More Sedona, Great Burgers, and Photography 102

October 8, 2008 - Wednesday

Day 2 in Sedona. Even though I spent my first hours there sleeping, we did really like the atmosphere of Sedona. Actually, perhaps *because* I spent my first hours there sleeping...
Anyway, we decided that we wanted to spend another day there and we had it in our schedule, so we ambled down to the front desk to extend for another nite - and we were told that they were all sold out. For a *Wednesday* nite??? Sooo while I added Blog entries (I really *do* do that sometimes), Kathy got busy online and tried "Hotwire.com" to find us another room for that nite. We were QUITE happy with "Hotwire" (thanks, Penny, for recommending it) - it saved us 30% on the price of the room we eventually wound up in - and we were quite happy with the room - about 5 miles further down the road we were on.

So. We packed up and drove to the "main drag" of Sedona and just ambled down the street and back up - wandering thru all of the shops and not buying anything. We do like to do that - just walk hand-in-hand and look at lots of wonderful, expensive pieces of art - and let the proprietors THINK that we might actually spend $12,000 for that onyx globe or that painting or whatever - and stroll on. A REALLY nice morning. And actually, the photos from yesterday were taken on this morning's stroll around. I *almost* bought a T-shirt which has a picture of an old cowboy on his trusty horse. The cowboy is just totally passed out asleep in the saddle and his *dog* is in the saddle in front of him, with the reins in his mouth. The caption is "Designated Driver". I was thinking of you, Kelly, but decided that you don't really wear T-shirts like that - and you also might be offended about having a dog in control of a horse.... :)

We finished with the main drag, then headed for another "community" of artists and shops - near our hotel. Go ahead and pronounce the name of the community. Go ahead. I dare you:


At about this point, Kathy and I began to realize just how good Kelly's camera really is (thanks again for *making* us take your camera with us, Kelly) - and we started to play with the filters. Yeah. I know. Photography 102, but I didn't know what we had. We found the UV filter and put it on - since a guy in a camera store told us that we'd already gotten the lens dirty and should have always protected it with the UV filter. And then we put on the Polarizing filter - and couldn't figure out how to get it *off*. We were sitting on a bench - nearly doing damage to the camera - when a nice English gentleman tourist gently asked if I might appreciate some assistance - as he was a bit of a photographer himself. How nice. So he explained how it worked and we thanked him, THEN realized that we REALLY wished we'd had the polarizing filter on for the Grand Canyon and Monument Valley shots - but it's too late for that. Bottom line, Kathy spent some time playing with the filter - and discovering just how blue it made the sky show:

By the way, the sky really *does* look that blue in person, but if you don't use the filter, it gets washed out. Yeah. All the rest of you already knew that (Mike? Rick? Do I hear you screaming at us?) but we learned it today.

Annnd Kathy always likes plants, so she snapped a shot of a rose we found:

So! Lesson over, we decided to try the "Bar & Grille" there for lunch. And. OK. More food. But I had the most-amazing Burger I have ever had. WOW! Great meat, prepared well, then with *both* grilled onions and mushrooms AND raw red onion - in addition to lettuce and mayo. Oh YEAH! A truly-memorable burger. Yeah, yeah... Grand Canyon, Monument Valley, pretty flowers but OH! The *BURGER*. (smile).

We spent a few more hours leisurely strolling around the community - really getting to wander thru some great art: paintings, sculpture (we ran into one gallery where the sculptor was right there - carving the clay - with nobody else in the gallery - so we got to talk to him and watch him sculpt Teddy Roosevelt on a horse - and talk about the bronze-casting process it would eventually go to. REALLY cool), and even furniture made from huge stones and steel reinforcing bars. COOL stuff! I tend to like paintings most. Kathy also notices pottery. It is one of those "really nice coincidences" that we both enjoy just browsing art - and we generally even like the same art. Nice afternoon.

Evening. Headed for our new hotel. Checked in and enjoyed the views, then went out to drive around Sedona. It was closed. No. Really. Maybe we just didn't get the "secret code" to find out where things happen in Sedona at night - but there was NOTHING going on after about 8PM so we grabbed Subway for dinner, watched TV while we ate, Blogged, and went to bed.

And now I've begun keeping track of our total mileage as suggested by Barry. Thanks Barry. Now you can all follow our mileage as we finish each day: 3113 total miles since leaving Florida.