Salt Lake City (May 6 -May 13, 2021)
“Great Salt Lake is an ironical joke of nature - water that is itself more desert than a desert” - Dale Morgan
Charley and I are in agreement that Salt Lake City is our favorite big city so far. Maybe it’s because there’s an endless list of things to do, places to shop (we went to IKEA twice!) and things to eat (there’s a chain of restaurants called Chuck-a-Rama. No joke). Perhaps it’s the views of the snowcapped mountains in almost every direction or because they have the coolest library I’ve ever seen. Maybe it’s because there was a Dutch Bros (new favorite coffee shop!!) within walking distance of our site….That’s it, definitely the Dutch Bros.
I do know what it wasn’t though – it definitely wasn’t our campsite. We also agree that this site was our least favorite so far. Mountain Shadows RV Resort is located in Draper Utah, about 15 miles south of the city. Most of its sites are seasonal meaning people live there permanently or reside there long term so the park isn’t really in the business of catering to traveling RVers. The campground was clean enough, we felt safe there and it was surprisingly very quiet but the site we had was very small and difficult to get in and out of. By small I mean we weren’t even able to set our camp chairs out. We had a piece of grassy area that was about 10 feet wide but the kicker is that we had to share it with our neighbor. He was a nice enough guy so at least that wasn’t an issue. We ended up having a long conversation with him shortly after we arrived. He’s an electrician and his company sends him all over the US to various construction job sites. He’s been at that particular site since July of last year. I suppose I shouldn’t complain. He’s had to share his tiny piece of grass with all sorts of people coming and going for several months. Now that I think about it, we’ve stayed at 17 campgrounds so far and most of them have been wonderful. I guess we’re long overdue for a less than stellar one.
We’ve been moving on average every four days but Salt Lake City was the very first location where we set up camp for a whole week. In all honesty, we needed to slow down a bit because our next stop was Grand Teton National Park. We were pressing our luck on weather in the Tetons so we decided to give spring a little extra time to arrive in Wyoming. We had some exciting things happening in Wyoming (did someone say visitors??) and we took the extra time to get organized, stock up on lots of extra groceries, give the camper a good cleaning (did someone say visitors??) and plan for the next exciting chapter of our journey.
There really is a huge list of things to do in Salt Lake City and even though we had a whole week to spend, we couldn’t possibly get through all of it. As with most of the locations we’ve visited, we tried to stick to the types of experiences that we can’t see or do at home or haven’t done on other vacations. In keeping with our M.O., we decided that our first outing would be to visit the various locations of the 2002 Winter Olympic Games in and around the Salt Lake area. Our first stop was Utah Olympic Park located in Park City, about 25 miles east of Salt Lake City. All of the sliding sports were held at this location – ski jumping, bobsled, skeleton, luge, and Nordic combined events. Our $15 pp ticket got us a brief history of the games and the venue plus a shuttle bus ride to the top of the mountain that’s the starting point of the ski events and sled races. After our guided tour, we visited the small but comprehensive 2002 Olympic History Museum where was saw Olympic metals, some of the puppets used in the opening ceremonies, the color-coded uniforms worn by the various Olympic volunteers, and other interesting Olympic memorabilia. Utah Olympic Park still serves as a training facility for Olympic athletes and is also home to one of only two ski jump training pools in the country (the other is in Lake Placid NY). Next, we made a stop at the Utah Olympic Oval located in Kearns, UT sixteen miles to the west of the city. This location is currently in use as a public skating rink, hockey arena, and indoor track but was the location of the speed skating events during the Olympics. It’s also still a training facility for Olympic athletes. As we were exploring downtown Salt Lake City later in the week, we stumbled on the Olympic Legacy Plaza which is home to a wall of honor dedicated to the volunteers who made the 2002 Olympics a reality. Salt Lake City is the United States bid location for the 2030 Winter Olympic Games. I really hope they are successful because I’ll definitely be watching the ski jumping events and yelling “I’ve been there!”
One day as we were headed back to our campsite after an outing, we passed what appeared to be a commuter train station located about a mile away. Charley looked into it and discovered that we could, for $5, get a pass that entitled us to unlimited travel on the UTA public transportation system for a whole day. We know a good bargain when we see one so we got up early the next day (assuming parking at the station would be limited. It wasn’t) caught the next train and headed into Salt Lake City to see the city sights. We started with the Capital building, which, unlike the Texas State Capital, was not in session. Also vastly different from our experience at the Texas State Capital was the security, or lack thereof. We probably encountered 100 armed security in Texas. In Salt Lake, there was one guy at the door who said “Come on in”. No metal detector and he didn’t even check through our bags. Security was probably lax because it was basically a ghost town. I’d be surprised if we encountered a total of five people as we were wandering around, including the security guy. The building itself appeared to be much smaller than the Texas State Capital but every bit as beautiful. We enjoyed wandering around, taking pictures of course, and learning about Utah history via displays that lined the corridors
We spent the rest of our $5 day checking out the Pioneer History Museum (what a collection they had! It was a bit overwhelming), visiting some of the LDS sites (lots of them were closed), checking out the library (most of it was also closed), and making the obligatory coffee stop. Salt Lake City is definitely one that we’ll plan to visit again someday. We were really impressed with its cleanliness, friendly people and of course the public transportation system.
It would be a shame if we were in Salt Lake City and didn’t get to see The Great Salt Lake. In doing a little research we discovered that seeing the lake via Antelope Island State Park was the way to go. It was a bit of a drive but I’m so glad we made the decision to visit because in my opinion Antelope Island rivals any of the National Parks we’ve been to, minus the crowds. While there we saw lots of wildlife – interesting birds, bison, and pronghorns (yes, it’s called Antelope Island but they even admit that’s a misnomer). We hiked to great views of the lake and visited an old ranch. It was a wonderful way to spend the day.
We also managed to squeeze in some additional hiking just outside Draper. Thanks to the recommendation of our campground neighbor we went off the beaten path near the more popular Bridal Veil Falls and hiked the Upper Falls in Provo Canyon. What our neighbor didn’t mention was that the hike was a little more strenuous and technical than what we expected but it was short and we really needed the exercise. If only Dutch Bros “Carmelizer” was calorie-free….
