Friends & Family – Page 3 – The Destinators

BGU/ABQ, The Prequel: Weatherford, OK

That unanticipated schedule change that resulted in our visit to Palo Duro Canyon SP on our way to the blues jam in Albuquerque also changed our route. Getting to the park in TX took us straight across OK, instead of heading north to Colorado as we’d planned. Now, my jamming partner Gary and I had been exchanging emails and we had a few phone conversations to decide on a list of songs to do at the jam, but we’d never met and we’d never played together. Well, Gary lives in Weatherford OK and it turned out that we’d be driving through there on I-40, so I asked him if we might stop by (for a few hours at least) so we could run through the songs we’d talked about. He said sure, and his wife Gayle suggested we stay for dinner to have more time to play. I asked if there was room to park the motorhome, which there was, and it was a done deal.

BGU/ABQ: Jamming in Albuquerque

The subject of this post is the seminal event around which our whole trip was planned. I’ve been an active member of Griff Hamlin’s Blues Guitar Unleashed for a baker’s dozen of years, and much or most of what I can now do with a guitar is a result of that. Our blog has a bunch of posts about visits with friends from the BGU forum and we’ve previously documented a couple of these Blues Guitar Unleashed student blues jams (here and here). A year ago, BGUer Larry H. announced his intention to host a jam in his hometown of Albuquerque the following fall (i.e., now). I was interested. Sue and I agreed that a fall-to-early-winter tour of the southwest would satisfy several of our needs, so I upgraded my response to officially ‘very interested’ and when the ‘who’s coming?’ poll opened I was the first one in.

St Louis

When we get close to St Louis, we feel a magnetic pull to our regular RV parking spot where we’ve visited a few times with my father’s brother Jerry and his wife Suzy. Much closer to my age than to my parents, these were my cool and fun aunt and uncle who lived away from the family homestead in New England (though they visited often). They hold the distinction of being the first of my extra large family that Doug ever met, back in 1984.

Cincinnati

One of the reasons for this fall trip is that another Blues Guitar Unleashed member jam will be in Albuquerque, NM, early in October. Now, the shortest, most direct route between our home and Albuquerque goes through Cincinnati, OH. Regular readers are aware of our reluctance to take the shortest, most direct route to anywhere. Well, sometimes we make exceptions to that rule and we did for Cincinnati, because that’s where my piano-playing buddy Honghong lives!

Toronto – III

We were on our way to Hamilton, ON which is about an hour from Toronto. And whenever we’re near Toronto, we check in with Iris about getting together to jam.

Rangeley, ME

Rick and Doug were work colleagues at the Sugarbush Ski School in the early aughts. I joined them on a chairlift ride one day back then and Doug introduced us. When I mentioned that I had grown up in Berlin, NH, Rick’s eyes lit up. He had been a competitive Nordic skier (cross country and ski jumping) and had competed at the legendary and historic Nansen Ski Jump in Berlin. I thought I was riding the lift with royalty…

Simsbury picnic jam

We’ve known Mark and Linda for over 30 years. They’re master gardeners, dancing chefs and fun conversationalists. They’re fellow RV’ers with lots of travel tales to tell and TWO campsites at their home – the garden site and the treehouse site. They’re also crafty instigators, having planted the irresistible kernel that caused our exploration of Maine to include this stop in Simsbury, Connecticut.

First, the back story…

Dover, NH

We last saw my Aunt Nellie and Uncle Bob at a family gathering about 9 years ago. They had recently moved to a senior community in Dover, and that is where they’re living now. Dover is on the way to Connecticut. Hmm, is this email address I have for them current? Yes it is! We connected with Bob and he and I planned a get-together for lunch.

Derry, NH (and out of Maine!)

As our wonderful month in Maine was nearing the end, we started looking at our options for routes home. Our loyal readers will of course not expect us to follow a beeline to our house, and they’d be correct. In fact, we’ve plans to make a stop in Connecticut. Oh look, Derry, New Hampshire is on the way – let’s see if we can drop in on Chris and Kim!

Portland proper

Our home town of Warren VT spans a section of the Mad River Valley from the Monroe Skyline on the west to the Northfield Mountains ridgeline on the east with the valley (and the Mad River, itself, of course) in between. From our house, a little less than halfway up the ridge on the west, we can see out across the valley to where our friends Meg, Rob, Wyatt, and Asa built their ski house in East Warren. When we all first met about 10 years ago, they were Bostonians skiing at Sugarbush and taking lessons there – which is how we came together. About 5 years ago, the family moved to Portland, ME. As we were planning for our Tour de Maine, we reached out to Meg and she arranged with us a visit for a mid-day walking tour of their adopted home city.