We Had a Grape Time

Although we got to see plenty of gorgeous scenery on our recent trip to Palisade, the main reason for the trip was to visit wineries in the area. On the afternoon we arrived, and over the next two days, we stopped at a number of places -- and here are some of the highlights.

Maison La Belle Vie Winery was an impulsive stop on the first night -- it was literally just across the street from where we were. It had a lovely outdoor patio area that would have been ideal just a few weeks earlier before the evening chill was so strong. They also had (among other good options) a tasty port-style wine that I enjoyed enough to buy a bottle. Regrettably, I didn't snap a picture there (since the sun had already set), but I'll swap out for an image of the rainbow that welcomed us to the area earlier in the afternoon.

On our first full day, we got to go to university. We stopped by Varaison, hitting it at just the right time where the owner and head winemaker Ron personally oversaw our tasting. And in his own words, "I'm not just going to shove a menu across the counter at you." Instead, he did a deep dive on exactly how to get your palate to perceive different flavors, and then how to drill in on exactly what about the wine is contributing to the flavors you like. The goal: once you know what you like and why, you should be able to find more wines that also suit your tastes.

Along the way, Ron taught us about De Long's Wine Grape Varietal Table, how alcohol content corresponds to fruit ripeness (and what numbers you should be looking for, depending on your own preference for fruit-forward wines), and much, much more. He also regaled us with stories of his past work for a massive beer conglomerate, a later stint in California wine country, and more. Ron seems to have done it all, and wanted nothing more than to share his experience with others.

Two Rivers Winery was another spontaneous stop, this one on day two, after our drive through Colorado National Monument. This winery is in Grand Junction, just minutes from the Monument, and was picturesque inside and out. We had the French-style chateau completely to ourselves, sitting in a big hearth room with a window to the distillation room and lined with paintings. Their highlight was the less common Baco Noir grape, grown right on their property, and great both on its own and in a complex red blend.

 

The final winery of the trip was Restoration Vineyards. It's location further away from the cliffs made for a sprawling view in any direction, which you could enjoy in their spacious yard peppered with inviting clusters of chairs. It was a beautiful setting for a full glass, and a sort of "summation" of the whole trip.

Palisade turned out to be a lot more like Napa Valley than I'd have ever imagined. Though not every turn revealed a new "wine Disneyland," you could certainly find just about anything here in Colorado that you might look for there -- whether that's a beautiful view, a sprawling estate, a hidden gem... or just a tasty wine. In all, the trip was an excellent reminder that from time to time, it's great to play "tourist" close to home. 

Monumental Views

This past week, I made myself a tourist in my own home state and headed to the western slope of the Rocky Mountains, to Palisade. We were several weeks past the peak of the peaches for which the city is well-known... but it's also Colorado's wine county -- a little slice of Napa or Sonoma Valley just a few minutes east of Grand Junction. (With bizarrely named roads that are just mile marker fractions. Think "turn left on D 1/2 road, and we're at the intersection of 37 3/4 road.")

I'll often post a chronological recap of my trips -- as much for my own later reference as for sharing with others -- but that doesn't quite seem the right approach on this occasion. A lot of our activities were wine-related, and not all the wine was worth a detailed blow-by-blow. So I think I'm going to break things down into a "booze" and "non-booze" post... and start today with the latter.

On our first morning in Palisade, we started by backtracking east a bit to drive the Grand Mesa Scenic Byway. Along the way, we saw bighorn sheep grazing right by the road, a curiously decorated golden toilet marking the start of someone's private driveway, and plenty of beautiful mountain scenery. But as we approached our destination, an overlook known as the Land of Lakes, the weather took a turn. A drizzle increased to full-on rain, and we were high enough for low-hanging clouds to become a view-spoiling fog.

We were the only car in the parking lot when we stopped long enough to reinflate tires after a pressure warning had gone off. (I need to get a portable compressor for my own car!) Just the time that took, standing out in the freezing rain, was enough to discourage us from trying even a half mile hike to what surely would be a view of fog. So we bailed and headed back down the mesa. We might have missed The View we'd been seeking, but the sights were plenty beautiful on the return trip. The weather was clearing as we got to the bottom -- not quite enough to convince us to turn around and try again for the hike, but enough to promise that our winery-hopping afternoon wouldn't be spoiled by rain.

We had much better luck with our morning hike on the second morning. We drove into Grand Junction to have breakfast with family from the Denver area that was coincidentally driving home from their own road trip, and then pressed on to Colorado National Monument. It's a location that I think gets forgotten amid beautiful and well-known spots in other "four corners" states, but it's absolutely worth seeing -- a long loop road that circles Monument Canyon and provides access to gorgeous hikes of many lengths and difficulties.

We drove in at the western entrance and stopped at Canyon Rim Trail. The visitor center was closed due to the current government shutdown, but the trail itself was the main attraction. As the trail name suggests, we hiked along the rim of the canyon, getting a wonderful view of several named rock features out in the canyon. It's about half a mile to a marked overlook spot -- though honestly, the view was more breathtaking along the way, and no less so on the short walk back.

While on that hike, we'd seen other visitors at an overlook on a different point of the canyon, and decided to seek that spot next. That turned out to be Otto's Trail, an even shorter quarter-mile hike that takes you right to the edge of canyon rim. (Though the uphill return trip caught us maybe a little off-guard after the level Canyon Rim Trail.) If you're ever in Colorado National Monument, you should absolutely plan on one or both of those two hikes; they're a real showcase of what makes the site special.

We continued with the full loop, making other shorter stops for photos -- but ultimately deciding against any further hikes in favor of grabbing lunch back in Grand Junction and then getting back to afternoon winery-hopping. These morning drives -- both the one that went according to plan and the one that didn't -- were a welcome reminder that when you live in Colorado, beautiful locations are really right there in your "backyard." I'm glad they were part of our getaway.

I'll be back later this week with highlights from our winery visits. 

Glenwood Getaway

Sometimes, it's fun to be a tourist in your own state. And Colorado is a particularly beautiful state for it. This past weekend, my husband and I drove to Glenwood Springs, around three hours west of Denver, for a wonderful little getaway.

On the drive up on Friday afternoon, we stopped at 10th Mountain Whiskey & Spirits, a place we came to know through their tasting room in Vail. But this stop was at their actual distillery in Gypsum, where I enjoyed a delicious praline Old Fashioned before the last leg of our journey to Glenwood Springs.

After breakfast Saturday morning, we went to Glenwood Caverns Adventure Park. It's essentially a small theme park built high on the mountainside overlooking the city; in fact, you have to ride a tram just to get to it. We rode several of the rides (including a dizzying swing that put you out in the open air overlooking the Colorado River). But we also cooled off underground with two different cave tours on site.

King's Row is more or less a large single chamber where you make your way down a long staircase, dropping a couple hundred feet (and about 10 degrees Fahrenheit), looking at all sorts of neat cave features along the way. The Fairy Cave tour is a guided tour through over a quarter mile of tunnels and rooms sprawling throughout the mountain. Highlights there included an outdoor exit to a natural terrace on the mountainside, a demonstration of the natural phosphorescent properties of the rock, and the comedy stylings of our tour guide (who clearly had done the same routine hundreds and hundreds of times, and was past giving it a full effort).

Glenwood Springs is known for its hot springs, which was the star of our afternoon stop: Iron Mountain Hot Springs. An outdoor spa resort with over 30 pools of varying temperatures, you can amble from place to place, relaxing. The clouds came out just as we arrived, which turned what otherwise might have been a too-hot afternoon into a perfect time to relax. We stuck mostly to the "adults only" side of the resort, which was not only more sedate, but also served adult beverages. A frozen drink to accompany a hot soak was a perfect way to unwind.

We were especially glad not to have planned the spa later in the evening when a torrential rain opened up to drown the city at just before sunset. We were dry inside at dinner and got to enjoy the sound through the propped-open restaurant entrance.

Sunday morning brought one more excursion before our drive home: we hiked the trail at the nearby Hanging Lake. It's a steep 1.2 miles up a mountain, but your reward is a cliffside lake so beautiful it feels like it came out of a fantasy novel. And a short walk up and behind the lake takes you to Spouting Rock, a tall waterfall that both pours over and leaks through the mountainside, in an equally fantastical display. The hike back definitely left my feet and knees aching, but it was a wonderful cap on a wonderful weekend.

Even for those Coloradans who at least occasionally travel around the state, Glenwood Springs is often just a "place on the way to Aspen." But it's very much a worthwhile destination of its own, and I really enjoyed our visit.

Back in All Its Pink Glory

Last night, my husband and I won the Colorado Lottery. No, not the one with big money involved. (Wouldn't that be nice?) Rather, the random chance to have dinner at the new, remodeled Casa Bonita.

Assuming you've heard of Casa Bonita, basically everything you've ever heard about it is true. When the restaurant was featured on South Park in 2003, most of my Virginia co-workers assumed it was just a wild fiction by the show. No, those of us who'd lived in Colorado had to persuade everyone: it's a real place, and South Park really didn't exaggerate anything about it. Yes, it's a Mexican restaurant with a magic show, a funhouse "cave," and a waterfall with divers somehow all crammed inside its seemingly Tardis-like structure.

Everything you may have heard about it since then is true as well. With each passing year, the place fell more into decline, and the food (never that good to start with) became increasingly inedible. But not even a visit to what Casa Bonita had become could erode the nostalgia felt by anyone who'd visited the place in its prime as a kid. When South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone announced they were buying the place and remodeling it, that nostalgia fueled a fever to attend that has continued a full year now after the reopening. You can't just show up to Casa Bonita; you have to put your name on an email list, then wait to be randomly selected for your chance to go.

After watching a few friends have their turn come up over the past months (and being surprised at the hints of jealousy I felt about that), our turn finally arrived. As it turns out, everything you've probably heard about the new Casa Bonita is also true. Everything is better.

The food is improved. I guarantee you that your favorite Mexican restaurant, whatever it is, serves better. But also, I can't remember ever feeling "full" when leaving Casa Bonita, as I actually did last night. At the very least, the food is at a level where it's no longer a thing worth talking about. Which, given the rest of the experience that is Casa Bonita, is exactly what it should be. Yes, it's pricey. But that price tag isn't about the food itself; it's paying for everything else.

And because Casa Bonita is now so backlogged with reservations that it can count on being completely full every hour it's open, that means it can be in full swing all the time. Yes, Casa Bonita has always had a theater inside... but I think I was in junior high the last time I remember there actually being a magic show on that stage when I visited. Now, the "insanely mysterious Sorcero" is regularly performing quick, comedic magic shows multiple times a night. Yes, there was always a waterfall at Casa Bonita... but your odds of actually seeing a "cliff diver" there after 2010 were slim to none. Now, a quick two-minute dive show occurs every 20 minutes. Yes, there had always been a puppet show stage near Black Bart's cave... and I don't recall ever seeing a performance there, even back in the 1980s. Now, every half hour, you get amusing Dad jokes delivered by puppet tacos and burritos, every half hour. (Though I do feel a bit badly for the person who has to deliver those jokes again and again, all night long.)

So yeah, Casa Bonita really is back to fulfilling the promise of being what Eric Cartman called "Mexican Disneyland" in that one episode. At least, it's enough so to deliver one fun evening. Maybe you have to come like I did, loaded with nostalgia for what the place used to be. But however it came together, I had a fun time.

Virtually Infinite

Every now and then, Denver gets to play host to the premiere of a nationwide tour. For three months, from February to early May, that's an interesting movie/game/science interactive experience called Space Explorers: The Infinite. If you're at all interested in crewed space flights, this will be right up your alley.

The presentation utilizes film captured aboard the International Space Station, with a special camera built to capture everything in a full 360° panorama. Hundreds of hours of footage has been curated and built into an immersive VR experience. You put on a set of VR goggles and walk out into a large space where you can tour a wireframe model of the ISS itself. You can look down and see the Earth below (or not, if you're prone to vertigo), and move through the environment and get a sense of just what size the station actually is.

Sprinkled throughout the VR setting are dozens of hovering orbs. Walk up to any of them, "touch" them, and the environment fades. You then get to see a minute-or-so clip of full-resolution footage captured aboard the ISS. It might show someone repairing some device aboard, suiting up for a spacewalk, or just having fun during downtime. You get enough time to experience about a dozen of these clips -- and you could easily go back and do it all again, since there are far more clips than you'll have time to see in one visit.

The entire experience concludes with you being directed to a chair, where a series of chosen clips is presented that were taken outside the station. Seated safely, you see all around the outside of the station, watch the Earth whiz by below, and generally become fully awed with the scope of it all. Like I said, if you're interested in crewed space flight, this experience is great.

Well.... "good," maybe. Only good because you do have to share it with other people. Perhaps 40 or 50 people are allowed in the space at one time; whatever the number, it feels like about 25% too many. You are able to navigate safely enough with the VR goggles: any people you attended the exhibit with show up as yellow "human-shaped" avatars in the wireframe, while any other people show up blue. To me, anyway, it seemed simple enough to avoid running into anybody else.

It apparently was not so simple for the rest of the audience. It's not that anyone full-on ran into me during the experience. But if you're in the middle of watching one of the full video clips, and someone approaches close enough to you that it might be an issue, the clip gets cut off immediately in favor of the wire frame, to let you know the person is there. You can't restart the clip again; you simply have to move on to something else. Three times during my 20-30 minute experience, something interesting was interrupted when someone else "invaded my personal space." There are simply too many people allowed in at one time.

So -- if you're going to go (and again, I think space flight fans will really want to), you might try for a time that may be less crowded. First thing in the morning, if you must go on a weekend? Mid-day during the week, if you have the option? Also be aware that while you can buy a ticket ahead of time with a prescribed time on it, that time is really just when you're able to get in line for the experience. If you're there with any kind of crowd, you'll be waiting a while before you actually get to walk the ISS for yourself.

And yet... still probably worth it. If you live in Denver (or if this exhibit comes to your city next), you may want to look into it.

The Jedi As I've Never Heard Before

On a number of occasions, I've written about concerts by the Colorado Symphony Orchestra in which they perform a film score live to a screening of that film. In two particular cases, it was Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back. This past weekend, they completed the original Star Wars trilogy with performances of Return of the Jedi.

Return of the Jedi is to me the least powerful of John Williams' scores for those first three Star Wars movies. Yet this is only by comparison, to two of the finest scores he ever composed (one an Oscar winner). Return of the Jedi is still music from John Williams in his prime. It features several memorable new themes, from the bass chorus for the Emperor, to the slovenly tuba melody for Jabba the Hutt, to the anthem for the Ewoks, to the mature and stately theme for "Luke and Leia."

Watching the Colorado Symphony Orchestra perform the score live made me appreciate it even more. It's incredibly detailed, with many supporting lines that fade into the background in the original recording (and vanish altogether under the sound effects of the actual film). It's a quite inventive score, even in its treatment of themes from the first two Star Wars films. Existing melodies are often handed to new instruments, shading them in clever ways that comment on the action.

There's also a lot of music. Not only is Return of the Jedi the longest of the original Star Wars trilogy films, most of it is scored. As conductor Brett Mitchell pointed out to the audience before Act II of the performance, the orchestra does not stop for the final 58 minutes of the movie. (If you're a hardcore Star Wars fan: every moment is scored after C-3PO says "Wonderful. We are now part of the tribe.") In the context of a special performance like this, that means there's more to listen and watch for.

John Williams uses french horns enthusiastically in most of his scores, but Return of the Jedi struck me as pushing the section even harder. More rare among Star Wars scores is the percussion he employs to represent the Ewoks. And I always find it fun to see how piano is used in a Star Wars score; it's not always easy to hear in the mix, but piano is Williams' instrument from his early days as a performer, and he often writes some sparkling moments for it.

As usual when I mention these Colorado Symphony Orchestra concerts, it's too late now for you to attend this particular show. And also as usual, I'll enthusiastically recommend you find a score-to-film performance that's up your alley -- either at the CSO, or at your local symphony, if you live in another city. But on this occasion, I can give you a year's advance warning to next year's Star Wars performance: the CSO has just revealed their calendar for the 2020/21 season, and The Force Awakens is on the way. That's a score I was quite down on at the time, but it has grown on me as I've heard Williams develop material from it in The Last Jedi and The Rise of Skywalker. I might just have to give it a chance live. And perhaps you'll want to too.

Going Up to Rabbit Hole

Puzzle Effect is on the opposite end of Denver for me and my friends. So while we were up in Thornton at lunch this weekend, after enjoying back-to-back escaping, we got to talking about what else is up north that we don't usually get to. Talk turned to another escape room that came recommended to us by the people who run our favorite room, the Crooked Key up in Steamboat Springs. We're from down in Denver? Well, we have to go to Rabbit Hole Recreation Services, they enthused. They're even better than we are!

Located in Louisville, Rabbit Hole Recreation Services has three different experiences available. We went for Paradox, a room themed around a mad inventor who has left us a time machine to activate and repair. The recommendation was not overstated. This was a fantastic escape room.

First of all, the construction of the environment was spectacular. The room was fully built up, fully furnished, and fully immersive. Even the giving of clues was incorporated into the experience, via a "magic mirror" sufficiently camouflaged to not look like a simple computer monitor. There were tons of interactive elements, moody lighting all throughout, and a large variety of sturdy and realistic props. Nothing looked fake or cheap.

Second, the room made no use of combination locks. We've done one or two rooms like this before, but they're definitely the exception more than the rule when it comes to escape rooms -- for good reason: it's not easy to incorporate challenging puzzles in place of the locks. Paradox did so in a sort of steampunk-adjacent setting with actual, working consoles that responded to your input of moving components around and flipping switches.

Because I'd never dream of giving away specifics, it's hard to convey just how cool some of the puzzles in the room really were. Suffice it to say that the number of tiny details, the volume of reactive elements, and the variety of the puzzles was truly impressive. And I really only got to experience just a small portion of it all...

...which would be my one point of caution for anyone trying this particular room. It purports to take up to 8 players, but we had 7 and it felt a bit too crowded for my tastes. We were stepping on each others' toes a bit, with not everybody always able to find a way to pitch in usefully. I really wouldn't call this a knock on the room itself, only in the claim that 8 players could do it at once. Indeed, I've now done enough escape rooms that I'd say the ideal number is probably 5 in just about every case, with either 4 or 6 working reasonably well for most. Paradox certainly fits this description. But here's another point in Rabbit Hole's favor: all their rooms are reserved privately! If you want to go with just a few of your close friends, you don't need to worry about a couple of strangers crashing your party at the last minute.

If Paradox is even slightly indicative of the quality of the other two rooms at Rabbit Hole Recreation Services, we have make the trip across town to try out those rooms! The Crooked Key in Steamboat may have been selling themselves short to say Rabbit Hole was even better, but I certainly haven't found better anywhere else in the Denver area. If you're in Denver, and into escape rooms, you have to check them out.

A Knight to Remember

It's been just over a year since I first blogged about Denver Escape Room. It was one of the better escape rooms my friends and I had visited. We loved it. So, apparently, did Puzzle Effect -- a company with locations in several states that has now bought Denver Escape Room, taken it over, and re-branded it. They've kept the great rooms intact, though. And to celebrate a friend's birthday this past weekend, we headed up to try two of their rooms we hadn't played before.

There was actually good reason to do these two particular rooms back to back, the way we did: they have a connected story line. First up was Knight + Rook, a room set in a private investigator's office. The P. I. has left behind clues to a kidnapping case involving a missing girl, which you have to decipher to call in a rescue team. In the second room, Rescue lets you play as that team, arriving on site to save the kidnapped girl before a bomb destroys the building where she's hidden.

Both rooms are well-built and immersive environments; it's easy to accept the scenario that you are in a private eye's office or a creepy abandoned warehouse. The puzzles are also well spread out to allow everyone in a group space to work on different things. We had six players when we went, but all of us had our chance to contribute something meaningful to the effort. Knight + Rook was especially good in this regard, with us splitting in half or even working in pairs for much of the hour.

These two rooms were both filled mainly with the combination lock puzzles typical of escape rooms... but with a nice variety of different lock types (and thus, different kinds of codes). Combinations were hidden in a variety of fun ways -- each of the two rooms had some nice "showcase" moments to get the code to some of the locks.

I think I personally helped more in Knight + Rook, finding the puzzles more up my alley. But Rescue was probably the better room of the two, featuring more unique moments. One aspect of it in particular was something I hadn't encountered in an escape room before -- and even seemed a bit subversive of the typical rules that are common to these rooms, if you've done them before.

We succeeded in both rooms, with a couple of clues nudging us along in both cases. (As was the case when Puzzle Effect was Denver Escape Room, they do a good job of not helping you too much too fast, giving you a chance to figure things out on your own. Unless you ask, of course.) Our time was pretty comparable in both. We've now done four of the rooms at Puzzle Effect... but there are still three more we haven't done. But the place impressed again, and I'm sure we'll be back to try those others.

But two rooms weren't quite enough escaping for us on this day. After stopping for lunch, we rather impulsively decided to check out a different location that had come highly recommended. More on that in another day's post...

Shakespearing Things Up

This week, I went to see a theater performance no one will ever be able to see again... and I enthusiastically recommend you go see it.

From now until March, the Improvised Shakespeare Company is performing at the Garner Galleria Theater downtown. The troupe got its start in Chicago, but has spun off into performances around the world, now including this long, half-year run here in Denver.

The show is exactly what it sounds like: five performers take an audience suggestion of the title of a Shakespearean play that doesn't exist. From that, they proceed to improvise a 90-minute performance of that play. All the trappings of Shakespeare are there -- much of the improvisation is in poetic meter, and much of that in rhyming couplets. Heightened language, tricky wordplay, and clever metaphors are peppered throughout. As many Shakespearean tropes as possible are hauled in -- lovers forced apart, women disguising themselves as men, villains scheming for vengeance, lowborn characters speaking truth to power, and more.

And above all: it is funny! I can imagine the slyest references hit better the more actual Shakespeare you know, but I don't think you have to know Shakespeare to laugh a lot. The mask does slip plenty, usually to slip in a modern joke or indulge in one of improv's most reliable laughs: putting another performer on the spot to watch them wriggle out of it.

The degree of difficulty on this type of improv seems off the charts to me. You have to pay attention to the rhyme and meter at all times. The language is far enough from normal to be almost like performing in a second language. It seems to me that only a handful of people could do it well... and most of them are probably employed by the Improvised Shakespeare Company. That they're able to basically make you forget about how difficult it must be for most of the show is, if anything, yet another testament to the skill involved -- they make it look easy.

On the night we went, the "play" performed by audience suggestion was "The Benefits of Economic Collapse." The result was inspired most heavily from The Merchant of Venice, though the 100-minute improv wove in splashes of As You Like It and other comedies. It was, of course, one-of-a-kind; as the performers themselves declared, it was the first and last ever performance of "The Benefits of Economic Collapse." But I have no doubt that attending the Improvised Shakespeare Company at any other performance would be just as entertaining, just as funny, just as breathtaking a display of wit.

I enjoyed the performance tremendously, and would even see them again during their run in Denver. The production was top notch, grade A, and if you're at all a fan of Shakespeare, you should absolutely get out to see them.

Dino-Might

Always willing to try out a new escape room, my friends and I went this weekend to Escape the Room Denver, a spot located in Southwest Plaza mall. Eight of us teamed up to take on their Jurassic Escape, a room loosely themed to the movie Jurassic Park. The goal (besides, duh: escape) was to destroy a designer-dino hybrid DNA sample to prevent evil-doers from cloning and breeding the monstrosity.

The experience was mixed. Escape the Room Denver had some pretty strong pluses and minuses on the continuum of escape room experiences. Overall, the group seemed to have had fun (mostly), but I would speculate that with so many escape rooms available all over Denver, it's not very likely we'll return to this one.

On the plus side, this was the most elaborate environment I've ever seen in an escape room. I've done a few rooms before that felt really polished -- as much as I would have said a room could get. This place blew the top of the bell curve. There was impeccable set decoration, outstanding and clever interactive elements, and fantastic props. If you're a fan of haunted houses (and 'tis the season!), think of the best haunted house you've ever been in. This was the escape room equivalent of that. Top notch.

The actual puzzles you encountered inside the room, however, weren't nearly as polished as the world they'd created. Key parts of the mystery were arbitrarily obtuse; afterward, we talked about how we'd felt like there were several elements we never really "solved" so much as "brute forced" until we tripped upon a solution. I think you could make the case that a couple of these moments were on us. (The room was more observation-based than most, and our group was "failing our perception rolls" quite a bit that day.) Still, there were elements where there was, for example, no clear connection between X and Y -- they just went together.

We also got the strong sense that elements of the room were either malfunctioning, or weren't actually automated (and our monitor fell asleep at the wheel when they were supposed to trigger something for us). Without divulging specifics, I can say that the challenge did contain several escape room staples: electromagnets you have to release, keypads where you have to enter a code, and so forth. More than once during our experience, we would try a solution, have nothing happen, then retry the exact same thing later and have it work. (And if we'd changed something in the interrim that turned a non-working answer into a working one? Well... back to "there was no clear connection between elements.")

Particularly frustrating for us was that the room actually wasn't set up correctly when we began. One puzzle we encountered near the end had actually already been solved when we reached it. We wasted a great deal of time trying to "solve" the puzzle, all the while saying to each other, "but it seems like this IS the answer, right? What are we supposed to DO here?" Further annoyance came when we broke down and asked for hints about it, and had our monitor first give two or three hints about solving the puzzle that was already solved -- not telling us (or not realizing) the mistake that had been made in preparing the room.

In the end, we were successful in escaping with less than two minutes to spare. And while we did have fun, there was also the sense that we'd relied on help more than we'd have liked, and didn't quite understand how we'd made it all the way through. We machine-gunned the monitor with questions at the end. Triumph mixed with confusion is an odd way to feel at the end of an escape room experience.

Escape the Room Denver does certainly excel in the look and feel of its environments, if Jurassic Escape is representative. But other places (like Denver Escape Room in Northglenn) are nearly as impressive in this respect while having much more clever and satisfying puzzles. If you're an escape room junkie "collecting" different locations, you'll probably want to give Escape the Room Denver a try. If you've never done a room before, I'd recommend somewhere else for your first experience.

A Fall Head of Steamboat

For the last several years, I've spent a winter week up in Steamboat Springs, skiing and enjoying board games with friends. But here's a change of pace: this past weekend, my husband and I went up there with two friends for a fall weekend getaway. And it turned out there was plenty to do there, even without the snow.

We headed up Friday afternoon, stopping about halfway for pizza in Frisco at HighSide Brewing. Though it hasn't been open all that long, HighSide has already become a favorite stop on the way back from skiing. It delivered again, with a delicious blood orange and vanilla Berliner Weisse that I enjoyed with a great white pizza.

We arrived in Steamboat just past sundown, setting up at the condo we'd rented for the weekend. It was in a perfect location in the center of town, with almost everything we wanted to do in easy walking distance. We made use of that right away, trying the whiskey at Steamboat Whiskey Company (not great), and then chasing that taste away with appetizers and drinks at a bar and restaurant called Laundry.

Before bed, the four of us completed the final game of Pandemic Legacy: Season 1 campaign, which we've been slowing working at for more than a year. It was a nice, memorable setting for that final momentous game. (As for the game itself? Well, I suppose I'll have a blog post about that in the not-too-distant future.)

The morning brought more gaming (after breakfast at Creekside Cafe), and then a return trip to the Crooked Key escape room. It's been a favorite stop of ours on every ski trip; we've been back again and again. They're now running a new game that's more scavenger hunt than escape room, Key to the City: S.K.I. This game sends you out into Steamboat Springs itself, carrying a backpack loaded with combination-locked goodies, and armed with an app on your smartphone. You have to hike around the city, solving clues to lead you to actual locations, and learning a bit of Steamboat history along the way. We enjoyed the hunt (and finishing with the third best score/time out of 100+ teams to play it so far was icing on the cake). The only downside? We've now done every room/game that The Crooked Key has to offer, so we won't be able to go back during this next winter's ski getaway.

We'd picked the right September weekend to be in town, because that afternoon we were able to go to Steamboat's OktoberWest event. At the ski resort, right at the base of the gondola, dozens of breweries were pouring a huge variety of beers. A Beef Cook-Off event was part of the fun too, with several delicious options from tacos to stroganoff to fancier presentations than you'd ever expect to see at a beer fest. And all of it was sprawled around a beautiful landscaped creek that had secretly been hiding there under the snow every time we'd been there to ski for the past several years. Great fun, and oh so tasty.

After returning to our condo, we'd planned to get in another game before dinner, but were rudely interrupted halfway through by a citywide blackout! A blown transformer literally took out everything, but fortunately our next evening plan was both outside town and didn't require electricity: a visit to Strawberry Park Hot Springs. I've written before about this nice place to relax and soak away your aches. It's maybe not quite as satisfying if you don't have post-ski pains to work out, but it's still a lovely spot to stargaze (even with a full moon spoiling half the sky).

Sunday morning began with some sweets from Powder Day Donuts. Then, after checking out of our condo, we played a round of disc golf. Thunderhead Disc Golf Course is a 19-hole course right on the very same mountain as the skiing. It begins right next to a closed-down-for-summer ski lift, and takes you over a mile all around the area, through very long and challenging holes. We were all exhausted by the end of it, but we'd had a great time. And despite it being only the second time I've gone disc golfing this season -- for the first season in years -- I posted a score I could be fairly proud of. (Better than I averaged back when I was going regularly!)

Our last stop was at our favorite Steamboat brewery, Mountain Tap. Delicious garlic knots and pizza, a passionfruit beer my husband loves, and a solid saison for me (extra refreshing after the long hike of disc golfing) was a nice capper to the weekend before starting our drive back down to Denver.

In turned out there was just as much fun to be had in Steamboat Springs even without the skiing. It was a great short getaway right as summer is coming to a close.

Getting Attached

Last night was the first time I'd been to Red Rocks for a concert in a while -- and among the most unusual concerts I've attended. Well, not so much unusual as... weird. "Weird Al" Yankovic was playing a sold-out Red Rocks, accompanied by the Colorado Symphony Orchestra, as part of his "Strings Attached" concert tour.

So much about the show seemed surreal in a fun way, like it couldn't really be happening. Last time I saw Yankovic was in the comparatively tiny Paramount Theater, and here he was filling up Red Rocks. Whenever he'd do a parody song, I'd think "I'll bet Robin Thicke/Chamillionaire/Coolio has never played with an orchestra." Whenever he'd do a particularly deep cut original song that took advantage of the orchestra, I'd think "I never imagined I'd be seeing The Biggest Ball of Twine in Minnesota/Jackson Park Express" performed in concert. Whenever he'd play something especially strange or irreverent, I'd think "I wonder if the Colorado Symphony Orchestra has ever played anything as odd as Weasel Stomping Day/Harvey the Wonder Hamster?"

From the "opening act" of the symphony playing a selection of great John Williams music (plus the Mission: Impossible theme), to the all-Star Wars parodies encore, it was a fun concert that the crowd was really into. A sea of cell phones went up unprompted for "Don't Download This Song." You could hear the laughter throughout "You Don't Love Me Anymore," even though it seemed like half the crowd knew every word to every song. The call and response at the end of "Dare to Be Stupid" was loud.

Part rock concert, part stand-up set, part night at the symphony -- this was a unique experience I'm really glad I went for. And judging by my Facebook feed, which last night was filled with "attending this concert" posts, I wasn't alone.

A Walk in the (Rocky Mountain National) Park

My husband and I just got back from a three-day weekend where we decided to be tourists in our own home state. We hopped in the car and drove up to Rocky Mountain National Park. We took our time getting there, stopping in Boulder at both Twisted Pine Brewing Co. and Upslope Brewing Company, and ultimately arrived at Estes Park in the late afternoon.

We checked in at the Stanley Hotel, the place made famous for inspiring Stephen King to write The Shining. And boy, do they know it. By the end of our two nights there, we felt they'd surely have torn the place down decades ago without the shot of Shining-based tourism. From the pipes leaking into our closet from the room above to the computer/credit card systems that were down for most of the weekend, it wasn't a great place to stay. Pretty, though. All the furnishings were carefully selected to blend early 20th-century with Stanley Kubrick's film adaptation. It was sort of fun, in a visiting a movie set kind of way. (Even if the Stanley was only used in the 90s TV mini-series, not the original film.)

On our first night in town, we sampled the first of three Estes Park breweries: Lumpy Ridge Brewing Company, which is located in a converted old gas station (and which has pretty solid beer). We also stopped at Snowy Peaks Winery to taste some of their offerings. We enjoyed their wine enough to bring a few bottles back to enjoy later. We then had dinner at the Dunraven Inn (delicious Italian food) before walking the shops of Estes Park (seemingly half souvenir shops, half salt water taffy stores) on a lovely summer night.

The next day, we trekked all over Rocky Mountain National Park. We went for a drive up Old Fall River Road, a less traveled (and less often open) one-way dirt road that was the only way across the park before the construction of the more famous (and maintained) Trail Ridge Road.

There are all sorts of great sights to see along the nine-mile drive, from a picturesque waterfall (Chasm Falls) to bright green meadows to forested paths to snow-covered valley walls in territory home to marmots -- ending up at the Alpine Visitor Center, near the highest point in the park.

From there, we continued along Trail Ridge Road, farther west into the park and intending to find a spot for an afternoon picnic. We'd planned all the food, but a heavy afternoon downpour spoiled those plans. We parked the car just a few feet off the Continental Divide and ate there, watching the rain pour all around us (half into the Pacific, half into the Atlantic, of course). It did finally let up enough for us to stop for a short hike around a spot called Lake Irene. The trail was covered with puddles from the storm, but we had the place mostly to ourselves, with people not yet coming out again after the rain.

Next, we backtracked on Trail Ridge Road, but not yet to returning to the hotel. We headed to the Glacier Gorge Trailhead for a short hike to a popular spot in the park, Alberta Falls. It's a lovely spot for pictures... it's just really hard to get one without any other people in them. We considered briefly a longer hike back up to a more secluded location, but decided it was a bit late in the afternoon for that. (Plus. we weren't as fully outfitted for such an adventure as we'd have liked.)

The evening back in town saw us trying the two other local breweries, Estes Park Brewery and Rock Cut Brewing Company. Neither was a standout, though the former was also having their fun riding the Shining gravy train, with multiple beers named in reference to the book. After another sunset walk among the shops in town, we closed down the night back at the Stanley Hotel in their whiskey bar. Neither of us is an aficionado of whiskey, but we appreciated how rare it was to find a place with literally hundreds to choose from. We were guided to a good choice by our server, sipping slowly amid the bustling Saturday night crowd.

When we'd planned our weekend, we weren't sure whether we'd want to head back into Rocky Mountain National Park on Sunday too. As it turned out, we were in a lazy mood. We didn't do much that morning but take a quick trip through the hedge maze they've planted in front of the Stanley -- again, in honor of the Shining. (Only installed four years ago, it hasn't had time to grow to heights that make it particularly difficult to navigate.) Some coffee and breakfast, and one more quick browse of the town shops, and we were on the road back home.

Rocky Mountain National Park has some beautiful spots. But also, you kind of can't go anywhere in Colorado without stumbling onto beautiful spots. Those of us lucky enough to live here are pretty spoiled. And being a "home state tourist" was a nice opportunity to appreciate that. We saw license plates from all over the country or people who drove days to get here. We saw it all, and then were comfortably back home in less than two hours (even after a traffic delay for a huge weekend festival in Lyons).

It was a lovely little getaway.

Factory Approved

Coming out of The Last Defender, my friends and I were on a bit of a high. We don't do escape rooms as often as most of us would probably like. And we'd just missed out on a success by one puzzle. So as six of us were carpooling back home, a conversation about other escape rooms somehow first turned into "there's a newer one nearby" and then into "we're going there, right now."

Escape Factory is set up in an industrial complex in Lakewood. It's not the slick and elaborately produced sort of place that Denver Escape Room (ironically, in Thornton) or EscapeWorks Denver is. In fact, we'd learn from talking with the man at the counter: it's one guy's particular dream (or, at least, entertained whim). Designed and built entirely by this one person, and on this occasion operated by him too, it's a noticeably smaller operation. After being spoiled by the sets we've seen at some other escape rooms, this could have been a bit of a letdown. Fortunately, this guy knows what he's doing when it comes to the puzzle design.

We just walked in, asking if he had any rooms available right then we could jump into. Appropriately, the one room he did have was about... being in a bunker and trying to prevent nuclear annihilation. An opportunity to prove ourselves after what had just happened!

As I mentioned, the puzzle design was clever enough. There was an actual laptop in the room with a password you had to "hack" to gain access to files. There were also the expected combination locks (though a bit more naturally integrated, story-wise, than normal). Logic puzzles, observation puzzles... the usual spread. And they were laid out in a non-linear fashion -- once again, that's the special sauce that allows any group of four or more to do an escape room while giving room for everyone to contribute.

The room did have a "found props" and "hand built" feeling, and part of that was that there wasn't much scenery. There weren't really any red herrings, decorative details you didn't actually need for any particular puzzle. Still, we had a lot of fun with it. Of course, it helped that we solved the room -- in a record time, apparently.

Escape Factory isn't the best escape room we've been to. But there's a good foundation there. The owner is building out a new room even now. Hopefully, that's a good sign that business has been good for him. And perhaps with experience and success, he'll be able to construct a more convincing environment to match his intriguing puzzles. I'd certainly be willing to go back and check the place out again.

Super Nova

I've written before about a number of "escape room in a box" products, one-use board games that try to replicate the experience of going to an escape room. In a sense, that experience was brought full circle this past Saturday night when my friends and I went to Denver Escape Room to play Nova.

Nova was purportedly being offered to the public for the first time the night we went. We were led not to a constructed room, but to a large space in the back of their building, where a series of tables were set up in an almost classroom sort of space. Each table had its own series of boxes and items (and a spread of snacks -- the only thing we were allowed to touch before the event began).

It seemed as though Nova may have been a preexisting game they've run before as a corporate team-building exercise. Five different teams (of 4 to 6 players), each at their own table, were given the same scenario -- a sudden accident has knocked our spaceship off course and damaged it. We needed to restore functions to the ship, determine our location, then reach the planet of our original mission, transport to its surface, and locate the Macguffin we were there for in the first place.

Nova was very much like an escape room in a box. But it was a big, expensive box. As you worked your way through puzzles and reported answers to the game monitors, they'd hand over still more sealed plastic tubs full of all kinds of new components. The game lasted well over an hour (and was meant to), filled with a wide variety of clever puzzles and many well-produced props fancier than any you'd actually get from a boxed board game. (Well... you could put these components in a boxed board game, but it would be a very expensive game.)

The suspicion that this was a large team-building event kind of game came from the nature of many of the puzzles. Each of the five tables had pieces of information that all other tables actually needed to reach solutions. Fully half of the puzzles had you get up from your own table and start making rounds of the room, gathering information you needed. The instructions before play were specific on this -- while you could hide your solutions to puzzles (as this was, nominally, a competition), you were required to share any background information with everyone who came by to ask.

Our group of five was working at our best that night. Everyone contributed at various points, and the game was very well designed to allow for this. There was not only a good variety of puzzles, but multiple puzzles were often delivered at the same moment, making it easy to divide the work.

At an hour and 22 minutes in, my group was the first to complete the game -- and we really had a blast with it. It certainly would have scratched my itch for an escape room, had we not already booked our tickets for The Last Defender the next day. Improbably, this event actually cost more than The Last Defender, though. Not that we felt we hadn't gotten our money's worth; Nova's breadth of puzzles and slickly produced components certainly made it an experience we enjoyed, and I'm very glad we did it. But at the same time, I could understand if it continued to be a game they only occasionally offer to the public, focusing instead on their fully-staged escape rooms.

This was a great event for junkies like us who can't get enough, but others may prefer a more conventional escape room experience rather than seeking this one out. That said, if you've never been to Denver Escape Room, it would be well worth going -- they're the best we've found in the area so far.

Last, But Not Least

My friends and I went a little escape room crazy this past weekend, hitting three different experiences between Saturday and Sunday. It was a combination of things we'd planned well in advance, and more short notice and spontaneous opportunities. We put some in the mix because we weren't sure just how "escape room" vs. "escape room adjacent" the activities would be.

I'm going to start with the middle of our three -- it's the one we had possibly the most questions about going in, and it's also the one on a timetable (for any of my readers who might be curious themselves). The Last Defender is being presented through someone you wouldn't think of when you think "escape room," the Denver Center Theater Company. Originally presented in Chicago, the experience has been brought here to Denver to run through late July.

The description of the event on the Denver Center web site makes it clear that the story of The Last Defender involves being in a missile bunker during a doomsday scenario set in the 1980s. You know, WarGames. It's also clear there will be puzzles to solve and games to play. It sure sounds like an escape room -- and indeed, neither the first nor the last escape room I've done using this theme for its setting. (There's your hint about my third escape room experience this weekend.) What wasn't clear is just how much this might be like a piece of theater. How much story would there be? Would there be actors?

If you want to go in with as many unanswered questions as we had, then here's your nutshell review: it was great! Go book it now. Do it!

For those sticking around for a little more info, here's what we learned in doing it: The Last Defender isn't really theater at all. It's a full-fledged escape room. What's more, it's the largest one I've ever done, supporting more players than any other room I've encountered, and built with great materials and production values.

The Last Defender supports 16 players at one time. Indeed, it requires at least 8 for them to run it. And this isn't one of those rooms that say they'll take a large number but is ultimately so narrow and linear that people wind up standing around watching other people. A constant stream of non-linear puzzles really makes it possible for everyone to be active -- working solo, in pairs, or in small or large groups to solve puzzles all throughout a large space.

As all the best escape rooms do, there are puzzles requiring a variety of skills -- physical, deductive, mathematical, pattern-matching, and more. Communication is required; you have to be willing to yell out what you're thinking to the whole group. You have to divide and conquer, throw in and help where you can, and be very active.

There are two small nods to this being more "theater" than escape room. One is a series of videos triggered throughout the experience, projected on a large screen to advance the plot. (Your countdown clock pauses while the videos play, so watching them doesn't count against you.) The theatrical element is in the way clues are delivered. There are "actors" in the space with you, dressed unobtrusively and never speaking. But through pantomime, they guide players who get stuck, and provide moments of encouragement.

The unique strength of The Last Defender is also its only real weakness, in my book: because it takes up to 16 players, you can't have it all to yourself. My group of friends always likes to plan together to book a room, to try to avoid being thrown in with strangers. Most of us just aren't social that way. But unless you can come up with 15 friends who all want to do an escape room together, you won't have The Last Defender to yourself. Depending on how you are with strangers, and what random people you're thrown in with, that might be a bummer.

On the other hand, The Last Defender is so sprawling, with so many puzzles contained inside, that you could easily do it more than once. When I played, I felt like I only got to personally experience around a third of the "content" in the room. Also.... sadly.... we did not save the day. We literally had one puzzle left to solve when our time expired. And they did not tell us afterward what we were missing. Come back and do it again, they encouraged.

The Last Defender was a grade A, top-notch escape room. Maybe a "minus" tacked on for me wishing I could have just had it to me and my friends alone. (But hey, that's maybe on me and not the room.) If you're a fan of escape rooms, you should absolutely go do this one. And you have until July 28 to do so.

A Full Head of Steamboat

I've just returned from a week-long vacation to Steamboat Springs, a now annual tradition of skiing and board gaming with friends. This is actually my second ski trip this winter; my husband and I went to Aspen just before Christmas.

I often return from a vacation with several days of posts about the things I did. My last ski trip didn't get a mention not because it wasn't special, but because I found myself without much to share. It's the same with this recent trip too -- future posts will cover some of the board games I got to try out, but I don't have much to say about the rest.

Skiing is no longer the comedy of errors for me that produced several days of posts about how hard a time I had learning. I'm still no master... though this year, I was willing to try a tree run labeled for experts that I looked at the year before and said "no thanks" to. And though I fell a few times, the fun was worth the effort.

In four years of going to Steamboat, this was actually the first year where we got any significant snow -- over a foot, mostly near the end of the week we were there. I have little experience skiing in fresh powder, but now that I got a big taste of it (on our last day on the mountain), I have to say: I don't get what the fuss is about. Sure, there's a "marking your territory" sort of thrill in leaving fresh tracks. But you have to work twice as hard to ski half as fast. Nothing gets groomed, your goggles get streaked with water, and your knees get quite aggravated with you. Give me a sunny day on a nice, groomed blue run, thank you very much.

Another noteworthy event this trip was our third trip to the escape room in Steamboat Springs, the Crooked Key. The only room they had left that we hadn't tried was "Escape from the Old West," an 1800s jailbreak. It was their easiest room, yet nearly as fun as the others, and put together with the same high production values that keeps The Crooked Key our favorite even as we try other escape rooms in Denver.

I'm back home now, and the blog will be getting back to business as usual. Like I said, you can expect some board game talk in the weeks ahead. I've also got to catch up with two Star Trek: Discovery episodes I've fallen behind on. The Oscars are a week away. (I'm not sure I'll get to any more movies, but I'll hope for some snarky quips from my friends about the ceremony.)

And for those who kept right on without noticing my blog had been off? You can pretend you missed me; I probably won't know the difference.

Rock Me, Amadeus

I've written on several occasions about going to the Colorado Symphony Orchestra to watch them perform the score of a movie live on stage. (Hell, I did so just earlier this month!) Yet even though I've now attended a number of these performances, the one I went to this past weekend felt unique. That's because the film this time was Amadeus.

Amadeus won the Academy Award for Best Picture of 1984. It's the tale of composer Antonio Salieri, a man who wishes only to honor God through music -- but whose own capacity for creativity falls woefully short in comparison to his brilliant contemporary, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Offended by Mozart's crass and irreverent behavior, Salieri seeks to avenge himself on the callous God that blessed the unworthy and mocks at every turn.

This is a movie near to my heart, by way of the original play by Peter Shaffer on which it was based. Back in my college days, I was in a production of that play. It was arguably the best work of my short and abandoned theatrical career; in any case, it remains a time I look back on fondly. Shaffer rewrote the play entirely for the screen, turning an award-winning play into an award-winning film. Both are triumphs in their own mediums, though it is my connection to the play that compelled me to seek out the Colorado Symphony Orchestra's screening of the film.

The musical score of Amadeus is comprised entirely of previously existing material -- works of Mozart and Salieri (with a smattering of other contemporary music). As a result, you'd expect this concert to be more akin to what you'd expect of a typical night at the symphony. But the soundtrack of Amadeus is hardly as simple as "now we'll play Don Giovanni; now we'll play The Magic Flute." The music is all very carefully curated and laid into the action just so, and the movie itself makes deliberate space for it.

Synchronization is important every time the symphony performs a film, but it's even more so here. Original vocals in the film were retained throughout -- for example, when we would see sequences from an opera performance. With only rare exceptions, the accompanying music was always performed live. Tom Hulce as Mozart would wave his hands on screen, furiously conducting his musicians, as Brett Mitchell of the CSO would just as intensely conduct the real ones in perfect unison.

Several key scenes in the movie really get inside Mozart's music and pick it apart, and seeing this happen live was a real treat. As Salieri would discuss the way a phrase on the oboe would hand off to the clarinet, you'd see and hear it happen right there on the stage. As Salieri would page through portfolio's of Mozart's music, the orchestra would turn in an instant and play samples of each new page. Whenever Salieri would monologue about what made Mozart's music so great, he'd point to things that you could witness right there in front of you.

A climactic scene at the end of the movie was as special a moment as I can ever recall at the symphony. Salieri agrees to take dictation for an ailing Mozart, writing out a piece line by line. It's a scene that frankly I'd say goes on a bit too long in the movie; it quickly makes its dramatic point about Salieri's emotional response, yet continues on for several minutes. But here, in this unusual concert venue, it was an extraordinary moment that ended all too soon. Mozart would name the instrument and speak the notes; Salieri would begin to write them, and the live symphony orchestra would take it up and play it. You very literally got to see how each component of a celebrated piece is layered together, bit by bit.

You also got to be chilled to your core by the power of a 140+ member chorus included for this performance. In past film score concerts, choirs have been routinely left out -- either the few bits of vocals in a score were actually omitted, or a substitution was made with a musician playing the part on a synthesizer. But they'd never dream of doing this to Mozart, of course. The choir made an already special evening that much more so with its raw power and raw emotion.

Every time I go to the symphony for a film presentation, I end up writing about it here, urging people to give one a try some time. I have never been disappointed. On this occasion, I was truly overwhelmed. So once again: give one a try some time, at the Colorado Symphony Orchestra or whatever orchestra performs near you.

Walking the Path

On occasion, I've written about escape rooms I've done with my friends around Denver (and one "not around Denver"). This weekend, we tried out a place that was new to us: Denver Escape Room in Northglenn. Like EscapeWorks Denver downtown, I'd give it a high recommendation.

There were 10 of us on this excursion, and we broke into two groups to try Grim Stacks (themed like a Harry Potter-esque book shop) and The Path (a Chinese themed room). I was in the latter group.

The Path was similar to the Taphophobiaroom at Crooked Key in Steamboat Springs -- it was a cleverly designed experience that avoided using any traditional locks. Working through the room was all about solving riddles and logic puzzles, recognizing patterns and making use of reference information scattered around the environment. No padlocks, no combination locks. Instead, doors and drawers were held shut by electromagnetism, and you had to solve puzzles to release the seal.

The production values inside the room were excellent. I've been to a couple of other escape rooms around town now, and this isn't always the case. I've seen as low as "weekend garage sale raid" to as middling as "high school theater" to as sky high as "this must have taken weeks." Denver Escape Room is more in that last category. The Path presented a neat environment full of things to see and do; everyone who did Grim Stacks gushed similarly (as much as they could without spoiling the room's secrets).

The doling out of hints by the room's overseers was also handled well. I've done rooms where the operator too frequently nudges you along, as if they're being paid by the success. Then there are the rooms where you have to ask for help -- which can leave a group too stubborn to admit when they need it. We did get stuck on The Path a couple of times (once over the dumbest thing; it's embarrassing), and the hints arrived with perfect timing. We were allowed to struggle as a group for several minutes, going back over every part of the room and talking through our roadblock together. We had the chance to solve things on our own before getting the push.

Both groups escaped, each with around 15 minutes left in our hour. (The Stacks group was about two or three minutes faster, so they can gloat about that if they want.) But success or fail, I knew after a few minutes that I'd be wanting to go back to try the place again. Perhaps the same large group can get together to swap rooms. Or try this place's unusual head-to-head experience, which allows two teams to actually compete against each other in the same room.

Northglenn isn't my end of town, but this is worth driving there for. If you like escape rooms, check out Denver Escape Room.

Dearly Beloved

Today's post is on the short side. That's because I'm talking again about Dear Evan Hansen, about which I've already said a fair amount. I can now add to that, though, that if you live in the Denver area, you now have a chance to see it without traveling all the way to New York. The touring version of the production began its run right here, and closes out this coming weekend. You have a few nights left to make it. And you totally should.

Dear Evan Hansen remains a great show, worthy of the accolades it received in its original run. Unlike Matilda, which was so diminished in the incarnation of its U.S. Tour that I apparently never even blogged about seeing it the second time, this cast follows well in the original's footsteps. Ben Platt won a Tony originating the title role, and while it's true and expected that no one following could match his intensity, the star of this production, Ben Levi Ross, definitely works. His vocal strength is obvious, and his more gangly and awkward appearance actually feels more authentic to the role of an outcast and weird teenager.

I love this show. I loved it the first time, transfixed by a pair of rare and amazing performances. I loved it the second, more able to recognize and appreciate the arcs of other characters in the story. It's great. See it. That's about all I can say.