Folias Music

Miles Driven: 5366
Miles Driven by Andy: 5366
Time in the car: 86 hours
Times Carmen did a full pack of the car: 13
Days without driving: 1
States visited: 13
Average driving per day: 6.6 hours
Average sleep per night: 6 hours
Total hours in the car with 5 people: 22
Profit made: decent

Different pieces performed: 30 (27 original arrangements, 3 original pieces)
Total social dance pieces we performed at milongas: 163
Cords in our gear: 24
Other musicians we performed with: 6
Opera singers we performed with: 1

Meals we cooked: 14
Out to eat meals: 9
Meals cooked for us: 6
Meals we assembled in the car: 5
Number of fast food stops: 0
Total avocados eaten: 13 (plus all the guacamole we ate in restaurants)
Bowls of oatmeal eaten: 22
Meals eaten with green chilies: 4
Bags of chilies purchases: 3 dried, 1 fresh
Number of coffees: uncountable
Different kinds of beer consumed: 15
Bottles of wine: 2

Home stays: 5
Camping nights: 5
Hotel stays: 2 nights at Hotel Andaluz

Highest point: 11,100 feet near Loveland Pass
Lowest point: Pacific Ocean
Highest temperature: 106 degrees in Yuma, Arizona
Lowest temperature: 45 degrees in Golden Gate Canyon State Park, CO
State parks visited: 5
Oceanside picnics: 1
Pika sightings: 1
Live skunk sightings: 3
Miles hiked: 18

Pillows Dave lost: 2
Times Luke changed his clothes in public behind the car: 4
Monkeys on horses: 1
Chilies eaten raw in car: 10

Awards:
Best Out to Eat: Church St. Café; Albuquerque, NM
Best Beer: Cali-Belgique on tap(!) from Stone Brewery (a must stop for beer lovers!!)
Best Performance: Hotel Andaluz; Albuquerque, NM
Most Enthusiastic Crowd: Cowboy Monkey; Champaign, IL
Best Attendance: Mercury Café; Denver, CO
Most Unique Venue: Candlelight Bar; Ventura, CA
Best Place to Dance, Drink, and Play Music on Sunday: Green Street Social Club, Salt Lake City
Warmest Crowd: Eagles Club; Glenwood Springs, CO
Worst Traffic: Driving north to south through L.A. at 11am on a Wednesday
Most Packed Venue: Ciao Bella; San Diego, CA
Most Picturesque Venue: Corrales Mission Church; Corrales, NM
Best View From the Car: PCH into Malibu tied with the Catalina Mountains north of Tucson overlooking the city
Best Coffee: Mercury Café Lattes in Denver, CO

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One of the best parts of the tour was performing original tango music for dancing. Here is recording we captured of Carmen’s composition Cumparsita Cats performed live in San Diego. Click on the bottom left of the score to turn the pages along with the music!

Listen to the live recording of Cumparsita Cats

You can also buy the score on our site!

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It has been difficult keeping up with the blog during the last five days of the tour. We have been driving an average of 6.6 hours a day and sleeping only 6 in addition to playing gigs, camping, and cooking along the way.

After our gig in Ventura, CA we drove through the parking lot that is L.A. and continued down into San Diego where we played (and ate!) at a lovely Italian café named Ciao Bella.

From there we drove with saguaros to an awesome campground called Rose Canyon 20 miles north of Tucson in the Santa Catalina Mountains where we camped for the night.

Our drive to Albuquerque began with a lunch stop and chili shopping spree in Hatch followed by two nights of gigs with lodging at Hotel Andaluz, an awesome luxury hotel that supports regular tango events with live music.

We also played at a historic mission church in Corrales, NM and had a great time playing with members of QTango Albuquerque’s local tango band led by Erskine Maytorena.

To get home, we spent two 10-12 hours days in the car! The highlights included nibbling on the loot from Hatch (fresh jalapenos, dried chipotle, guajillo, de arbol peppers) and a last food stop for barbecue in St. Louis, MO.

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After our gig in Champaign we made a nine and half hour drive to a campsite in central Kansas. So far, Carmen is the self appointed Tetris master of car packing. Her goal is to get at least 2 inches for Andy to see out the back window.

In the car, we entertained our self with a Pat Metheny marathon through northern Missouri (in honor of his home state), a discussion about time beat division in Tool’s Lateralus, a delicious car lunch of sprouted grain tortillas filled with avacado, pepper, tomato, black bean salad, and a critique of the live recording from the previous night’s performance.

When we arrived, Kansas was beautiful and a steamy 104 degrees!

We woke up early the next morning and drove six hours to the trail head for a one and half mile (with 1,000 foot gain!) hike to an Appalachain trail style shelter west of Denver.

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We just played a really cool show at the Cowboy Monkey in Champaign, Il and it turns out there really is a Cowboy Monkey! Whiplash! He was a monkey trained to ride on a Border Collie in rodeos. Check out whiplash

Thanks to Joe Grohens for setting this up!

Lots of enthusiastic dancing!

and…thanks to Jackie Wypij for the beds and a fantastic breakfast in the morning! Off to Kansas….

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