We had been warned that high quality dining options were severely limited in Hurricane, Utah. Moreover, it was likely to prove difficult to obtain an alcoholic drink – beer possibly, but certainly not wine.
And those warnings were sadly endorsed over the next few evenings.
It all began when we went out to dinner on our first night. Having consulted TripAdvisor and selected its number one restaurant, a pizzeria in a cinema complex around a mile away, we were feeling optimistic. Armed with the respective street numbers we set off in our search for the cinema.
We found this easily enough – but no sign of any pizza restaurant. We walked a little further and then around the whole area, all to no avail. It was only when we returned to the motel and read the fulsome TripAdvisor reviews a little more carefully, that we discovered that it was only a mobile street wagon that set up stall during daylight hours (and even then not on a Wednesday)!
We headed off back in the direction of the motel, only mildly disappointed because we had spotted an attractive looking restaurant called Barista’s on the way down. And by the time we had been sat at our table and started to read the hundreds of alleged customer testimonials claiming that the pizza and ice cream, along with many other items on the menu, were the best on the planet, we had struck lucky in adversity.
I like to think that I am reasonably streetwise, and do not often get hoodwinked by confidence tricks (I’ve conveniently forgotten the guy on Fisherman’s Wharf in San Francisco who screwed ten bucks out for me for “cleaning” my boots), but this proved to be one of my dumbest moves.
The teenage waitress in shorts who clearly wanted to be anywhere else took our drink order. Conscious already that wine was out of the question, we asked what beer they had. With a huge sigh the girl said “St. Pauli” in a “take it or leave it” manner, so St. Pauli it had to be. Now, although I didn’t articulate it immediately, I was familiar with this German brew and suspected that it might be non-alcoholic. After the girl had yanked the bottles out of the fridge and slapped them down on the table, and we had taken our first sips (it was too unpleasant to gulp), we knew it.
The food, whilst not inedible, also fell way short of the absurd praise scrawled over every inch of wall space (the staff must have had great fun fabricating that piece of fiction). My miniscule portion of fish and chips was delivered in a cereal bowl and Janet’s enchiladas came with no accompaniment whatsoever – not a hint of beans, rice or sour cream. The “service” remained surly and peremptory. Indeed, I think it might have been the first time I had eaten in America without being asked continually during the meal by the server whether the food was acceptable.
To add insult to injury, on reading both TripAdvisor and Yelp reviews back in the motel, we read a lengthy litany of furious, even vicious comments about the food, beer and staff attitude. And yet it had looked so appealing from outside. The words book, judge and cover sprung to mind.
We consoled ourselves by purchasing a six pack of beer in the local gas station, though even this was of low strength (Bud Light, Coors Light and the like).
This was not, however, why I got to sleep so easily that night. I can thank the account of Joseph Smith’s revelation in the Book Of Mormon for that.
Having exhausted the full extent of Hurricane’s gourmet offerings on that first evening, we played safe on the following night by buying in a Domino’s pizza, washed down again by insipid beer.
We were no more successful in hunting down a bottle of wine to have with our evening meal on the following two nights in Panguitch. Raids on assorted supermarkets and gas stations proved equally futile. Only the dining room in the lodge at Bryce Canyon proffered a wine list, but, of course, that was at lunchtime and we were about to embark upon a prodigious hiking expedition that afternoon.
Whilst our stay in Utah was, in all other respects, wonderful, with visits to Zion and Bryce Canyon National Parks, Cedar Breaks National Monument, Red Canyon and Pink Coral Sand Dunes Park, our first swing into Arizona meant one thing above all other. No, not Lake Powell or the Grand Canyon but an opportunity to partake of one of the most civilised pursuits available to humankind – consuming a glass of wine.
Having got that off my chest, it is time to return to the true hero of this diary – the road.
And the journey between Hurricane and Panguitch had some interesting moments.
Tony Quarrington 