Short Version:
Clean, fed, and watered, we soak in a hot pool, sleep like the dead, then hit a mobile human zoo before going feral again
Long Version:
Most people checking in to the Old St. Francis School Hotel probably don't look - or smell - quite so feral as we did. To his credit, the bloke at the front desk* took it in stride, and gave the impression of taking a shine to us. He gave us the facilities talk, and the art tour basics, and set us free to roam around and do stuff.
And boy, did we do stuff! We clogged their internets, and we showered**, and then we went to the front pub and we drank delicious beer and we ate delicious foods and then we repeated both of those things. In response to a slightly wishful-thinking question, our helpful serverman*** told us we were not allowed to take glass into the soaking pool
, nor alcoholic beverages, but suggested that if we were to pour our recently-purchased pitcher of brewed-on-the-premises delicious Terminator Stout into the handy, opaque paper cups he just happened to have lying around, nobody in a position of rule-enforcement would be any the wiser vis our nefarious activities. And he was mainly right, as the challenge, when it came, came from front-desk* man, and consisted of a smiling "That's water in those cups, right?"
A mumbled reply saved us from outright lies in the pursuit of libation, and we were soon making our circuitous way past two separate outdoor smoker-banishment areas, one theatre-pub, and one busy bar to the soaking pool, which was Turkish-styled, with tiled frescoes on the walls, a fountain in the middle, and stone lion-things spouting water from their mouths. Oh, and a skylight open to the stars.
It was very cool, but was almost the scene of a horrific occurrence; I realised just as I started to remov
e my hotel robe that when we'd gone back to our room to change from fashionable**** out-in-public clothing to swimwear-under-hotel-robes, I'd neglected to complete the transition, and was, in fact, not wearing anything under the hotel robe. Which suddenly felt awfully flimsy and hospital-gown-revealment-inclined as I scuttled back through the bars, and the corridors, and past the women who said I was cute and tried to peek under my robe, and eventually to the Dolores Friberg Room*****, which has, I`m sure, never been quite such a welcoming sanctuary as it was for me that night. Finally, pants were mine! I almost stopped at the bar on the way back to the pool, such was my newfound chutzpah. Instead, I slipped into the pool area, conducted one final make-sure-there-are-pants check, picked up my paper cup and stepped into the pool, and into bliss. Nene was already zoned-out on how awesome the hot water felt on sore muscles, and it didn`t take me long to catch up. Before long, though, the warm water on top of the hardcoreness of the day had us drowsy, so back to Dolores Friberg we trundled, and into the enormous bed, where we both crashed, near-instantly, and slept past the alarm I`d set for the morning`s mass hot-air balloon launch.
When we did arise, there was a flurry of activity, mainly from Janine, who`s planning our Mexico trip. Eventually she tired of the whining, and we went and ate delicious foods, then she did some more planning while I made some sneaky feral-preparations in cahoots with the morning front-desk* guy, who was only a few months into a 'normal' lifestyle, having lived free in the woods for the last couple of years.
All-too-s
oon it was time for one last pool soak before checkout and then we were paying our bill and hauling our crap to the van. Set off - in the SUN! - to see the town, and walked straight into the Team USA - World Beard and Moustache Championships Procession. We just about died from the sheer awesomeness; hundreds of fantastically-bearded and -moustachioed men (and a few women) parading through the city centre en route to the (massive!) convention centre, where the competing and judgi
ng - by Miss USA herself, no less! - and all-night partying was to take place. We tagged along, massive grins alternating with wonderment on our faces as the fluidity of the procession brought an ever-changing spectacle of hirsuteness before our wandering eyes. Before long, we`d walked a mile in their company, and were a-thirsting. Luckily, `twas the day of good things happening to those who are clean, and 'our' parade ran headlong into the Balloons Over Bend Festival, where we found a) a place to stop, and rest a while, and photograph the beards as their caretakers paraded them past us, b) refreshments, and c) delicious hot sauce in a bottle, which we purchased from a cheerful blind negro man******.
All bearded out and hot-sauced-up, we meandered back to the van, drove out to the woods via a laundromat with free wi-fi and a by-the-slice pizzeria next-door. Pitched our tent in an isolated spot and slept like logs til late the next morning.
* = Which was kind of at the side, and visible from the back, but not from the front.
** = probably clogged the drains, with the amount of forest and planet that came off us
*** = I've long been an opponent of tipping waitstaff, on the grounds that they're being paid already out of the moneys I'm already laying down for my drinking/dining experience; i.e. I'm already giving them moneys to service my needs. I'm starting to change my tune, though, as I'm exposed to the kind of service one receives when the amount of moneys the servitor receives is directly pinned to the type of service they provide.
**** = May not have been fashionable.
***** = Named for the school`s first secretary, who held the post for 25 or so years. The portrait in the room made her look like a very nice lady. From the photos we saw elsewhere in the complex, I think I`m glad we were in Dolores, and not in Father Luke.
****** = may not have been blind.
Clean, fed, and watered, we soak in a hot pool, sleep like the dead, then hit a mobile human zoo before going feral again
Long Version:
Most people checking in to the Old St. Francis School Hotel probably don't look - or smell - quite so feral as we did. To his credit, the bloke at the front desk* took it in stride, and gave the impression of taking a shine to us. He gave us the facilities talk, and the art tour basics, and set us free to roam around and do stuff.
And boy, did we do stuff! We clogged their internets, and we showered**, and then we went to the front pub and we drank delicious beer and we ate delicious foods and then we repeated both of those things. In response to a slightly wishful-thinking question, our helpful serverman*** told us we were not allowed to take glass into the soaking pool
, nor alcoholic beverages, but suggested that if we were to pour our recently-purchased pitcher of brewed-on-the-premises delicious Terminator Stout into the handy, opaque paper cups he just happened to have lying around, nobody in a position of rule-enforcement would be any the wiser vis our nefarious activities. And he was mainly right, as the challenge, when it came, came from front-desk* man, and consisted of a smiling "That's water in those cups, right?"A mumbled reply saved us from outright lies in the pursuit of libation, and we were soon making our circuitous way past two separate outdoor smoker-banishment areas, one theatre-pub, and one busy bar to the soaking pool, which was Turkish-styled, with tiled frescoes on the walls, a fountain in the middle, and stone lion-things spouting water from their mouths. Oh, and a skylight open to the stars.
It was very cool, but was almost the scene of a horrific occurrence; I realised just as I started to remov
e my hotel robe that when we'd gone back to our room to change from fashionable**** out-in-public clothing to swimwear-under-hotel-robes, I'd neglected to complete the transition, and was, in fact, not wearing anything under the hotel robe. Which suddenly felt awfully flimsy and hospital-gown-revealment-inclined as I scuttled back through the bars, and the corridors, and past the women who said I was cute and tried to peek under my robe, and eventually to the Dolores Friberg Room*****, which has, I`m sure, never been quite such a welcoming sanctuary as it was for me that night. Finally, pants were mine! I almost stopped at the bar on the way back to the pool, such was my newfound chutzpah. Instead, I slipped into the pool area, conducted one final make-sure-there-are-pants check, picked up my paper cup and stepped into the pool, and into bliss. Nene was already zoned-out on how awesome the hot water felt on sore muscles, and it didn`t take me long to catch up. Before long, though, the warm water on top of the hardcoreness of the day had us drowsy, so back to Dolores Friberg we trundled, and into the enormous bed, where we both crashed, near-instantly, and slept past the alarm I`d set for the morning`s mass hot-air balloon launch.When we did arise, there was a flurry of activity, mainly from Janine, who`s planning our Mexico trip. Eventually she tired of the whining, and we went and ate delicious foods, then she did some more planning while I made some sneaky feral-preparations in cahoots with the morning front-desk* guy, who was only a few months into a 'normal' lifestyle, having lived free in the woods for the last couple of years.
All-too-s
oon it was time for one last pool soak before checkout and then we were paying our bill and hauling our crap to the van. Set off - in the SUN! - to see the town, and walked straight into the Team USA - World Beard and Moustache Championships Procession. We just about died from the sheer awesomeness; hundreds of fantastically-bearded and -moustachioed men (and a few women) parading through the city centre en route to the (massive!) convention centre, where the competing and judgi
ng - by Miss USA herself, no less! - and all-night partying was to take place. We tagged along, massive grins alternating with wonderment on our faces as the fluidity of the procession brought an ever-changing spectacle of hirsuteness before our wandering eyes. Before long, we`d walked a mile in their company, and were a-thirsting. Luckily, `twas the day of good things happening to those who are clean, and 'our' parade ran headlong into the Balloons Over Bend Festival, where we found a) a place to stop, and rest a while, and photograph the beards as their caretakers paraded them past us, b) refreshments, and c) delicious hot sauce in a bottle, which we purchased from a cheerful blind negro man******.All bearded out and hot-sauced-up, we meandered back to the van, drove out to the woods via a laundromat with free wi-fi and a by-the-slice pizzeria next-door. Pitched our tent in an isolated spot and slept like logs til late the next morning.
* = Which was kind of at the side, and visible from the back, but not from the front.
** = probably clogged the drains, with the amount of forest and planet that came off us
*** = I've long been an opponent of tipping waitstaff, on the grounds that they're being paid already out of the moneys I'm already laying down for my drinking/dining experience; i.e. I'm already giving them moneys to service my needs. I'm starting to change my tune, though, as I'm exposed to the kind of service one receives when the amount of moneys the servitor receives is directly pinned to the type of service they provide.
**** = May not have been fashionable.
***** = Named for the school`s first secretary, who held the post for 25 or so years. The portrait in the room made her look like a very nice lady. From the photos we saw elsewhere in the complex, I think I`m glad we were in Dolores, and not in Father Luke.
****** = may not have been blind.
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