Football fans from across the country headed to Miami this week for Super Bowl festivities. Two Upvalley couples are taking quite different routes to get in -- or try to get in -- to see the big game.

Barbara and Brian Pope, who live in Angwin, are die-hard Chicago Bears fans -- especially Barbara, who is from Chicago. Brian, who works at St. Helena Appliance, is a Calistoga native.

Leslie and Toppa Epps, who live in Calistoga, are behind the Indianapolis Colts -- or at least Toppa is. He's a native of South Carolina. His wife Leslie, a native of Calistoga, hasn't quite decided which team to support.

There's another fundamental difference between the two couples.

The Eppses, who own the Pink Mansion Bed & Breakfast in Calistoga, have been planning this weekend since the Calistoga Education Foundation Wine Auction in May 2006, where they paid $5,500 for their pair of tickets. The tickets were donated to the auction by Dick Vermeil, a Calistoga native and former coach of the Philadelphia Eagles, St. Louis Rams and Kansas City Chiefs.

Meanwhile, the Popes don't even have tickets to the big game. They decided to fly to Miami at the last minute.

The couples, who attend the same church, headed out earlier this week for Super Bowl festivities.

"Barbara Pope is really a die-hard Bears fan," said Toppa Epps. His wife quickly agreed, "She'll even wear Bears paraphernalia -- which Barbara calls 'Bear-phernalia' -- to church, and sometimes, when there is a Bears game going on she'll listen to the game with headphones on in church."

"Yeah, but never when the pastor is speaking," Barbara Pope said in a separate conversation. "I've been a Bears fan since I was in high school."

For Barbara Pope, the Bears affair was ignited when she had a school girl's crush on a high school football player. Long after the crush fizzled she still carries a torch for the monsters of the Midway.

"I warned my husband early that I have a thing for the Bears," she said. "He had to accept that."

Brian Pope is a San Francisco 49ers fan, usually. When they're not playing each other, he backs the Bears, but when the Bears and the 49ers clash, things change around the Pope household.

"It becomes an every-man-for-himself situation," Barbara Pope said.

The Eppses don't have as strong a tie to any team.

"I'm a die-hard Washington Redskins fan," Toppa Epps said. "So I had to choose a team to support and I like the Indianapolis quarterback. They've never won before, the Bears have."

"I'm sort of leaning toward the Bears, though," said Leslie Epps. "I don't really know for sure yet."

The couples differ on their opinions of who is going to come out on top in Super Bowl XLI.

"I think it's definitely going to be a close game, they're both good teams," said Toppa Epps. "I'm going to guess the winner will be the Colts 29-13."

For the Popes, there was no guesswork.

"Do you think we'd be going all the way to Miami if (the Bears) weren't going to win?" demanded Barbara Pope. "No way, but if by some weird accident the Bears didn't win, we still plan to have fun, to be a part of the celebration."

Brian Pope agreed with Toppa Epps, that the game will be close.

"I'd say it'll be the Bears, 21-14," he said.