Element #1: Tapas Teatro & Pazo

These two Baltimore tapas restaurants set aflame my heart and palate. Pazo’s open atmosphere and fantastic tapas and wine menu quickly made it one of my favorite Baltimore bars/restaurants.

Pazo

Where Pazo is a huge open room full of energy, Tapas Teatro, located just north in the Mt. Vernon neighborhood of Baltimore, is everything you would picture a European street cafe being. A small, charming, and warm space with tasteful art adorning the walls, and right-on-the-sidewalk seating.Where Pazo tends to be more widely Mediterranean, Tapas Teatro is almost exclusively Spanish.

Tapas Teatro

Where I would end up on a given night, would depend on my mood. If I was feeling more social and felt like putting up with crowds, I’d go to Pazo. If I was looking for something more chill, a casual night with friends, I would go to Tapas Teatro. You would’ve been more likely to find me at Tapas Teatro. Their small plates were amazing. The attention to detail, from presentation to flavor, was stellar. The sangria: served in a giant rounded pitcher, icy, ruby-colored, and jeweled with fresh cuts of fruit. If you’re ever in Baltimore, go to Tapas Teatro.

Element #2: Hemingway (Specifically, The Sun Also Rises)

The Sun Also Rises was the first Hemingway I read. Ever. His writing style is understated and simple. His stories are almost always based on his own experiences. The Sun Also Rises follows a group of friends (and expatriates) living in Europe. The story jumps from Paris to Spain (San Sebastian and Pamplona) where the characters take part in the running of the bulls and the fiesta surrounding it.

“El vino did flow.”

Although it was most likely a product of the atmosphere surrounding the celebration in Pamplona, drinking all hours of the day seems to be romanticised by Hemingway … which is why I am a bit uncomfortable with the fact that I felt drawn to the particular lifestyle our expat friends were living. But c’mon, who wouldn’t want to spend their mornings, afternoons, and evenings enjoying (for the most part) food, booze, coffee, and friends?

Hemingway and friends in Spain

Element #3: A Summer Visit to Seattle/My First Encounter with Las Rocas

Living in a Baltimore suburb. In my parent’s basement. Working at a Christian radio station. These three things don’t exactly allow one to “fall into culture”, if I can quote my own phrase. My limited exposure to wine was basically my Dad bringing home a bottle of Corbet Canyon Merlot or Chardonnay from Buttons, one of the local liquor shops. I began to branch out a little, but was still more of a beer guy, truth be told (I still am, by the way). I am totally going to be nailed on this, because I am going to come off sounding as if Seattle has culture and Baltimore does not. If you are thinking that, let me refer you back to the three opening sentences of this paragraph. The point is that as things were in Baltimore, I had to try hard to find things I loved. I had to go out of my way. That was not the case in Seattle.

Seattle (courtesy of Ork Posters)

My dear friends (and now housemates) Emily & Scott moved to Seattle in the summer of ’07, thus opening a bright, shiny (sometimes rainy), and obsessive place to me. Obsessive? Seattle seems to be a place where everyone wants to perfect their craft, whatever that may be. Restaurants (for the most part) want to be the best at what they do. Brewers and wineries want to craft the perfect beer or wine. Coffeeshops and roasters want to pull the perfect shot and achieve the perfect roast or blend. With this attitude seemingly all around me, it was easy to get excited about finding really good stuff in Seattle. Emily and Scott certainly fell for this aspect of the Emerald City. It was transmitted to me upon my first visit in October of ’07.

When I visited again in the summer of ’08, Scott & Emily were more settled and more in love with Seattle. Summer in Seattle is brilliant, if you didn’t already know. You probably thought it rained all the time, didn’t you, Steinberg? Not even close …

Let me set a scene for you wizards …

EXT. HOUSE, QUEEN ANNE, SEATTLE  – LATE AFTERNOON

BRIAN, ERIC, & SCOTT stand together on the deck off of a house. The deck overlooks Lake Union, the Cascades mountain range, and the Seattle skyline. The three young men enjoy a cold brew, a clove, and take in the view that is laid before them. The sun is still high in the sky. It is Sunday. It is warm. It is perfect.

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After a drink or two and a smoke, we headed inside to the dining room table for dinner. Forgive me for not remembering the meal exactly (Apricot Chicken?), but when we sat down for dinner with Emily and Tab (Eric’s wife), there was a bottle of Las Rocas on the table. The rest, as they say, is history.

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Las Rocas

How much do I love this wine? In short, about as much as one can love a liquid. It goes well with anything. Just ask my friend Dave S. from back in Baltimore. He had it for the first time with a peanut butter sandwich and said that it was a nice complement.

Las Rocas drinks well out of it’s price point. It’s peppery, a bit sweet, and subtle. The tannins are smooth. The fruit (cherry and raspberry, mostly) is present, but not overpowering. There is oak. There is some chocolate. There is a whole lot of goodness in this bottle. A whole lot of goodness for around $10.

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Maybe I think this wine so great because I’ve been influenced by the perfect storm of events that surrounded my trying it: the tapas, Hemingway and Pamplona, a Seattle summer and good friends. Maybe I want so badly to love it because I love the places, characters, events, and friends that helped me experience it. Or maybe I love it because it actually is a fantastic wine. One that is easy to drink, cheap, really good, and complements sitting down with friends, a good book, a good meal. This is why I like wine as a whole. It screams of community. There is no better representation of this than what adorns a wall in our apartment. Beer bottle-caps line the frame. Wine corks from bottles, long emptied and enjoyed, line the inside. Tacked to the cork are pictures of friends. Loved ones. The people we most enjoy, over a drink or two. For relaxing times, make it Suntory Las Rocas time.

The Wolftrap

The Wolftrap, from Boekenhoutskloof (that’s the vineyard in South Africa), is a red blend consisting of 68% Syrah, 30% Mourvedre, and 2% Viognier. Picked it up on a whim. Just perused the wine aisle at Whole Foods and found an intriguing wine for under $10, of which there are many.

I am not very familiar with South African wine … on New Year’s we drank a South African sparkler … outside of that, I don’t know that I’ve encountered another South African wine. So, I conducted a bit of research …

South African winemaking dates back to 1659 and has experienced a rather varied worldwide interest since. South Africa’s current production puts it in the top ten wine producing countries in the world, though this wasn’t always the case. Before the end of apartheid throughout much of the 20th century, South African wine received little attention worldwide.

“Its isolation was further deepened by boycotts of South African products in protest of the country’s system of Apartheid. It wasn’t till the late 1980s and 1990s when Apartheid was ended and the world’s export market opened up that South African wines began to experience a renaissance”

Once the export market opened up, the renaissance experienced in the South African winemaking was helped along by the Vine Improvement Programme. This program(me) was brought into existence in order to bring up the standards of South African wine by bringing a better understanding of the viticultural arts, if you will, to the winemakers. This has spurred the winemakers to strive toward a more “international style” of wine, that would find fans on a global scale. In some cases, winemakers from France, Spain, and California were flown in, bringing with them new techniques and styles to the already unique style of South African wine. Today, as I mentioned earlier, South Africa is in the top ten of wine producing nations in the world. It should be an exciting world of wine to delve into … okay, enough cheesiness …

The Wolftrap

Traditionally, many South African wines have been characterized by very rustic flavors, and The Wolftrap certainly hits on the rustic side. It is a very substantial wine; full and heavy, with a touch of gameyness (Some describe it as meaty. I don’t like the sound of meaty) to it, which I didn’t find unappealing at all. Loads of spice and smoke throughout. There is a subtle floral quality I picked up on that was soon washed away by heavy berry influence (blackberry, strawberry). With all of these heavy flavors (the smoke, spice, gameyness), the subtleties remain intact, interestingly enough, which added to the surprising balance achieved in this red blend. If you like big, red blends full of spice, smoke, dark berries, this wine is for you … just be prepared for the gamey aspect, it could be a turnoff to some.

Up next, I think I will (finally) write about one of my long time favorites: Las Rocas Garnacha

Las Rocas Garnacha

Cat Amongst the Pigeons 2008 Unwooded Chardonnay

2007 Atteca Old Vines Garnacha

My good friend Dave and i traveled down to historic Ellicott City, MD from Baltimore to one of my favorite wine shoppes, The Wine Bin. I love this particular shoppe, firstly, because it is in an old brick firehouse, and second-of-ly because the owners are awesome people who stock what they like … this means they are able to speak passionately and informatively about the wine they carry. Dave and I drove down on Saturday afternoon prior to the party to look over potential suitors. Dave is more of a white wine drinker, and I, as evidenced by this blog so far, am more of a red wine drinker. After chatting up the owners for a bit, we began our search. I am a sucker for Spanish wine … Tempranillo, Garnacha, Monastrell, all good, if you ask me. I gravitated toward a display in the center of the shoppe that featured a large selection of Spanish wines. Dave, meanwhile, browsed through the over 200 wines under $20 that the Wine Bin carries. I looked for my two favorite Spanish reds, Las Rocas and Monte Oton, both garnachas … both were sold out. My search for something new began …

Meanwhile, the owners were gracious enough to open a couple of whites for Dave and I to taste. Dave had, up until this point, picked out an Australian Cabernet Shiraz blend. So as we began tasting the couple of whites that were opened for us, Dave began to slowly drift away from his first decision. Based a couple of comments I made about my dislike for fruit juice, one sided white wines, they opened a bottle of Cat Amongst the Pigeons Unwooded Chardonnay. I was skeptical, yet gave it a try. I find most white wine to be too sweet, and it either tastes like Welch’s white grape juice, or apple juice that has sat in the fridge way too long. This one, an unoaked chardonnay from Australia, was surprising. If I do like anything about white wine, it is when there is a lot of oak present. The fact that this particular chardonnay was unoaked worried me. I worried it would be overwhelmingly sweet and fruity. I was wrong …

Sorry I doubted you, Cat Amongst the Pigeons ...

I found Cat Amongst the Pigeons to be really, really good. Nice and dry with lots of minerality and citrus in the finish. A little pear and a little stone fruit present as well. I found that the minerality more than made up for the absence of oak. When I tasted it again at the party, hours later with food, I found that more sweetness was brought out, which bothered me a little at first, but once my palate adjusted, I found Cat Amongst the Pigeons to be a white wine that I will definitely be buying in the near future (provided I can find it in Seattle). it was especially good with a nice, creamy gouda.

2007 Atteca Old Vines Garnacha

I try not to judge a wine by its label, but some labels are so damn aesthetically pleasing, that I can’t help but to be interested. Sadly, a great label and a great wine are not always congruous, but sometimes, the stars align. Atteca piqued my interest. A Spanish old vine Garnacha … “Old vine”, in particular, caught my eye. I’ve been a big fan of the old vine zins for a while now, so I was excited. My hope was that the old vine garnacha would carry the same punch, the same intense fruit and spice of a good old vine vinfandel. Whether this hope/logic is sound, I don’t know, but I hoped for something good.

And something good is what I got. The Atteca was everything a good garnacha should be: lots of berry and cherry, a good deal of spice, and a nice, smooth mouth feel with enough tannins to hold on through the long finish. A bit of mineral was present as well (I think the vineyard mentions graphite in their description?), but I really liked the amount of spice … some vanilla and some toasty oak notes. I’m guessing this wine would benefit immensely from being held for a year or two before popping it. If you do open it right away, let it breathe. I would definitely buy it again if given the chance!

So, I suppose the wine and cheese party was a success … I had some pretty terrible wine, but also came away with a couple of new wines to try to have on hand in the future. I hope to be able to find Cat Amongst the Pigeons and Atteca here in Seattle!

Coming up next: The Wolftrap, from Boekenhoutskloof of South Africa …

The Wolftrap

Château du Donjon 2006 Minervois

i’d no previous knowledge of the minervois appellation and actually found it quite difficult to track down much information on it. here is what i did find …

The Minervois name comes from the village of Minerve, a scenic village located in the south of France in the Languedoc region. Here is a map for visual reference:

Minervois wines are exclusively red wines “and are produced from Carignan (which can account for no more than 40% of the blend), Grenache, Lladoner Pelut, Mourvedre, and Syrah grapes”. This particular Minervois from Château du Donjon is made from Grenache, Syrah, and Carignan.

A couple more interesting things to know …

Carignan had become the most widely grown grape varietal in France by 1988, but in an effort to drive the quality of wine up, the European Union started a vine pull program. This program offered cash subsidies to vineyard owners provided they pull up their vines. Though this vine pull program didn’t target only owners of Carignan vines, it had its largest effect on the varietal, dropping from 167,000 planted hectares in ’88 to 95,000 hectares in 2000. Merlot is now the most widely planted grape in France.

On to business …

We consumed the entire bottle of this Minervois in one evening, so there is no second day to talk about.

First Pour: Not surprisingly, right out of the bottle, the first sip was acidic, effervescent, and a bit harsh. The notes that did come through were dark cherry and some spice. The finish seemed to linger forever.

Second Pour: A full glass this time, after letting it breathe for 20-40 minutes. As expected, the effervescence disappeared along with most of the harsh acidity. Replacing these characteristics was a wonderful balance of cherry and a bit of raspberry and white pepper. Some of the initial heat from the first pour lingered, but i felt added depth rather than making this an unpleasant wine.

Last Glass: Little nose, lots of finish. Plenty of oak and white pepper. Cherry and even a little plum coming through … the heat that i thought added depth to the second pour, was, for the most part, absent from this final glass. The wine had mellowed a bit too much for my liking.

Overall: Showed promise, but lost too much of its mystique by the final pour. I would rate it as a slightly above average everyday table red. As with most wine, i would be curious to see what a year of cellaring would do. Probably won’t buy again, not because i didn’t enjoy it, but just because there are a lot more wines to try and a handful of wines that i know i love for around the same price (i paid around $13).

Coming up … a white???

that’s right … i traveled “home” to Baltimore last week and had a little wine and cheese party where i managed to find a white wine i truly enjoyed.

2008 Cat Amongst the Pigeons Unwooded Chardonnay

The breakdown of the tasting experience will not be as in depth because of the nature of the party … i didn’t have the same amount of time with the wine that i normally do … with that said, i think what i will actually do is pick my favorite red from the night as well and just talk about the white i loved, and the red i loved.

Stay tuned …

Dead Tree

A brief visit back to some dead tree drawings …

Malbec is an interesting varietal because it was first grown in the Bordeaux and Cahors regions of France, but because of a devastating frost in 1956, 75% of the vines were destroyed. Though some were replanted, the grape dropped in popularity in Bordeaux but stayed fairly popular in Cahors, where it is primarily used in blends.

Malbec was introduced to Argentina in 1868 and since then, it has really come into its own. The Argentinian Malbec produces “a softer, less tannic-driven variety than the wines of Cahors.” It is said that the Malbec in South America (it is also grown in Chile) has virtually nothing in common with its European sibling. As a varietal, Malbec has become almost synonymous with Argentinian wine. This is no surprise as evidenced by the abundance of Malbecs to be found on the shelves of wine shoppes worldwide. They are fruit-full wines, packed with full bodied punch, and one can usually do well for under $20. I picked up this bottle of Punto Final from Whole Foods for around $11.

First pour: Harsh and overwhelmingly fruity, but promising. A shit ton of dark fruits with a finish rife with minerals, green earth, and acid. Virtually nothing on the mid-palate.

Day One: Perhaps i was a bit congested, or perhaps Punto Final needed some more time to open up, but the notes on the mid-palate explode in this wine after letting it breathe a bit. Still very fruity and sweet … cherry, some cranberry, currant, almost raisinlike. The mid-palate reveals pronounced earthiness. Berries linger, but with notes of tobacco and green earth. Finish is hot and woodsy. Had part of a glass with some spicy chili and the heat of the chili was intensified by the heat of the wine. Preferred it by itself.

Day Two: Had a guest on Day One, so the bottle didn’t make it past first day intact …

Overall: I am curious about this one. On the fence a bit. Would maybe buy it again and keep it on hand for a year or so, since it is so young, and see what happens, but definitely a good Malbec.

Coming up — A couple options … i picked up a bottle of Château du Donjon 2006 Minervois today. That is on the table along with a bottle of the intense and delicious Bogle Phantom, and a bottle of the old standby of Las Rocas Garnacha.

Château du Donjon 2006 Minervois

Bogle Phantom

Las Rocas

Will I go for something tried and true? or go with the upstart unknown??? Stay tuned!

Rook is a red wine blend from Washington state consisting of 17% Cabernet Sauvignon, 57% Merlot, 26% Syrah. each of these grapes adds some of its own character to this tasty blend. now, i’m not a sommelier or wine connoisseur, nor will i pretend to be, so i won’t throw out a lot of the wine tasting jargon, but will instead speak/write simply.

i purchased this wine several weeks ago from whole foods for around $12. i just got around to opening it on Tuesday night (1/5).

when opening a wine, i usually like to pour a sip into my glass to swirl and drink right away, just to get an idea of what lies ahead of me. but i also do this to refine my palate; tasting the usually harsh first pour and comparing/contrasting it with the second pour, which i usually taste after about 20-30 minutes.

First Day: Scotty and i both felt that straight out of the bottle, the Rook was heavy and sweet with dark fruit with a rather harsh acidic finish. after about 30 minutes, the second pour was strikingly more mellow. more character was exposed as the sweetness gave way to some nice spice and the finish revealed medium tannins and mild oak.

Second Day: poured the last two glasses a couple of hours ago. the wine had mellowed even more. the sweetness was dulled a bit more and i felt as though i was able to discern more specific notes of cherry and dark plum, giving way to some mellowed spice and dark chocolaty bitterness. the oak held fast in the finish.

Overall: i found the Rook to be enjoyable. an easy drinking wine that is pretty typical as far as WA state blends go. would definitely go for another bottle … perhaps with some food next time. giving it time to breathe was the best way to go. enjoy it on the second day.

Coming up next — 2008 Bodega Renacer Malbec Punto Final

Vin

wine is great, isn’t it? i think so …

this may make me sound like an aspiring alcoholic, but it seemed that over the last two months of 2009 i consumed wine, both in quantity and variety, like our friend Scrambler over at gloaming and dawn consumed movies over the same period of time. a job at whole foods market is partly to blame, both for the income it provided, but also for the 20% employee discount. for a solid month and a half, i came home with a new bottle of wine. sometimes it was an old favorite like Las Rocas Garnacha from Spain, other times it was taking a chance on something new and unknown, sometimes going only on the word of a trusted team member in the specialty department (who have become some of my best friends at whole foods). i never spent over $20 on a bottle.

i hate to make this sound like a goal or resolution for the new year, which is why i won’t throw out a number like 100 Bottles of Wine in 2010! or something similar, but i wanted to catalogue my winetasting exploits and give my opinion of each bottle. i will write about wines that are new to me, and wines that i know i love. i will try to remain under $20 a bottle. with me in my tasting exploits will be the aforementioned Scrambler who, though i haven’t discussed this with him yet, will be riding shotgun and offering some of his own opinions too. we have essentially been doing this with every bottle we’ve consumed, only this time will the opinions be catalogued here.

some bottles we finish in one night, other bottles we finish over two or three days. in the case of the bottles that last more than one night, i will offer opinions on the character of the wine over time.

there is a really sweet website called cellartracker that i discovered in the last year and half or so that allows visitors to check out wine ratings from regular people all across the world. some are amateur aficionados, others are just people like myself. this series of posts will be my cellartracker of sorts.

i leave you with this …

the evergreen state

we plugged in the water for coffee, grabbed some food out of the back and proceeded to get changed and break down camp. as we were doing all of this, the camp host came over and we attempted to square away the payment for our site … he promptly informed us that we had set up camp on a double site, which is twice the cost of a single site. it sounded as if he wasn’t going to cut us a break … we had pulled in late, it was pitch black, it looked as if the site we were on was a regular single site … we didn’t end up having to explain this all to him, as he gave us a break and only charged us for a single site, lucky for us (i don’t think we had enough cash between the two of us). the camp host was, at first surly and gruff, and really seemed to think he had done us a huge favor by not charging us the $30 … i don’t know, i really don’t think there was anyone else staying on the grounds that night to really make our “offense” a problem. he just had that kind of “i have power over you” attitude. after collecting our $15, he hung around and tried to talk to us for a bit. he noticed the MD tags on my car and asked about what we were doing out in WA. after explaining our story, the camp host made some bad jokes, once again reminded us of the favor he had done us, and left us to pack the car for the last leg of the journey.

to be back in WA was confusing … i was all at once excited and depressed. life on the road had been good to me. being somewhere new every day, the rush of seeing new, wondrous things … the magic of the mountain west had me firmly in its grip. the majesty of her mountains and towering pines, the rugged wilderness, some of it still seemingly untouched, had left me in a dreamy state. the thought of finally settling somewhere, even though that place was a place i loved, was depressing … i had found contentment in motion … maybe it was really fear. fear of real life being at hand … of having to face the uncertainty of life without a job and little direction in a place that was becoming home, but still unfamiliar. i didn’t feel ready at all to start again. this disconcerting feeling was not what i expected when we had embarked. my realization: the excitement that built up in me each day of the journey seemed to stem not from being closer to Seattle with each mile traveled, but from movement in general. the thought of stopping somewhere killed me … even though the movement was counterfeit, i wanted so badly for it to be real, to be able to find some countervailing measure to fight back against the entropy and atrophy. for the time being, i was being sustained by the beauty of the captivating landscape of WA. it was enough of a distraction … maybe distraction isn’t the right word. it acted almost as a source of hope and inspiration. i just seem to be terrible at channeling said hope and inspiration into anything at all …

Double Site

we pulled out of the campground having decided to take the backroads into Seattle to allow ourselves to see more of the Cascades. this proved to be both beautiful and frustrating … a lot of roadwork slowed us down in many places along the way, but also provided Jeff and I with some time to think about what to do once we entered Seattle. it also allowed us to shoot pictures like this one …

These roads are very dangerous ...

the roads took us through forests of a million evergreens, all of them towering over the road below …

out the passenger side window ...

the day was perfect. sunshine hit the mountainsides. the trees exploded with bright green and black shadows, moving upwards, the green of the trees dramatically changed into the brilliant blue of the late summer sky. the further west we moved, the more into the sky the mountains sunk their teeth. we entered the kitschy bavarian mountain town of Leavenworth …

Leavenworth

Mountains around Leavenworth ...

Bakery

it means, "The Copy Shop" for those of you who don't "sprechen sie Deutsch"

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driving out of Leavenworth, the road took us alongside a mountain river. it was white with rapid water and loud as the tides. as the mountains rose up around it, its sound was sent skyward, thrown back and forth between the mountainfaces, before being released into the open air.

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the roads snaked through evergreens and the mountains caused the car rise and fall like like a boat on rough waters. all along the way, the river was at our side, its rushing waters carving through earth, guiding us down the mountains in the direction of home … we lost elevation quickly as we went from Leavenworth to the small mountain town of Gold Bar, though the mountains still loomed large on all sides …

down the mountain ...

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Tunnel

one of the last mountain vistas before Seattle ...

one of the things i love about Seattle is how close the mountains are. it had taken us longer because of the route we decided to take, but really, it is less than an hour’s drive to the Cascades from Seattle proper. as quickly as we had left the stately peaks of the Cascades, we were in the midst of the suburban sprawl of Seattle and not long after that, the buildings of downtown Seattle joined the skyline.

Seattle!!!approaching the exit ...

once we were in Seattle, we stopped in at what once was, and was now once again, my home in queen anne. we cleaned up, i unpacked my stuff from the car, and jeff and i discussed our next move. we drove around a bit, stopping at Kerry Park for some quintessential Seattle skyline pictures, and visited other green spaces around Queen Anne before heading down into Fremont for some food. After a tasty meal of burgers at Blue Moon Burgers, i drove Jeff around Fremont …

Aurora Bridge ... the underside

"You gotta pay the troll toll ..."

" ... if you want this baby boy's hole, you gotta pay the troll toll ..."

headed to Gasworks Park after our lunch and visit with the troll … gave Jeff a chance to capture a few more pictures …

Gasworks

Plane taking off from Lake Union ...

Boats!!!

we drank in the city from Gasworks park and headed up to one of my favorite coffeeshops in Seattle … even the world … Zoka, in Green Lake.

Zoka

we enjoyed our lattes and basked in the warm rays of the Seattle sun, just enjoying the mere act of stillness after the frenetic motion of the incredible journey …

seeing that it took me just 4 days or so to cross the country, and nearly 6 months to finally finish writing about it (i don’t think i’ve really finished), perhaps i will revisit the trip in the next few weeks … hopefully reflecting more on the thoughts and feelings that rose up in me along the way and that have arisen in me in my months of permanent living in Seattle.

while i’d rather not include this next part because it would spare me the embarrassment, Jeff would be upset if i didn’t include it … Jeff was up and showered first and had gone upstairs to gather some things and to hang with Mike and Carol for a bit … i got up and headed to the bathroom to shower, having not had a real shower in a couple of days. i turned the water on and waited for an appropriate temperature, so as not to scald myself upon entering … the water, at this point, was still coming from the main spigot. once the temperature was satisfactory, i was ready to hop in … only, i couldn’t, for the life of me, figure out how to turn the shower head on. i scoured the tub/shower looking for the mechanism that would switch the water from the spigot to the shower head and … never found it/never figured it out, much to my chagrin/future embarrassment … i had to then, give myself a sponge bath of sorts trying my best to clean my road worn body. once i felt somewhat clean (or as clean as one could have gotten), i got dressed and headed upstairs with my things, making no mention to anyone what had just happened … only mentioning my ordeal to Jeff hours later while on the road. i am quite silly, i know.

Mike and Carol were already hard at work preparing a huge breakfast for Jeff and I. the grill was fired up, and bacon was being thrown on … each piece met the grill with a loud sizzle, reminiscent of applause, as Jim Gaffigan would remind us. Carol cut up some melon and beat some eggs to then give to Mike to prepare over the side burner of the grill, where the bacon was being cooked. once everything was complete and laid out before us, we, again, like the night before, felt incredibly indebted to our hosts and amazed by their generosity to relative strangers. over breakfast we discussed our route out of Cowley and into Yellowstone … Mike and Carol suggested a very specfic route that would take over a mountain pass by the name of Beartooth. the route would have us weave along the Wyoming/Montana border, entering and leaving each state several times before arriving at the northeast entrance of Yellowstone National Park. Mike and Carol mentioned the towns we would be passing through and if there was anything worth stopping for in each town. As we finished breakfast, we helped clean up, and began saying our thanks. we couldn’t have thanked our hosts enough. Mike and  Carol were amazing. they treated us like old friends. they said that if i ever come back across the country, to stop in again … we had made new friends in Wyoming.

Jeff and I had the car loaded and pulled out of Cowley, heading west on 789. from 789, we turned north on 310 and entered Montana …

Montana ... we've got ... mountains!

310 took us through various random small towns … i hate to say not worth mentioning, but compared to everything else … they aren’t worth mentioning. From 310, heading north and west, we turned on to Rt. 72 and headed south and west.

some scenery ...

once on 72, we passed through a town called Belfry and turned due west onto Rt. 308, which would take us through the town of Bearcreek. Bearcreek is significant because the “worst coal mining accident in the history of Montana (occurred here) killing 74 men and sealing the fate of the coal mining industry around Bear Creek. Today, the rail spur has been removed, and no active mining is done in the area” [ Wikipedia ].

Bearcreek mine remnants ...

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the pictures above show a lot of mining buildings still standing, seemingly abandoned. it was all pretty eerie …

From Bearcreek, we continued on toward the town of Red Lodge, where Mike and Carol suggested we get gas because it would be the cheapest gas we could get for a while. they also mentioned Red Lodge being a quirky little mountain town. Jeff and i drove through and snapped a couple pictures of random things …

Red Lodge

a river runs through it ...

leaving red lodge, we drove into the mountains …

into the mountains ...

i would be lying if i said i wasn’t at all nervous about driving in the mountains after our experience the day before. headed south and west on 212 back towards Wyoming. between us and Wyoming was Beartooth Pass, with an altitude of over 10,000ft. Mike and Carol spoke of the drive up the mountain being really fun … steep grades and switchback turns. this excited me. the drive back down from 10,000ft. did not. nevertheless, we pressed on into the mountains. each mile traveled brought views more scenic than the previous mile. the scenery we began to encounter reminded me of when i had been in Rocky Mountain National Park two years earlier.

Beartooth Scenic Byway

Huge tracts of land ...

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hazards of the road …

hold on ...

tighter ...

if not for the sign, i'dve driven off the mountain ...

after a series of switchbacks and steep grades, we arrived at …

The Rock Creek Vista Point

breathtaking, no?

Me

the view ...

Jeff

after many pictures and exchanging of amazed utterances … we pulled out of the vista point and to our amazement, continued to climb …

our pace was slowed not only by our ogling of the beauty all around us, but by the loose gravel of the roads, and the steep grade of the climb up to the pass. i cannot imagine that the road up here stays open very late into the fall … 10,000ft. is high for a pass. we continued climbing, encountered a bit of roadwork (surprise), and took a lot more pictures …

Beartooth

Glaciers

Ski lift?

jagged

more ...

Bear's Toof

10,947 ft.

having passed over the west summit of the peak, the dreaded descent was upon us … though it wasn’t as fierce a descent as the one conquered a day before, there was more traffic to potentially complicate our drive … motorcycles and minivans and trailers and RVs to be exact … the pace down the mountain was acceptably cautious. we crossed back into WY on the way back down, only to cross back into MT not more than 30 miles later. the winding roads of highway 212 provided driving excitment and the views out the window remained breathtaking … plus there was the possibility of wildlife around every corner …

This is Grizzly Bear Country

Down ...

Down ...

once we were back in MT, we drove through the small, touristy town of Cooke City, just outside of Yellowstone National Park’s northeast entrance.

Driving into Cooke City ...

we got to the entrance for Yellowstone. the fee was $25 for up to a week’s stay … we were just driving through, so it seemed a bit steep. the ranger at the pay station was nice enough … from MD … Havre de Grace, he said. we paid the $25, and entered the park with expectations of grizzly, wolf, elk, and moose sightings dancing in our heads, much like sugar plums dance in the heads of children at Christmastime (i think it’s time to update this saying.)

Yellowstone National Park

as we entered, stately evergreens stood tall looking over from both sides of the road … seemingly a perfect place to spot at least a deer … here is what we saw …

Bison hanging out in the woods by himself ... sad

this is funny because once we drove out of the tree-lined entrance to the park and into the valley, there were hundreds of bison grazing … for whatever reason this one was in the woods … alone.

part of the herd

the view as we drove into the valley …

Waterfall

the bison and waterfall further raised our already too-high expectations for Yellowstone … especially for us driving through … as we drove along, we encountered a lot more bison on the side of the road … jeff spotted one on the right side of the road. i drew his attention to the left side, where i spotted this …

Pronghorn Antelope! again, all alone??

i pulled over and Jeff went in with his 80-300mm telephoto lens to capture the above photo … we piled back in the car after a few more photos and after pulling some eats out from the backseat. back on the road through Yellowstone …

Yellowstone River

i’d like to skip over our next stop, but i suppose i can’t because it is something that we did … on our map of the park we saw a petrified tree monument or something to that effect. it sounded cool enough, so jeff and i decided it would be worth a stop. once we stopped and parked and walked up a paved walkway to the “tree”, we were amazed by it … not because it was so spectacular, but exactly the opposite. this is more of a product of our ridiculously high expectations. the actual tree, though not much to look at, was hundreds of years old and had survived the harsh climate and volcanic activity of those years. anyway, here it is …

Petrified Tree

after we felt we had wasted time at the Petrified Tree, he hauled ass, heading westward still in the park. Mountains, rolling hills, green meadows, waterfalls, etc. Yellowstone is a beautiful place.

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...

...

blurry, but beautiful ...

of course, the beauty of the park cannot be captured in a handful of images … even if i posted every last picture that Jeff and I took in the park as we drove through, the magnitude of the beauty wouldn’t come through. our time in the park was drawing to a close … saying our “time” was drawing to a close is a bit misleading. it was just that the road we were driving through on would soon exit the park and take us north toward I-90W. we climbed one last mountain in the park and once at the top, we were greeted with a pleasant surprise …

Badass Elk

Elk!

growing some antlers ...

the space that was full of elk was a courtyard in a little town in the park. it reminded me so much of estes park, CO, which is the  town right outside of Rocky Mountain National Park, where elk roam through the streets and gather in a park on main st. it was a good way to end our time in the park. the descent from the courtyard took us down into another valley where we exited the park, passed through the town of Gardiner, MT and headed north on Rt. 89. for some reason, we didn’t end up with many pictures from this part of the journey. this, however, is in no way an indication of lack of beauty. it was really no different than being in Yellowstone still, just higher speed limits. we encountered a touch of rain on the way up to I-90. upon further inspection, once we left the park, the next pictures are from when we filled up in Missoula, MT … weird. i guess every photographer needs a break … so Jeff took a break.

one thing i do remember from this leg of the trip is the delicious homemade conchord grape jelly (courtesy of jeff’s grandmother in law) that we had on PB&J sandwiches. so delicious. there is something about a good peanut butter and jelly sandwich …

this was our longest day in the car because of the time we took to drive through Yellowstone. we, as i said, stopped in Missoula, switched places, grabbed a little treat for ourselves, and headed out. the treat i refer to, and i am ashamed to say, was mcdonald’s. before you begin to pile on the criticism, all we got was one order of fries and two apple pies (one each). just a little treat to keep us going. jeff took the wheel, and we headed north and west on I-90 toward our destination.

The route through Montana ...

i had my fun on the roads earlier when we conquered Bear’s Tooth, and at this point in the trip, Jeff got his fun. I-90 west of Missoula and into Idaho turns into a winding speedway. The car handled wonderfully. Jeff was loving every minute of the drive and the scenery was no slouch.

Montana

Idaho

west with the sun in our faces ...

Idaho ... more than just potatoes

the bitterroot mountain range is stunning … not so craggy as the rockies, but covered almost exclusively in coniferous trees. the sun hits the trees and and creates intense patches of light and dark. it was just sad to see Idaho go some quickly … something like 63 miles … and then …

...

Spokane River

Washington State

we had finally reached washington, but it was later in the day than we expected. the sun was setting and we still had 2-3 hours left of driving before we got close to the campgrounds. once we entered washington, the earth flattened out. the mountains were behind us, for now … we pushed further into washington state as the sun began to set, not only on the day, but on the trip itself.

Setting ...

this was a difficult time on the road … washington state drivers seem to be unable to grasp the concept of the left lane being the fast lane … so we’d end up behind a minivan going 65mph in a 70mph area, and of course everyone around this minivan was going 65 as well, which made passing near impossible. it was just a very frustrating stretch. on top of this, with the sun setting and darkness coming, the campground we initially had pinpointed as our stop for the night was looking to be a little bit too far off of I-90 for us … so i had go into my phone and vigorously search my nav software and google maps in order to find a more convenient campground for us … after a little research, the R & D (that is, whoever was passenger with the phone) found a couple sites closer to I-90 … but the drive was still tedious. we had about 80 or so miles to the campground, traffic had cleared up enough to where the darkness and lack of traffic started to wear on us … 4 days on the road will eventually wear you down. we were tired. we wanted to be at the campground, out of the car, enjoying some hot tea and a clove, but we still had a ways to go.

i was sad that it was dark when we crossed the Columbia River Gorge. going over the bridge at night is an interesting experience, especially when your car is buffeted by crosswinds … i am curious to see how it is to cross in the light of day.

soon after crossing the gorge, we stopped for fuel and some candy, as a little pick-me-up … the home stretch was proving a bit tedious. a little while after our stop, we were jumping off I-90 again towards the campground. after passing through the small town of Cle Elum, we were ensconced in the tall pines of central WA. it got very dark, very quickly. we saw our first sign for the campground … the distance didn’t at all agree with what google maps was telling us … this is the part of the trip where it seemed like we were in every horror movie ever … lines like these started from our lips …

“it’s just up here a bit further …”

“maybe we should stop and ask for directions …”

“huh … my cell phone just died …”

ha, it was a little creepy, to be quite honest. each little town we passed through seemed more deserted than the last. it wasn’t all that late, and yet, we saw nary a light on. the part about the cell phone isn’t completely true … it didn’t die (even if it did, i had a car charger), but instead it lost reception completely. no gps, no incoming or outgoing calls. google maps still gave us a map, but the gps was no longer following our progress. after a while, we passed the point on google maps that was supposed to be destination. we were now relying on street signs and our own sense of direction. after a little while longer, and many more jokes about being in a bad horror flick, we pulled into the campground. we promptly parked at the first site we saw. upon turning the car and lights off, we were hemmed in by the black of night; swallowed up in its darkness. it was black. can’t-see-the-hand-in-front-of-your-face dark. we had a single flashlight by which we were meant to set up and get around by. we grabbed some things from the car, plugged in the water for hot tea, scoured the site for a suitable tent location, and began setting up for the night. it wasn’t too bad, actually, but mostly because jeff is a whiz with camping gear, having camped in many settings and circumstances. props to jeff …

got settled, layered up (it was cold and getting colder … into the 40s by morning), poured ourselves some tea, and lit a clove. the day was nearly over … it was a long one.

with the evergreens of washington state towering over us on all sides and the stars, with their ancient light, suspended overhead, we slept. comfortably nestled in the belly of blackest night, we slept.