Salt Lake City

Well, the group of four has slit up.  Mel & Dee, Roy & Carol, and Ron & Roberta have headed south to Maob and we are in Ogden in a mobile home & RV park for 2 nights.  We have a bus tour Thursday afternoon and evening of Slat Lake City including the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.  Judy is excited!  Here's our site for 2 nights.

When we set up I had trouble with a rear Big Foot leveler, it went all the way down and would not retract, whatever I tried.

What a pain in the ass.  I called Quadra Manufacturing and we tried several things, none of which worked.  After 2 1/2 hours and swapping the up and the down hydraulic lines (ATF was squirting out all over) twice it finally retracted.  I'm still leary of it's reliability.  We shall see.

A statue in SLC honoring the Pony Express Riders, preferably young teenagers, 120 pounds and orphans.

"This is the place" a quote from Brigham Young, the second Mormon leader, after leading his flock west in the 1830's after religious persecution in the eastern states.  He said he had seen the view from this spot in a vision.

                                                             Brigham's farm home.

Here's the Brigham's "Lions House" named after his nick name "the lion of the Lord".  We had dinner here.  The house was large to accommodate his 51 children and 27 wives.  Smart?  You decide. Me....nope.

Utah state capitol.  A couple decades ago it was refurbished and two large office buildings were added, one for the senators and one for the representatives.  They wanted them made of the same stone as the capitol building but it was not available due to new federal regulations.  What to do?  Well lets imprort it from Italy, it's only the taxpayers money.  So 750 million dollars later Utah had a grand refurbished capitol building and two new office buildings for their representatives and senators. Oh, I should mention they work 45 days a year.

                                  And a couple pictures of the Salt Lake City Mormon Temple.

And here's what Judy really came to see.....................................

There are 360 members of the choir and the process they have to go through to be a member is VERY rigorous.  The choir (and orchestra) are in street clothes as the had a recording session and we were not sure when or even if we would get to see and hear them.  They rehearse Thursday evenings. We both could have spent hours listening to them and watching the antics of the conductor.

Promontory, UT & the Golden Spike Nat'l Park

Today we were up early to have the truck at a Ford dealer in Ogden to check the front brakes and wheels, it's making an intermittent noise.  No problem was found and we were on way home by noon.  We picked Mel & Dee up and traveled the 25 miles to Promontory where the Central Pacific and Union Pacific met in May 1869 connecting the east with the west.

And here's Judy examining the golden spike.....well.....a replica.  The real one came from a private individual (Leland Stanford....the same as Stanford University) so it's on display in California.

Competition existed between the two crews and as they were nearing Promontory on day the Central Pacific laid a record 10 miles of track in one day winning a $10,000 bet and this sign commemorated the event.

Here's the Jupiter, a replica of the Central Pacific's original; in the summer they also run replica engine 119 of the Union Pacific nose to nose.

 

                                  As you can see here Promontory is in the middle of nowhere.

                                     And here's where they met and the last spike was driven.

                           The middle of nowhere also had one more thing a couple miles away...............

                               some rockets at Morton Thiokol where rocket fuel is manufactured.

After returning home we visited a Mormon tabernacle in Brigham City.  The inside was kind of plain.

Across the street was a Mormon temple, much larger.  We went inside but only a few Mormons approved by their leaders are allowed inside.  The temples support several congregations where the tabernacle supports one as I understand.  Above is the side and below the front view.

Brigham City, Utah

One last picture of Arco, ID.  If you click on it and enlarge the picture of mountain you will see lots of numbers painted on it.  This was done by the local high school graduating classes. The oldest we saw was 1922.

                                                           Here's a closer look.

We noticed that the country now has much more farming and is much greener.  The trees are turning red also.

                                               Our site in Brigham, UT for a couple days.

Craters of the Moon National Park

        Isn't this a beautiful National Park?  Don't you just want to climb up that magnificent black hill?

                                                    That's Roy coming down the path.

                               Roberta checking out the natural beauty of Craters of the Moon.

 

The fearsome four.  Ron, Judy, Carol & Roy.  They went for a cave (really a lava tube) tour but when Judy saw the uneven entrance she dropped out rather than place her new hips at risk.
The 800 acre park was formed about 15,000 years when volcano(s) erupted here and lava flowed.  When the eruptions stopped the lava hardened and formed this National Park.  I imagine that when it was named decades ago man had not yet been to the moon so someone assumes the moon must look like this place. To me, Craters of Hell better describes the area, it is so depressing.  

Off to Idaho!

It was only 197 miles to Arco, ID but it was the most challenging to date mountain tow for our new F350 and boy is that a great truck!  It started with a 7 mile 6% uphill grade with some switchbacks. No problem, we cruised up at 40 and 50 mph and even after a 20 mph switchback we accelerated back up to 40 effortlessly.  The pass was only 6000 feet and going down was just as easy.  Shift into M (manual) and select 3rd gear and we coasted down at 30 mph.  Judy took a downhill picture of the road on the GPS.  The second pass was over 7000 fett and a piece of cake.

    

                                               This is probably someones dream home!

Judy and I both were wondering where the road went, looked like it disappeared into a mountain.  It was niffy, a narrow path between tall cliffs.

                                         Taking a break to stretch our legs on top of a pass.

                                                                The road ahead.

               We stopped at some of the Idaho roadside historical markers and found this one interesting.

We arrived early in the afternoon and the other 3 came in an hour latter, they always stop for lunch which we usually don't.  Here's home for the next 2 days.  The campground also has a small restaurant so we all had a very good BBQ rib dinner.  Judy and I agree that today was probably the most impressive sightseeing day we have had since we started.  The pictures do not do it justice.

Big Hole National Battlefield

It must have been a cold night, our water line was froze this morning with ice cycles on the spigot. We had water in our fresh water tank so I just opened a valve and turned on the pump so we could shower.  Rather than rush to visit the battlefield after we arrived in Sula we decided to stay a second day and have more time to relax and visit the battlefield on Friday.  It was a 25 mile drive to the national park. But first we all had a hearty breakfast at the campgrounds restaurant.

Here's the gang (Carol, Roy, Roberta, Ron, Dee, Mel & Judy) outside the visitor center. 

If you enlarge this picture you can read about the 1877 battle between to Calvary and Nez Perce Indians.  There had been a running battle between the two, the Nez Perce hoped the fighting was over and set up their camp here as they had done for generations.  The Army launched a pre dawn attack on August 9 killing between 60 and 90 Nez Perce men, women & children but suffered 31 killed and 39 wounded when the Indian braves rallied and fought back.

We watched a 20 minute video and the deck behind the visitor center was an excellent vantage point overlooking the entire scene where the army had their cannon snuck up on the Indians camp and the Indians rallied to fight back while the remaining women and children escaped down the valley.  The park is out in a desolate area of southern Montana.

Sula, MT & Big Hole Nat'l Battlefield

We had planned to leave Kalispell, MT on Wednesday but the weather forecast wasn't real good so we all holed up in our HitchHikers Wednesday to wait out the cold rain and wind.

Here's the last look at the Flathead River as we were getting ready to pull out of the campground in Kalispell.  low mist near the ground and low clouds obscuring the mountain tops.

As you can see the day turned out to be real nice for a 200 mile tow to Sula, MT just north of the ID line.

Ron went upstream from the campground to try his luck which wasn't so good, the fish won, he lost.

Dee decided to just walk behind the campground and had better luck, This one was a keeper but as she reached for it it got off the hook.
We arrived early in the afternoon so there was lots of time to relax, fish, soak up some sun and have a campfire.