snow and all! We got there too late to really do much other than dinner, but dinner we did very well at the Burrowing Owl! We took my car on this road trip so I did most of the driving, but I decided to have a vodka gimlet this night so Andy drove us back to hotel...win win!!! The next day, we were up before the sun to head to Durango, thinking we'd have pleeeeeeeeeenty of time to drive there...um, second touring lesson...check the weather before heading out in a state that has snow...and mountains...!!!! OMG!!! When we saw snow AND read signs about possible "avalanche," my nerves took over a bit...we didn't bring ANY winter wear!!!! All I can say is that when we finally reached our day's venue, Balcony Bar & Grill, Andy and I took a breath and we both threw back a shot of whiskey...just saying! Luckily, we had a great show with lots of folks around as there was street festival going on, with the only challenge...the weather...in the low 50's with wind and threatening clouds the whole time! The rain came in over night and combined with sleet and snow at times as we headed back to AZ, not really stopping until we were well south of Flagstaff...I couldn't believe the weather! And finally, our third lesson...plan NM and CO tour in June!!! For pictures and some video, head over to our band's Facebook page!
