Close encounters of the celebrity kind!

Emma says: Not my turn to blog but Mandy and I have had a fun afternoon so I thought I'd share. Since arriving in Telluride we have been hot on the trail of the many celebrities in town for the annual film festival. Our venture out last night to the Opening Night Feed in the main street only increased our appetite, especially after my encounter celebrity film critic Leonard Maltin!

Anyway, as it turns out, our 'host' here in Telluride, Marilyn, went to high school with Helen Mirren's husband, Taylor Hackford. As it turns out, Helen Mirren is in town for the festival and was doing a 'conversation' session here in town today. So Mandy and I trundled into town with Marilyn this arvo and hung around the local courthouse where Helen would be speaking. It was a very exclusive affair with only 90 places available and most of these went to patrons of the festival. We were lucky enough to have a contact that couldn't get us into the event but got us close enough to get some photos (see right) and to get an autograph each! Helen Mirren was lovely and very accomodating - and Mandy and I were stoked!


To top it off after our first celebrity encounter, Mandy and I went for coffee with Marilyn further down the main street. Here we ran into Peter Yarrow of Peter, Paul and Mary fame (the group that sang 'Puff the Magic Dragon'). A quick photo and another autograph later, we let him go, content with a good afternoon's work on the celebrity hunt.

Tonight, the team are enjoying a night in with Ang cooking us a roast chook - yummo! We need all the energy we can get as we've heard that Nicolas Cage is in town so he is our target for tomorrow!

Tomorrow afternoon we leave the bright lights of Telluride bound for Montrose...