Road Trip To Marfa – Day 2

Day 2 in Marfa was spent mostly relaxing. The Allen Oldies Band had an afternoon gig playing on the back of a trailer that was hauled into the common area near the train tracks that is used on the weekends for the farmers market. David Beebe and Allen Hill had gone over to the Marfa Public Radio station to interview Allen Hill and promote the mid afternoon show as well as the evening show in Alpine and the show on Saturday at Padres.

The promotion did get quite a few people out to the afternoon show which lasted about 45 minutes.

The next show was in Alpine, about 30 minutes away from Marfa. Scheduled to start at 10:00 pm the band was planning to head over there around 4:30 for a 5:00 pm sound check. This meant about 5 hours of downtime plus the show which would run about 4 hours and then the breakdown and trip back to Marfa.

I opted to stay in town and skip the festivities. There’s still the Saturday night show at Padres and a lunchtime show on Sunday so I felt I could give this one a miss.

Walked around town and shot some pics and hung out with some of the band wives who also opted to skip the Alpine leg of the tour.

In the above picture you can see the Marfa Courthouse in the distance. I was able to climb to the top of the dome and put together this panorama of the City of Marfa with Main St. in the center.

Road Trip To Marfa – Day 1

When I decided to go on this road trip to participate in the Allen Oldies Band Marfa Invasion Tour I made a conscious choice to leave my vehicle behind and cast my fate with some friends. Typically I don’t like the idea of not having my own transportation in a situation like this but after much agonizing I decided that the stress of driving the 10 hours by myself would be greater than the stress of not having my own car so I decided to go for it.

I was picked up at 7:30 on Thursday morning and we headed out. Everything was going well. We stopped in Luling, TX to gas up and get some food at Buc-cee’s.

After that it was smooth sailing to Junction, TX where we stopped for some BBQ and then on what I thought was going to be a stop in Ft. Stockton for another bathroom break and petrol.

After we cleared the multiple exits to Ft. Stockton with their signs promising food, bathrooms and GASOLINE it became apparent that we would not be stopping and since I was a passenger and the driving logistics were not up to me I didn’t say anything figuring it was not my place and that there was an alternate plan.

After we turned off of I-10 on to 67 it was obvious by the commotion in the cabin of the rented minivan that the low fuel light had come on. Discussion turned to how many miles could be driven once this had happened and a decision was made (by my hosts, not by committee) to press on in hopes of finding a gas station between our current location and the next town which is Alpine.

Let me just say for the record, there are NO gas stations between Ft. Stockton and Alpine Texas. And it should also be noted that a minivan with 6 passengers and their luggage can go about 25 miles. Much less than the 40 or so needed to get to Alpine.

We did, in fact, run out of gas.

After pulling over one of our hosts got out of the van and was able to quickly flag down a passing motorist. A woman in a van travelling with an infant child. I was surprised at her willingness to help and before long our hosts were in the van and off to find gas leaving myself, Jim Henkel, Bill Shirley and Tricia behind to wait and watch our stuff.

It occurred to me as our hosts were heading off with a complete stranger that this seemed remarkably like the beginning of a bad horror flick…

Bill introduced us to a card game called Tichu which we played to while away the time as we waited for rescue and distract us from the dangers the surely lurked all around us.

We played Tichu and we were even visited by a DPS officer who checked in to make sure we were OK. While hot, it is a dry heat out here in West Texas and we were never really uncomfortable. After about an hour our hosts returned with gasoline and profuse apologies.

All in all it was not a horrible experience and it wasn’t long before we rolled into Marfa and got settled.

Of course Marfa is a small town and word of our experience got around and there has been a bit of good natured ribbing over the last few days.

Valencia – It’s A Wrap

In case you were wondering, we’re back. We flew home a week ago Monday. Our flight was early…7:30 am…which meant getting up before dawn, double checking our packing, checking out of the hotel and catching a cab to the airport.

We flew from Valencia to Paris where we caught the overseas flight back to Houston. As it turned out, our flight to Paris was delayed and we found ourselves running through the Charles de Gaulle Airport fairly certain we would miss our connection. STRESS! Bleh! We worried for naught, though. They held the flight and we made it in plenty of time.

Valencia was a spectacular city. It’s hard to figure out why Rick Steves has not covered it in any of his extensive European travels. The Holy Grail, The City of Arts and Sciences, the museums, the beaches. Those things alone make it a worthy place to visit. Add the Las Fallas Festival and you have the trip of a lifetime.

Prior to departure Cynthia had lost her voice. This was a concern because her Spanish language skills really come in handy and, not only that, she has more fun when she can speak the language. Fortunately she had mostly recovered in time for the trip and it was not an issue.

The festival was really something. Throughout the time we were there we wandered the city to check out the fallas. There were literally hundreds around the city and we only managed to see a small percentage of them.

We also took in the other sites and just enjoyed the festival atmosphere. It was hugely crowded, especially on the last day, but we managed very well. Fireworks started about 8:00 am each day and detonated all over the city all day long and culminated in a spectacular display at 1:30 each morning. Not only that, but individuals had their own fireworks which they set off all over the place. I even had my own “petardos” to splode when the mood struck me.

The noise, the crowds and the scheduled events all combined to make the overall trip an adventure in sleep deprivation. We capitalized on the afternoon siestas and strategically planned our meals to minimize wait times.

My social networking experiment paid off big time. I contacted Manel via Flickr and Twitter and when we got to Valencia we made contact. He came out one day and give us an insider tour of the city for a few hours on the final day of the festival. He couldn’t hang out too long as his family had their own fallas celebration he needed to attend. After our tour he suggested driving us to Peñíscola on our last day to see the Templar Castle.

Manel didn’t speak much English so it was mostly him talking to Cynthia and her translating. I got the gist of most of the conversation. I can understand more than I can speak. There were times though that he was talking tech in Spanish and it was actually me doing the translation from Spanish geek to English geek so Cynthia could understand.

It’s hard to describe the whole experience. To boil it down it was noise, crowds, fires, explosions and really good food and company. As foreigners much was lost on us in regards to the cultural and historical significance of the various events, but it was fantastic to witness none the less.

Photographically, this was my best outing ever. The tripod and the 30mm Sigma f/1.4 lens were of the greatest benefit in the evenings, but the Tamron 17-50mm was the true workhorse overall. The Sony 70-300G came in handy, but ultimately saw little use and the Sony 11-18mm was an excellent wide angle standby. The gallery is up here. If you want context you should view the commentary under the blog topic Las Fallas – Valencia.

My best/favorite picture from the trip has to be this one of La Ciudad de las Artes y de las Ciencias de Valencia:

That being said, the fire parade shots which I shot with the Sigma and the shots of La Crema which were taken with the Tamron are real highlights for me.

I doubt it’s something we’d ever do again, but we are sure as heck glad to have done it once. As Cynthia says, it’s a big world and time and money are short. Repeating a trip is never as fun as going on a totally new adventure so we’re in search of the next one.

Thanks to everyone who followed along and made comments via this blog, Flickr, Twitter and even Facebook. It was awesome having an audience to share the experience with.

Peñíscola

For our last day in Valencia Manel agreed to pick us up at the hotel and drive us the 120 kilometers (75 miles) to Peñíscola which is a beautiful city located on the coast and is topped by a castle that was once home to the Knights Templar and Benedict XIII (an Antipope). It was also the filming locations for the movie El Cid.

When you climb to the top of the castle you have a pretty spectacular view of the beaches and surrounding city.

The full sized version of the panoramic image can be seen by clicking here.

We had a fun time climbing around in the castle and shooting pictures.

Eventually we climbed back down and walked the beach for a bit for some lunch and then headed back to Valencia with a stop at a Horchatería where Manel introduced us to horchata which is a traditional Valencian beverage and quite tasty.

We’re very grateful to Manel for all of his kindness and hospitality and we could not have had a better send off!

Life Is A Beach

Friday was the first day after the official end of the Las Fallas Festival. We needed something peaceful and easy going after a solid week of late nights, loud noises and huge crowds so we decided to hop the bus and head to the nearby beach.

I forget sometimes what a beach with clear blue water and light colored sand looks like. Valencia is right on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea and it is a magnificent beach.

We just spent the day walking along the paseo from one end to the other. We came across this cool fountain which we’d seen pictures of previously

The beach was not overly crowded, but there were a number of people out. Some were walking like we were, others were sunning themselves on the beach or fishing. Some were running and launching themselves into the air

Around 2 pm we headed to an area on the beach that was lined with upscale restaurants and took a seat on the patio to enjoy some sangria and world famous Valencian paella.

Everyone we knew who has been to Valencia said the paella was fantastic, and they were right. It was a tasty tasty meal!

After a bit more walking we headed back to the bus stop and made our way back to the hotel.

It was a great day!

La Crema

The main event. Midnight is the time all the fallas are burned.

We decided the above falla would be the one we watched burn. It was within easy walking distance of the hotel and was facing a wide open area along the dry riverbed so we would not be crammed into a small space by the throngs of onlookers.

We got there an hour before the burning time which was midnight. The crowd was very large and enthusiastic. Once the firemen cleared the electric lights and lowered the fire screens that protected the nearby buildings a series of fireworks detonated and the falla began to burn. At one point the fire was so hot we could feel it on our faces. It’s a wonder the people up close were not injured. I suspect there’s more than few eyebrow-less festival-goers after this.

It burned to the ground in about 10-15 minutes.

By the time we got back to the hotel there were plumes of black smoke all over the city, billowing into the Firework were going off everywhere. Within a few hours the entire city was covered in a haze of smoke.

The next day, silence….

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