I always try to do something post trip because I always have weekend that follows. This time around Ian came to town to have a taste of Arizona. We had a lot of miles to cover in the long weekend, luckily we had the fuel efficient 2005 Honda Civic Hybrid.
Friday lunch time I pick Ian up and take him to a local brewery. It's called Nimbus; it's awful by the way. The food was okay, I had an awesome fried bologna sandwich, but their beer is so-so. I lot of Tucson people swear by it, but they lost their taste buds long ago. Next, we made the 1.5 hour trek up to Phoenix. We had tickets to the Diamondbacks game.
So like always when two best friends get together, you just pick up where you left off. The last time I saw Ian was in March and sure as shit nothing had changed. We talked, got caught back up, made fun of people. We checked into our honeymoon suite up in Phoenix. Then it was off to the game.
Walking around we couldn't decide what we were going to eat, then Ian saw a Peter Piper Pizza station and turned into the fatty we all know and love from high school. He ordered two pizzas just for himself. We had descent seat, about row 30 on the third base side. The stadium wasn't that full because the night before they dropped from contention for the wild card. So after about 5 innings we upgraded our seats to row 3.
Big booty hos
Much better! Ian had just purchased a very expensive camera so I played with that and the different lenses throughout the game.
Some fireworks after the show
Afterwards we went and saw Sara and Joe. We went to Mill Ave, which is the 6th street, 4th street, Cincinnati of ASU. The bars and clubs were packed and there were lines, so we decided to go off the strip to Macayos, they had $2 red stripe on a Friday. I've never heard of that cheap of beer on a Friday, so we did that for a few rounds. They were also playing Katt Williams stand up uncensored. That was very good. Sara was the only one carded and was upset for looking young for some reason, after she complained everyone was carded. We hung out for awhile, got caught up and then called it a night.
Because I'm awesome and a gold member of the Starwood Guest Program, Ian and I were treated to free breakfast buffet that was lackluster at best. I still had about 3 plates, but I didn't enjoy it. So about 10 am we finally got on the road for our 3-4 hour trip.
Ian put his camera on multishot so I have about 40 of these things
Pretty easy drive until we got to Flagstaff, the elevation goes up pretty quickly, 1000 to 7000 pretty quickly; needless to say, my batteries were maxed out and drained quickly. We went in and out of a few rain storms which made us think this might not have been a good idea. We had to do some NASCAR type passing of cars, trucks, and buses on the two lane highway, way to go 97 hp Honda civic. Well we finally got there and it turns out it with customer appreciation day for national park service, so they axed the cover charge. And we are all about avoiding cover charges.
As far as the Grand Canyon goes, if you think you don't need to see it, you are wrong. If you think I can see it online and get the gist, you are sadly mistaken. I'll let the photos speak for this part of the blog.
That smoke is not natural, the Forest Service was doing controlled burning that day, so our shots ended up getting ruined because of all the smoke, damn yous guys.
whoopsie daisy
Ian and I did a lot of Clark W. Griswold where we go look over the edge, alllright, and then move along. We didn't have much time there and we didn't have that much time because Arizona doesn't partake in Daylight Saving Time. We tried to hit every aspect of the South Rim; I think we were pretty productive. The drive down was interesting; it was pitch ass black out and raining. So naturally we went over 80. Or rather I did because I was hypermiling. Which means put your car in neutral and let gravity work for you, can't think of a better way to get 100+ mph.
see warp speed can be scary
It helps when you have a gradual descent of 6000 ft, I think we hypermiled for about 30 minutes. SWweeettTT! We stopped in Flagstaff for dinner and then made the trip all the way back to Sierra Vista that night. We were booking it too, did it in 5 hours‼
Sunday we poked around in the morning and played rock band for awhile. Then I gave Ian a quick tour of Ft. Huachuca, showed him where I work and play. Then I took him to hippy central Bisbee.
das devil donkey
mining pit
It's an old mining town that hippies have invaded. A lot of bars, antique stores, restaurants, you only need to see it once. It's very pretty there though because of all the red dirt; red dirt because of the copper, gold, and silver mining. Then we made the trip up to Tombstone. I was able to get my Marshall Jacob badge, trip a success for me. We saw a histogram show. We saw a reenactment of the shootout at the OK Corral.
Took some pictures at Helldorado. Took some pictures of the sunset and then we drove back to down. Ian damn near busted a nut when he saw Buffalo Wild Wings; I didn't know he loved wings so much. Evidently they don't have good wings in California. That night we played some more rock band, Ian is a fantastic drummer, better than me now, I'm still better at guitar so I guess it's all good.
Monday we were going to get up early and get some lunch before I took him to the airport, but when you wake up past brunch, the only thing you have time for is driving to airport macht snchell!
My trip with Ian was fun. He was my third houseguest. Being a host to your friends is usually pretty easy especially when they go with flow so well.
Had a blast Ian, thanks.
Jacob
Here are two of the widescreen shots
