A long but beautiful day!

Friday, 9 September 2011

Hello!! We’ve got WIFI!! YIPEE!!

So…where was I when last I blogged…oh! Back from Gardiner MT and the Tumbleweed Café (combination of hot spot, new and used books and sandwich shop…I’ve decided that I want to start a combination hot spot-laundromat-book store – what do you think?!) As the start of the NFL season was last night, and we knew that the bar of the Mammoth Hotel has TV reception, we joined a raucous group of Saints fans, with a few Packer fans thrown in for good measure. Ended up spending the evening there, ordering bar snacks such as buffalo wings (NOTHING to do with bison, I promise!), the Mediterranean platter (hummus, baba ghanoush, tabouli, etc.) and the worst hot fudge sundae I’ve ever had …I think somebody forgot to put in the ice cream…) Very good game, Packers won by 8 points, and a good time was had by all – except some of the Saints fan, who retired at the end of the third quarter…

Up early this morning, as we figured it would be somewhere between 9 – 10 hours getting to Torrey, Utah, and we needed to get to our B & B by 6 p.m. Emmy (GPS) lead us through the park to the west entrance at West Yellowstone, and then basically the same path that we took last year, past Salt Lake and Provo, and down state. Off the freeway to head toward Capitol Reef, and had pretty much of a traffic-free ride over beautiful hills to Torrey and the Old Schoolhouse. Torrey is really an interesting place. There is only camping available in the park, so the area around the park provides any and all accommodation. The Old Schoolhouse is a stunningly beautiful renovation of – duh, the local old schoolhouse. Lots of light hardwood and clean lines; very, very comfortable. Our room, the one I picked from photos on their website, is Chinle. It is on the third floor, and is a large king-sized room with bathroom. (Note: Next time, I want Moenkopi, as they have views from three sides, which I LOVE!) Met Ty, the innkeeper; very nice lady. She recommended Diablo for dinner, and we headed there to make reservations for dinner tonight (which is why I’m going to have to stop now, but will finish when we get back.)

Dropped things off, watched a few minutes of the U.S. Open while R was checking email, and out we went for the drive to Capitol Reef. WOW! We haven’t been through there in probably 28 or 29 years, and we had both forgotten how incredibly beautiful it is around here! We have beautiful views from our room, but the closer we got to CR, the more beautiful the scenery became! Lots of pictures to post … sorry!

Will break now and change clothes – we are VERY hopeful about dinner tonight (and tomorrow night, at the Turquoise Room at La Posada hotel in Winslow…) always nice, especially after some of the meals we have had, to get something wonderful at the end of the trip!

More later!

Oh my…just an incredible meal! Truly, one of the best ever! Very interesting place – very busy, but as we had reserved, no problem. For starters, they present you with a “tapas” platter with home-made brown bread and various grilled veggies (onion, green onion, red and green sweet peppers, zucchini, yellow squash, egg plant, peppers) with feta cheese on top – very yummy and unexpected! We then had our salads; mine was spinach and warm mushrooms, R’s was citrus. My salad was actually standing up !! in a green tortilla, spinach on the bottom, then the sautéed mushrooms on top, all mixed together with a thyme and rice vinegar dressing and sitting on a tomatillo salsa. R’s salad was more “normal” looking, and included orange and grapefruit atop frizzy greens, tossed with roasted red pepper vinaigrette and candied nuts…everything disappeared quickly! For mains, R had the twin beef tenderloin steaks with chayote squash, carrots, potato barrels, crisp corn tortillas and mole blanco. I had their vegetarian entrée – Mayan tamale: eggplant, poblano peppers, roasted tomatoes, masa and casera cheese steamed in a banana leaf, with char grilled vegetables and brandied corn custard – fabulous, especially the corn custard!

Their dessert tray was scary – and of course came with their homemade ice cream…

I had their carrot cake with peach ice cream; R had the apple tart with chai tea ice cream – washed down with glasses of St. Germain elderflower nectar…waddled out of the restaurant! This is a place to which we will DEFINITELY return!!!

Night!

m
x