Bengal Trailer Invades Arizona Part 2

This is part 2 of a 3 part Blog recapping the epic Bengal Trailer Trip to Arizona:

To read part one click here

Saturday

By the time we rolled into our hotel it was around 6:30 am Arizona time. We quickly unloaded the bus and some of the group went to breakfast, some to take the bus to the Ford dealership, and the rest of us decided to get a couple of hours of sleep before we had to get up to make our tee time at Legend Trail for 18 holes of golf (http://www.legendtrailgc.com/#!gallery/c1w0f).

While some of us were waking up, Greg had just successfully negotiated/begged the dealership to get the bus back up and running as soon as possible. We loaded our clubs into Tony’s rental car and we crammed 8 people and 7 sets of clubs into a vehicle meant to hold 6 people. Tony Wolfe and I suffered the most uncomfortable seat during our 30 minute trek.

We pulled into the golf course in plenty of time. Greg, Kathleen, and I even had time to get what can only be described as the most amazing breakfast burrito known to mankind. I am not sure what was in it but when asked what I wanted for breakfast 2 days later, it was the only thing on my mind.

We broke off into 2 foursomes and decided to play a scramble with the losing 4 buying drinks for the winning 4. One team had Tony W, Tony I, Adam, and Anthony while the other team consisted of Greg, Jack, Kathleen and myself. We wanted to play a course that was like playing in the desert and this course certainly did NOT disappoint. In the midwest when you play a golf course the scariest holes are the ones where you have to hit over water. On this course there was only one hole with water. The rest have tee boxes that sit behind huge boxes of sand and desert life. And if you hit your ball in there you can forget about finding it. It is under a desert plant or cactus and you are not getting it back. I lost 2 balls on the first hole alone. I quit keeping track after a while. And I wasn’t alone. Everyone lost more on a course with no water than we ever have back home.

But the sights on this course were miraculous. The course was a mix of beautiful green grass, desert plants like large cacti, and the backdrop was the gorgeous mountains of Scottsdale. To get to the back 9 you even had to go under a tunnel. This was certainly a tough course. We 3 putted more than once and we were playing a scramble. But it was just an absolute ton of fun! Besides the golf the highlights of the outing were seeing actual roadrunners (which are way smaller than you’d expect), Greg falling out of a moving golf cart trying to pick up a ball, and a debate as to why the cacti on the course have huge holes in them. Some say it’s from golf balls hitting them and others say it’s a fungi.

As we wrapped up 18 we got a call from the Ford Dealership letting us know the bus was done and was ready to be picked up. A huge relief to everyone who needed it up and running for the trip back. We closed out with score reveals. As it turns out we are all not very good golfers, but the team of Greg, Jack, Kathleen, and myself are just a little better! We won by a final score of +8 to +13. We still never got our drinks but golfing at an amazing course with amazing company and amazing weather was prize enough.

We packed up and jumped in the rental. Greg drove us past some of the best/crazy houses I’ve ever seen. As we pulled up a private drive we drove past houses that were literally built into the mountains. The views from the houses were breathtaking but your backyard is boulders and I have to believe you’d have to worry about rocks crashing into your house daily. But the houses were MAGNIFICENT!

We moved on and picked up the bus and headed back to the hotel. Once to the hotel we took a quick nap and got  ready to go out and experience Scottsdale. We made it to Cien Agaves for tacos and margaritas. A table behind us had a ton of Bengal fans and at one point we all shouted “Who Dey”.

After we left the restaurant, we hopped in an oversized golf cart and took it to some bars. The first bar we went to was called Giligins.  This place was a pretty big disappointment. All I’ll say is there was false advertising that let our high expectations down. But we ran into Bengal Jim and other Bengals fans there. After we left there we moved over to a bar called Bevvy. This place was pretty chill even though it was hopping! We spent most of our time there playing a game that was a mix of shuffle board and pool. After we left there we decided to head over to Ricky’s bar to see our friend Justin who was DJing a Bengals party. We ran into Lot E’s Terry W and many other fans. It was clear by the 3 bars that Bengals fans were out in “full effect” in downtown Scottsdale. Once we left we hit up a few more bars along the street. All of which seemed to be the same bar; loud music, huge glass garage doors that were open, and about 50 plasma tv’s. There was nothing that differentiated these bars from one another and everyone was packed! It was crazy. Greg even said that this bar scene was crazier than Miami’s bar scene. That’s some high praise. The other thing was that every girl was dressed to the nines and most guys were wearing tshirts and jeans. It was the biggest mismatch I’ve seen. We left there and went back to Bevvy’s where we finished up the night. We made it back to the hotel around 2:00 and knew we better get some sleep because Sunday was the big game!

Sunday

We woke up on Sunday ready to get our tailgate on! But before we could do that, we had a lot of trailer work to do from the incident on our way down. The trailer had things thrown around and deep fryer grease all over. We took the trailer to a do it yourself car wash and disassembled it. We scrubbed every inch of the trailer including the canopy top and all the coolers. The trailer usually only gets this treatment on Bengal Trailer Clean Out Day during the preseason.

All the hard work deserved a little treat. We walked down the plaza to a small store that just said “Doughnuts” on the sign. We got a dozen doughnuts that weren’t your typical doughnuts. Those included Maple Bacon (with actual bacon bits) and Bedrock (made with actual Fruity Pebbles). We found out the dough was actually made in house and is vegan. I had my doubts but the doughnuts were really good although no one wanted to eat the bacon doughnut.

We put the trailer back together, made a quick stop at Home Depot and headed back to the hotel. We had just enough time to change and move on. A quick 30 minute drive west, we pit stopped to pick up ice at a Wal Mart and then it was time to get to Lot F. We arrived at 1:30 just as the lot was opening. We met up with our Hall of Fame counterparts (The Cards #1 Tailgate Experience). These guys were super welcoming to the Trailer. They even asked another Cardinals fan to move so the BT could park next to them. The Cardinal fan refused. Turns out he was kind of a (insert whatever word for jerk you would like). We unloaded the trailer, DJ Justo set up his equipment, Greg started deep frying , and Kathleen (Molly 2.0) began pouring shots. As I started walking the shots around to make friends in the lot I came across the guy who refused to move spots. I offered him a shot and his response, “Look I appreciate you guys came all the way from Cincinnati, but you need to turn your music down. We want to watch the games…(It was here I tuned his lecture out).” To which I replied, “But do you want a Bengal Bomb”. He turned around and did not even respond to me….seemed like a dude who was happy with his life.

The tailgate started really slow. But slowly but surely Bengals fans started migrating in droves. The tailgate was rocking. We had easily over 100 Bengals fans partying with us. Bengal Jim, Houston, James, Kevin, and many others from Cincinnati and even Bengals fans from California were keeping it turnt up! The Cardinals fans in the lot were super cool. Even a guy in Steelers jersey was taking gas cans to the face! We hoisted the Carson dummy over the flagpole and it turns out the Cardinal fans thought it was pretty funny as many came over and snapped pictures.

I’m not sure at what point during the tailgate but Cincinnati sports broadcasting legend John Popovich stopped by and even led the Bengals fans in a toast.

I haven’t mentioned it yet but the weather was incredible. I was tailgating in late November in shorts and a t-shirt!!! This was easily in my top 5 of all time tailgates.

We wrapped up and headed into the game. At one point in the line to get in I led other Bengals fans around us in the Bengal fight song. Not sure if Cardinal fans were too amused!

No need to recap the game as we all know how that turned out. But it was a great game and the boys were right in it.

We walked out to find the trailer had been TP’d (not the worst thing that has happened to it). We cleaned up, ate some of the leftover food, packed it all up, said goodbye to our Arizona hosts, and headed back to the hotel.

Most of the crew tapped out at this point but Greg B, Greg F, myself, and Anthony made it over to the local casino. We did some solid people watching which included guessing the profession of some of the patrons in the casino. Greg F and Anthony played (lost) blackjack. Anthony nearly had his drink  forcibly removed from him as the waitress was trying to make people hand in their drinks at 2:00 am.

We hopped back in the car and headed back to the hotel to close out our last night in Arizona.

To read part 3 click here