I did the road trip to Provo for the Wisconsin/BYU game last week (Badgers are one of the three college teams I follow). Some of you know that I've been in a heavy travel assignment since March/April -- enabling me to use Marriott rewards points for all lodging on this trip!
short version: Fantastic time and I will 100% do that road trip again for a game, probably the UU/CU game in 2019. Wife is likely now spoiled with Marriott based vacation and it may be hard to get her back in a tent.
my itinerary from last week, which I recommend:
Wed: left work 3PM --> drove to Steamboat Springs
dinner at Mahogany Ridge (
) followed by an evening trip to Strawberry Hot Springs w/ the wife (
).
Thu: drove in through the Eastern entrance of Dinosaur Natl Monument. The Utah side of the monument has all the dinosaur bones and gets most of the visitors, but the drive through the CO side of the park on Yampa Bench Rd was well worth it (the road is Subaruable). We did all the scenic drives and a few short hikes on the CO side, visited the Utah side, looked at the bones and headed to SLC. Dino NM is cool and I'd stop again on my way to Northern Utah, but unless I was doing an epic
@sockdolager rafting trip, I wouldn't make it a primary destination.
Grabbed carryout dinner and took it into Red Butte Amphitheatre, the best concert venue I've ever attended not named "Red Rocks". Saw my third Gov't Mule show of 2017 that night (my 4th Warren Haynes show of 2017!). Great show, great crowd, amazing venue. The amphitheatre allowed food, coolers and opaque backpacks --
that were not searched upon entrance (literally, the guys in front of me had a 40 gallon cooler and were not even asked to open it -- just waived in after their tickets were scanned).
Fri: day in SLC area. hike at Antelope Island, dinner and a scenic drive through Big Cottonwood Canyon.
Sat: drove to Provo, breakfast at this Russian place downtown called Hruska's Kolaches -- delicious and a big change from the ordinary. Fed and otherwise prepared, we headed to the game. I have never, ever, been treated so well while wearing enemy colors. IIRC, I've attended eight different college football stadiums as a visiting fan, wearing the away-team's merchandise and openly cheering for the visitors --- not one previous experience was even close to this. The walk across campus to the game, four people welcomed me to Provo and said they hoped that we had a great time. During the game, someone from BYU came through the visitor's family and friends section with free ice cream for all the Badger fans. After the game, walking back to the car and at the restaurant during dinner, at least six people again approached me, thanked me for visiting BYU, apologized that their team didn't show up and wished Wisconsin a good season. Tailgating was almost non-existent, but BYU fan could give Nub fan a lesson in being classy (I should re-post this on a Fusker board).
drove to Moab Saturday night.
Sun: Canyonlands National Park (just barely scratched the surface of this park, need to come back and spend a few weeks there). Drove home. Arrive home just after 10PM. Sleep....
Mon: alarm goes off 5 hours after getting home, and I'm on the way to DIA by 3:30AM. Back to the matrix.
pics: Dinosaur NM, Antelope Island, Lavell Edwards Stadium