We found that the week we spent in Utah two summers ago was one of our favorite. So since we were so close we wanted to go back and visit the northern portion/ Salt Lake City since we totally missed that on our last trip. From Idaho we headed south into Utah. We set up our tent at a KOA north of Salt Lake City and made the relatively short drive into the city. Along the way we saw the restaurant sign for In-N-Out burger and crossed about three lanes of traffic to get there! We didn’t even realize they had expanded to Utah so this was a no-brainer for dinner! John got a double-double with fries and Danielle got the grilled cheese with fries. Amazing! So fresh, they don’t have freezers or microwaves so it is guaranteed to be delicious.
Fueled and hyped up from the surprise dinner locale, we headed into downtown Salt Lake City to Temple Square. We easily found a parking spot and headed into the Square. Founded by Brigham Young and is owned by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS). While you are free to walk around the beautiful and immaculate grounds, accessing all building except for the actual temple itself, we waited a few minutes for a tour. Our tour was lead by Sisters Ko and Wang from the Philippines and Taiwan respectfully. The Assembly hall and the organ were absolutely beautiful and have been there for such a long time and still in regular use. They shared a lot of historical informational about the LDS church, as well as some of their doctrine and beliefs. At the end of the tour they gave John a copy of The Book of Mormon and we got to see a scale model of the inside of the Temple.
Back outside it was just becoming dusk and the temple looked beautiful. We walked around to see Brigham Young’s house before heading back to the car.
We stopped by two local breweries, Salt Lake Brewing Company and Squatters Pub before heading back to the campsite.
The next morning we headed to The Golden Spike National Historical Site. Maybe commonly known as Promontory Point, this was the location of the competition of the Trans-Continental railroad. While the actual Golden Spike is at a museum in Stanford, they have a replica and a pretty neat little museum about the building of the railroad and operation of the railroad during this time. You can walk outside behind this visitor center/museum and stand right on the track and see where the Central Pacific and Union Pacific companies met in 1869.
Heading back on the highway towards Salt Lake City we both agreed we needed to stop at In-N-Out Burger one last time. We ordered basically the same thing (John downgraded to the single cheeseburger since it was lunch), and despite being less than 24 hours since our last visit, this one was even tastier!
Our last stop in our quick trip to Utah was Dinosaur National Monument. While the monument actually spans across the Utah/Colorado border, all of the dinosaur fossils that are viewable by the public are on the Utah side in the fossil quarry. Here you get to see fossils exactly the way they were found. In fact they are still excavating it right before your eyes. I don’t care how old you are, dinosaurs are still the coolest!
A mile or so from the fossil quarry are some nearly 1,000-year-old petroglyphs you can easily see. They are attributed to the Fremont people that lived in this area from about 200 A.D.
While we considered staying at the campground but the sight of an impending storm in the distance kept us driving and we headed into Colorado! Just like our last visit, Utah was full of surprises and we loved all of the culture, religion, and history. Wonder what we will see on our next visit back?!
Dietz Summer Road Trip 