It’s a Pearl of a Street

I’m currently visiting family in Colorado. One of my brothers, Brian (who is living with my brother Chris and his wife and family since coming home after several years in Taiwan), and I went to Pearl Street in Boulder this afternoon. Pearl Street is a restored area of older brick buildings that now houses a variety of businesses–from art galleries to restaurants to head shops. It has a bit of a hippy 60’s vibe with yuppy over-tones.

On this section of Pearl, the center part of the street where the cars used to drive is now a pedestrian walkway, as well as a space used by all manner of street performers. Unfortunately I failed to take my camera and thus have no pictures of the contortionist (who also juggled while being twisted up like a pretzel). Or the gentleman playing a small harp and singing who had a very fine voice. Fortunately, my brother Brian had some pictures on his computer from one of his earlier trips to Pearl, so I will insert some of those so that you can get a little flavor of the place.

Juggler

Drummer

Pearl Street

We stopped and had lunch at one of the many restaurants along the way and it was fabulous.  This particular establishment had a rooftop dining area and we chose to eat up there.   I had a green salad with chicken strips that were perfectly spiced and extremely flavorful. The salad also had fresh tomatoes, cubed apples and candied walnuts with a great raspberry vinaigrette dressing. Yum.

Rooftop Restaurant (in background)

After lunch we cruised the shops, stopping in several along the way, including a cute little art gallery where I purchased a small enameled work of an Eastern bluebird on a branch of apple blossoms for my bathroom wall.

We also stopped in one of the headshops that, for some reason, are all below street level in basement stores. It’s one of those things where, while we didn’t have any real reason to be there, we just had to look. Call it a trip down memory lane…. Of course, since marijuana is now legal in Colorado and will be for sale to the general public starting in 2014, I suppose the stores will be of more use at that time. But with two universities close-by, they seem to be pretty heavily trafficked already.

We also went into an ice cream shop, thinking about a little dessert, but changed our minds when we saw the prices. At $4.50 for a single-scoop cone it seemed a little pricey to the both of us. Heck, I can buy a pint of the good stuff for that price (or less!) in any grocery store. Sheesh.

After that we walked by the courthouse, which is on the same street, and is an impressive stone building with lovely landscaping. There is a monument on the grounds dedicated to the casualties of “the world war”. It was erected in 1935, so the people who put it there had no idea that an even worse war was about to come. There was a large sign at the entrance to the grounds that, among other rules, stated “no camping”. I guess those soft, green lawns were just too tempting to street people and hikers passing through.

Courthouse grounds

Courthouse

Near the center of the pedestrian area, there’s a play area for the kiddies that is painted to look as if a stream is running down the center and is strewn with large rocks for them to climb on. It was obviously popular with the kids, as every rock had at least one kidlet climbing on it.

Kiddy play area

The street was very busy while we were there. I have a feeling that the snow we had yesterday, while very short-lived, served to remind everyone that winter is just around the corner. Thus many people decided to take advantage to the day’s lovely weather and get out while the getting was good. Tomorrow promises to be even nicer with highs in the low 70’s. I have yet to decide if that will become a travel day or if I will wait until Monday to tackle crossing the Rockies.

Deadwood Isn’t All That Dead

I spent a Saturday night in Deadwood, SD.   The town seems to be comprised of casinos and souvenir shops selling your average tourist crud.  But on one weekend in  August the town comes alive as “Kool Deadwood Nights”.   It’s a Friday/Saturday only event with a big car show and concerts in the main street in the afternoons and evenings.

Friday night’s headliners were Paul Revere and the Raiders, which I obviously didn’t see, but Saturday night the “star” event was the Buckinghams, which I did see.   But that came later.

First was the drive up to Deadwood, which was beautiful.  The Black Hills are really pretty, particularly in the higher elevations.  South Dakota doesn’t get nearly as much rain as St. Louis did, but things are still very green here.  I’m told that this is not the norm for SD, that August is usually much hotter and the hills tend to get rather brown, but this year they decided to stay green.  I’ll pretend that it’s just for me.

Parking in Deadwood for an event such as this can be a real challenge.  The main parking lot at the bottom edge of town was already full, with several cars circling the lot hoping for a space to open up.   Not promising.  The side streets leading away from the main street go pretty much straight up the hillsides and are a parking nightmare, but one must use what’s available.    Fortunately I had caught a ride with someone else, because it would have been impossible to park the RV anywhere in town.

Finally a parking space was located and the car parked so that we could head up into the action.  There were classic cars parked in every available area once we got into town, easily over 200 cars spread out on the street and all of the parking lots on both sides of the main drag, up to the point where the street was closed to all vehicular traffic in preparation for the night’s musical entertainment.

But the cars, my goodness.  there was every type of car or truck imaginable, from an MGB to a Rolls Royce Corniche.  Plus plenty of Chevys, Fords, Chryslers, etc. from almost every decade up to the early 1970’s.  A lot of these cars were so clean you would think the engines had never been started.  I saw several that I wouldn’t have minded owning at some point in my life, just not now.

As we got closer to the stage, it became obvious that people get to town well in advance of the night’s headliner’s taking the stage.   There were lawn chairs, camping chairs and folding chairs in rows filling the entire street from curb to curb.  They covered every available inch for several blocks.  The rows farther back wouldn’t have had any chance of actually seeing the stage but for several large screens set up above the crowd on either side of the street, one set for each block.  The sidewalks were, fortunately, kept clear so that people could actually move around town without having to seek out side streets and alleyways.

Having spent a good deal of time looking at cars and still having plenty of time (or so I thought) before the show started, we decided to look for a place to have dinner.   There was a casino at the top of the street advertising a prime rib and crab leg buffet, which sounded good to me.  I went in  and saw a pretty long line at the entrance to the restaurant so I went up to the desk to ask how long the wait was to get something to eat.  The guy at the desk told me in a rather snotty tone that I would have to get in line and wait until I reached the front before I could ask a question.  Huh?  Just tell me how long the wait is.  What’s so hard about that?

After estimating how many people were in line and how long it was taking for each person to speak to one of the people at the desk I figured it would take 20 minutes minimum, so I just hung around by the desk.  The second person up asked the question I wanted the answer to.  The response was “two hours”.  OK, enough for me.  I was out of there.  The outright rudeness was bad enough, but a two-hour wait was out of the question.   Fortunately the next place we tried had only a 20 minute wait, so prime rib was one the plate soon enough…along with a couple of tequila sunrises alongside.

After a fine dinner, we wandered down the sidewalk and ended up right beside the stage, hung around for a few songs and set our dancing feet free.  The entertainment was wonderful and a great time was had by all.   But the hour was getting late and alcohol tends to tire me out, so when it was suggested that we head for the car, it sounded good to me.  Guess I’m getting to the point that all night partying just isn’t all that interesting to me anymore.  But I was more than glad I came.