Utah Here We Come!

IIt's that time again! Time to go to Utah!

We started out by doing some geo caches along the way. There were probably a hundred or so along the freeway between our house and Utah, so we just picked a few.

The first one we did, was near Truckee, still in California. It was through a wildlife underpass under the freeway. Most people don't even know this exists!  We didn't either!

Can you see where the cache was hidden below?

How about now?

 

Our next one was near the hot vernal pool and springs about an hour east of Reno. It was hidden in a pipe that went under the ground, and was guarded by a special creature!

We decided to do one in the thriving metropolis of PuckerBrush. It was attached to the back of the sign with velcro.

Our next stop was off the freeway about 1/2 mile in the middle of nowhere. No towns, no rest stops, nothing. Just an exit to dirt roads. It was in the middle of a field inside this rusty bucket.

 

The kids always look for two things on the way to Utah in Nevada. The tunnel before Elko, and the volcano near Wells.

 

Finally! We see this:

 

We always have to stop at the Salt Flats rest stop. The kids like running up and down the ramp. Of course there was a geo cache here too hidden behind the soda machine. (There were geo's at every rest stop along the way, but we didn't stop at all of them.)

 

The last one we did on the way was the "Tree of Utah" that you may have seen between Wendover and Salt Lake City. It's a "virtual cache" so all you have to do to log it is take a photo of it. In case you were wondering why it's there, here is the story:

The sculptor and artist, Karl Momen, from Sweden, financed and built it himself.  He was driving to California and had a "vision" of a Tree in the middle of the barren desert and salt. He did some research and built it where the crew of the Enola Gay practiced their bombing runs before proceeding on to Hiroshima, and also where members of the ill-fated Donner Party were delayed which caused them to be in the snows over the Sierra's. He built his tree between 1982-1986. It didn't used to have the fence around it, and you could stop and walk up to it.

Once we arrived at Grandma and Grandpa Binghams house, the kids were out playing in the back yard.

 

We miss being so close to the mountains. You forget how close they really are!

 

The two valley's: First Utah Valley, and the 2nd, Salt Lake Valley.

 

We stopped off in Sandy to do a nice cache. At first we saw this box and thought that can't be it. It's too much in the open. But the GPS was pointing to it, and then we noticed the cache ID on the box. Very clever! It is right next to the Auto Mall and all the prizes inside are car related.

 

And then it was off to our most favorite family place to eat!  It is SO YUMMY!!!! 

 

We spent a few days camping also at Cherry Hill near Ogden for a family reunion. Here are some pics from that:

 

 

 

Back at Grandma and Grandpa's, Jacob was teaching the horses how to dunk for apples, and Hannah was having fun running around.

 

We dropped Meghan off to go to EFY at BYU for the week. Her roommate was also named Megan and went on our cruise with us last year. They had a BLAST at EFY!

 

Here is Meghan giving us a tour of her apartment:

 

Quite the Ladies Man - in between two Meg's

Here is one of the dances.  What a shame the dances aren't well attended:

Can you find Meghan? Click to make it bigger:

 

Here is Meghan bowling not so good so the rest of her team would feel better, since she was like a bowl master!

These two boys thought it would be funny on the formal night, to stop off and cool down in the fountain. Their counselor didn't think it was all that funny. They couldn't go home to change and they had to have dinner in their wet clothes!

 

Which one is Meghan? (Hint: she has a white shirt on)

 

Here they are just getting started in the morning:

 

 

 

 

We went to an historic park and they were having activities as the pioneers would have done back in the day.

 

This park was in honor of John Moyle who walked from Alpine with his wooden leg each week to Salt Lake to work on the temple. (Click on the pic to see it larger)

We also were able to attend an African Children's Choir who were very very good!

Here is a video of them singing: It's a LONG video (8 mins) so feel free to use the slider bar to fast forward it.

 

All too quick, it was time to make the return trip back home. Shelley didn't stop for any geo caches along the way, as she was driving the whole way (Doug had come home earlier in the week). Their favorite sign on the way home was this: