Out of State, Out of Mind Episode 4

After a long drive on Saturday, we arrived at our next port of call, Salt Lake City. While we were enroute to Montana, I had the bright idea of going to visit the Spiral Jetty in Utah. Because it's there, and I seem to hit Utah only once every 20 or so years. However, by the time we got within sniffing distance of the long route to it, we'd been in the car for 5 or so hours. I waved at the exit and called it done. Because of the rats, we couldn't really stop for long breaks...Joey got heatsick in the car after a half an hour break in Missoula and had to be nursed back to health with a cold compress in Butte. It was a close call.

So we had one break in Idaho Falls in the parking lot of a Quizno's with our AC running in the truck. By the time I got to Salt Lake I was in sad shape. But Alex desperately wanted to catch the owner at Sam Weller's Zion Bookstore. After a fruitless search for a restroom at the huge honking mall city mere blocks away from the temple, we gave up and headed to Sam Weller's. I was so strung out and distracted I didn't get a picture of the facade, which I'm sorry about. (But they had a bathroom.) It's a great big store, with lots of quality used books mixed in with the new, which I like. I browsed the books while Alex made his pitch to the owner. In the kids section I found a copy of a book printed in 1974 about a little girl who goes to the hospital to get her tonsils out. I read this same book in 1975 when I got my tonsils out, and I'm surprised by how accurate my recollections of the photos were!

After that we crawled down to an EconoLodge near the I 15 I had spotted on the web the day before. We noted some interesting nightspots, but by the time we checked in, I was checked out. We ordered in pizza.

The next day we were up pretty early. I wanted to check out the Temple square area and take pictures. We knew it was going to be beastly hot, so I was eager to get out the door and back to check out at 12. We got a good parking spot on the shady side near the main complex and hit it on foot. I've been there before, in 1981. I took all the tours at that time, so I'm pretty well up on the history of the buildings, etc. I was kind of tempted to retake the visitors center tour with Alex, but I was afraid he'd start muttering aloud. We have a copy of the Book of Mormon, and we've both dipped into it and some other readings, so no need to see the movie.

We walked past the Beehive House and the Lion House, both residences of Brigham Young. It was Sunday morning so Mormons of all ages were streaming past us, to get to the Temple for service. There were perky young Mormon women greeting guests at the gates...they were also diverting guests who were coming to the Tabernacle to hear the choir. The Tabernacle is being retrofitted and the choir now sings across the street in a convention center. They paused to give us literature and asked if we'd been here before. I demurred answering, as I estimate my last visit was before these gals were born.

I took pictures for about an hour before the heat got crazy...I grabbed a free paper and used it as a parasol on the way back to the truck. We packed up and hit the road by 11:30 am, planning to stay the night in Winnemucca, NV.