Here we are, on the road: We’re in Tooele, Utah

Sunday, September 4, 2011 Lorraine’s report

Hello from Salt Lake City, UT, more specifically Tooele, UT, (pronounced Twowilla). We arrived here on Thursday about noon. We have been having a terrific time with friends, Katie and Joe and their two young sons, who happen to live here. They have been kind enough to be our tour guides, and are full of information on the area; it’s great!

This past week found us meandering our way from Huntington, OR last Saturday to Elko, Nevada last Sunday. We hadn’t planned on driving quite so far; but we stopped by the RV Park we were going to, and found it to be extremely close to the railroad tracks, with not much in that little town to do. We made the decision to head to Elko; especially since we hadn’t been there before. We drove from 9:45am until 5 pm; I think we were in Mountain Time and went back to Pacific Time there in Nevada. It was a scenic drive, not too much traffic, and the roads weren’t awful, and the weather was beautiful.

In Elko we stayed at the Iron Horse RV Park, a very nice park, voted the Number One RV Park for 2010 in Nevada. We arrived and got our space, Chuck went to unhook the car and it wouldn’t start. He had to call Coach Net and they came and got him started, still don’t know why it wouldn’t start.

The next day found us headed out to Lamoille Canyon in the Ruby Mountains to view the beautiful rock formations. The gal in the RV Park office said it was not to be missed; I have to say it was well worth the drive. The only thing we noticed was that we went up to around 8000 feet and found it a bit hard to breathe the thin air. We finished our tour and stopped by the Red Lion Casino for some gaming time.

Tuesday found us headed into Elko to visit the Nevada Museum of the Northeast. The museum was nice, full of information about the Elko area. We went by the Stockman Casino for an hour or so of gaming.

After letting Misty out, we went back and found The Star Hotel which was home to the Basque Steak House Restaurant. A friend of Chuck’s said it was a good place to eat and shouldn’t be missed. He was right.

When you sat down, they immediately brought you a bowl of cabbage soup and fresh baked bread and butter. That was before they even took your order for drinks. We each ordered a steak, and it came with fresh roasted garlic on top of the steak. They brought you a big bowl of salad, spaghetti, baked beans, and green beans. It was served family style, and there way no way you could eat all of it. We ended up bringing home enough for another meal.

I enjoyed the Elko area, although I was disappointed with the casinos they had there. I remember people talking of flying into Elko for the gaming; there are only 4-5 casinos and they aren’t big at all, I guess I was expecting more like Reno with the tall buildings.

We were on the road the next day heading to Wendover, NV right on the border of Nevada/Utah. We pulled into the Nugget Casino RV Park and went in to pay. We played there at the Nugget; went on to the Montego Bay Casino and had dinner there, and finished up at the Peppermill Casino. It was fun to play the new games at these casinos.

The next day found us driving through the Salt flats in Utah. There were miles and miles of white salt fields everywhere, then like a flash they stopped, and we were back in the grass and trees. Our destination was Tooele, UT, the Vorwaller Homestead and RV Park, which is a short ways out of Salt Lake City. We pulled in around noon and set up the rig.

I called Katie; she was our daughter, Susy’s good friend from Rainbow Girls in Ferndale. She is married to Joe, and they have two boys, Jared, age 5 and Lance, age 3. She came right over to see us, her home being only a mile or so away. She told us a whole lot about this area.

She happened to mention that the Mormon Tabernacle Choir had practice that evening and the practice was open to the public. I told her I would love to see the Choir, that I had loved their Christmas programs I had heard from when I was young girl living in Alaska. She said we could do that, so we picked up Jared from Kindergarten and headed into Salt Lake City. She called Joe and we met up for dinner at The Crown Burger Restaurant. While waiting for him she drove us by the capital building and drove us around Temple Square. After dinner we parked and the 6 of us headed out to tour Temple Square.

First stop was the Conference Center. We had a tour guide take us through this huge building; it seats 21,000 people, has a water fall cascading down the south side of the building, and the four acre roof is planted with flowers, trees and one type of tree, Bristle Cone Pine tree, that has been around this area at least 4000 years.

This building is full of original pieces of all kind of art. The inside is a football field’s length from the stage to the top floor; there are two huge screens, one on each side of the stage, to project the program, so the very top row can see what is happening down below on the stage.

We went into the Tabernacle and the North Visitor’s Center; only practicing Mormon Church members are allowed into the Salt Lake Temple. It was after 6:30 when we started sightseeing and I wanted to see the choir rehearsal at 8, so we hurried through these buildings.

Seeing the Mormon Tabernacle Choir was on my bucket list, and I was not disappointed!!! It was all I dreamed it would be, and the only thing that would have made it better was to hear the Choir sing “O Holy Night” like I heard when I was a young girl; that song is what makes it Christmas for me! What a great evening, full of wondrous sights and sounds.

Friday found Chuck replacing the electrical wiring coming into the rig. He found a burned wire, called for an electrician, the guy couldn’t make it out here from south of Salt Lake City for several hours, so he started on it himself. He was able to complete the rewire, but his knees suffered from him being on them for over 4 hours.

Katie came over after she dropped Jared at school at 12:45 and she and I went to run errands. We were home in time to pick Jared back up at 3:15. Chuck was able to rest up a bit, so we headed over to dinner with Katie & Joe.

After a nice early dinner, we all headed out to tour the Kennecott Utah Copper Bingham Canyon Mine, the largest open hole-pit copper mine in the world. It is impressive, and you can see this mine from space. The mine started in 1903, is more than three quarters of a mile deep and over two and a half miles wide. The mine has produced more than 19 million tons of copper, as well as vast quantities of gold, silver and molybdenum. The mine was designated as a National Historic Landmark in 1966 by the US Dept. of Interior and in 1972 by the National Park Service.

As the sun was setting over the hills, the light playing on this man made miracle was unforgettable. WOW!

Plans were made to leave Saturday morning by 9:30 to go to see a herd of Bison on Antelope Island in the Great Salt Lake. We enjoyed a nice drive with Katie, Joe and boys and were delighted when we came upon the buffalo resting by the shore. There were over a hundred head all enjoying a warm hazy day there by the lake. I was fortunate enough to put my feet into the Great Salt Lake; it was cold, slimy and had tons of sand fleas hopping all over the place-I didn’t like that part.

Chuck took us to lunch/early dinner at the Cracker Barrel, it was Katie’s first visit there, and she liked it.

What a great time with good friends we have been having here in Salt Lake City area. There is so much to see and do, I’m not sure if we will be able to do it all. I have enjoyed all of it very much.

Happy Birthday to Alicia, Craig’s wife, a Happy 50^th Birthday, Craig is Chuck’s brother.

Until next time….

Lorraine

9/4/11 Chuck’s report

We’re back in the tourist zone once again, busy seeing and exploring. We’ve had a very good week and marking things off our bucket list we had wanted to see/explore.

Last Sunday found us on the road, our planned stop was to be in Idaho but when we got to the park, we decided we didn’t like the location or sites so we made the decision to continue on to Elko, NV., a place we’ve never been before. We knew we would want to stay more than one night as we’ve been on the road for three days in a row now, more than our normal mode of traveling.

Lorraine was checking out parks via our GPS and the phone and finally decided we should try Iron Horse Park. We saw a couple others along the road and they didn’t look like much from the road so our hopes weren’t too high about our planned stop. We found the park, turned off the road and went down a long hill to the check in office, what a nice looking park. Long spaces, not too crowded and laid out very nice. We parked in front of the office and went to check in. While Lorraine finished checking in, I went out to disconnect the car so we could get into our back-in spot.

I don’t know what I did wrong but after unhooking the car, I couldn’t get the ignition key to turn or get any power to anything. There it sat, in the road, locked in gear and no way to drive or tow it out of the way. So we just told the gal in the office we would get it moved as soon as possible, called our roadside service and continued to set up the motorhome. I got a call back from our roadside service saying that help was on the way and should be there in about 15 minutes.

Sure enough, in just 15 minutes there was the tow truck. After discussing our problem, we decided to hook up his jumper cables and give the battery a boost, even though it showed to be fully charged. Once the cables were hooked up, we immediately got power restored and everything worked as it should, must have been a relay stuck or something, I need to talk to a mechanic sometime to see what he says. But good news, we got the motorhome set up and everything has been fine with the car since.

Monday morning we decided to do a bit of exploring around the area. The gal when we checked in told Lorraine that a place to not be missed was a drive through Lamoille Canyon just a bit out of town. So off we took, trusting our GPS to get us there. The drive up and through the canyon was very scenic with lots of pull offs to see the views. But we had started about 5600’ elevation in Elko and soon the altimeter was showing us to be above 8000’. Both of us were having trouble catching our breath, guess all the years of smoking didn’t help me at all. I know I wouldn’t have been able to do any walking or climbing at that altitude, it was hard enough just sitting in the air conditioned car. Boy it’s hell to get old!!

Once we got finished with the drive though the canyon, we drove though the little town of Lamoille, not much to see but looked like a nice small town none the less. Afterwards, we stopped by the coach to take Misty out for a walk then we drove around to see the town of Elko. Elko is a nice town, lots of businesses but with all the road construction on the main drive in town, it made it hard to sight see. We did see a museum that we marked as something we would stop and see later. We made our stop at one of the casinos, Lorraine had some good luck, not so for me. It wasn’t too long before I suggested we call it a night and head back to our rig so we called it a day.

Tuesday I did some investigating of the altitude in there areas we were planning on seeing during the rest of our stay in Utah. Seems some of them are pretty high so we will probably be modifying our travel plans a bit. I also called friend Dave who had just gone through some of these areas for his recommendations and experiences. We haven’t changed any plans yet but we are prepared to make quick changes if needed. We are at ~4500’ here in the Salt Lake Area and somewhat getting acclimated to the somewhat higher altitude and are hoping it will help us as we move to higher areas in the next couple of weeks. Keep sending good thoughts our way.

After I spent some time with that and Lorraine finished some laundry, we made our way to the museum we had seen the day before. It had lots of exhibits but some weren’t what I expected from a museum here in the Old West. There was a very good section on some history of the area, a very large exhibition of guns and pistols. What I didn’t expect to see was a large, nicely laid out section of stuffed animals from around the world. Sure there were animals from the local area but I didn’t expect to see the lions, tigers, elephants and such. It was nice, but sort of out of place in my mind. But we did enjoy the museum as a whole and would recommend it to anyone who stops by the area.

Later, of course, we had to try our luck at the casinos again. This time I won but Lorraine left some seed money for us to pick up next time we are in the area. Lorraine was planning on frying some chicken for dinner but a friend of mine from work had read our blog and saw where we were in Elko and suggested we eat Basque. After a check on the internet, I found out more about it and found a good place to try it. Not sure how to explain but basically they are an ethnic group who were the sheepherders in the Old West and they had established some restaurants since. So we decided to give it a try, based on Tom’s recommendation. It isn’t often that I will turn down a chance to have Lorraine’s fried chicken so this had better be good, Tom.

We found the place, it was the dining room inside the Star Hotel. Didn’t look like much from the outside and once inside looked like family dining with long tables for 10 or so. The hostess took us to our table and before we really got settled into our chair, the waitress dropped off the menus, a large bowl of cabbage soup and a loaf of bread. She took our drink order then came back later for our food order. Both of us ordered a steak dinner and she soon brought out bowls of spaghetti, green salad, green beans and baked beans. The other gal was carrying the plates with our steak and potato, lots of food for two people for sure. They do use lots of garlic in their food, it wasn’t overpowering or anything, just saying. And yes Tom, I enjoyed it and we will have Lorraine’s chicken sometime later, thanks for the suggestion.

Next morning we continued on to another new spot for us, Wendover, NV. This town is right on the border of NV. and Utah, once again about 5200’ for us. We only planned to stay for one night so we got set up, went to the casino to pay and tried our luck on the slots for a bit. All I can say is I know Joe/Alice will be through here either late this month or early next month and we ask them to pick up the money we left here and bring it back to us. Thanks Joe, will get it from you next time we see you.

Thursday we were on the road once again, this time with Tooele, UT as our destination. Joe and Katie, friends we’ve know for years from back home, moved here about 4 years ago and offered to be our tour guide if we stopped by to see them. Seeing as how we’ve only driven through the area, never stopped and explored it, we took them up on their kind offer. I found a RV park in the area that sounded ok on their web site and we had made reservations thought this holiday weekend. We got setup and Lorraine called Katie to let her know we were here, it appears she had driven by already and didn’t know our rig or that we had South Dakota licenses on the car and motorhome, she was looking for someone from Washington so she drove right past us, ha.

But she soon stopped by with one of their sons, three year old Lance with her. After a short visit, we decided to head into Salt Lake City for a quick tour before Joe got off work and then meet with him for dinner and more touring. We stopped by their house for a short while, picked up their other son, Jared from kindergarten and took off. We made one quick stop at a place alongside The Great Salt Lake then toured downtown a bit. We drove by the capital building and Temple Square where lots of the Mormon building are located. They have their Temple here, the Tabernacle, family history library, visitors’ center, conference center and many more. I believe we could go into all except for the Temple as it was reserved for members of the Church only.

We met with Joe and decided to have a quick bite to eat before we toured some of the building. We had a very good tour though the Conference center, where the Choir was scheduled to have a practice session later, at 8:00 that night. We then crossed the street and went to the visitors’ center, walked through the park, toured the Tabernacle and just enjoyed the whole experience. What a neat place to see and explore, we could have spent days there. But we had to see the Choir practice!! So back across the street and into the Conference Center Theater hall. This place is 365’ from the back of the top balcony to the front of the stage, over the length of a football field. There are no posts or columns holding up the balconies, they are cantilevered over the seating area below with no visible means of support. Quite a building, over 1,400,000 square feet in the whole building with lots of painting and exhibits. This is a must stop if you are ever in the area and remember, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir has a practice session every Thursday throughout the summer.

So after a full day, we headed back to Tooele with plans for more exploring in the following day. Friday Joe had to work and we were going to spend some time with Katie and the boys. When we set up here, I had felt our electrical transfer box and it was warmer than normal so I wanted to check out the wiring in it. This is the 120 volt power to our coach and I knew it could cause a fire if there was something wrong. Once I opened the panel, I could see where one of the incoming wires had been hot enough to scorch/burn the insulation off. Sure enough, it was very loose inside the buss bar. I made a quick trip to Home Depot to pick up some replacement cable and proceeded to make some working room in that compartment. I had to remove the cord reel and all the other electrical stuff I had in there just to be able to see what I was doing. Long story short, about four hours later I had everything back and working as before and all the connections were tight once again. Sure glad I checked it when I did as it could have started a fire and these things burn down to nothing pretty quick, whew.

While I was working on this, Katie, Lance and Lorraine did some shopping in the area. After I finished, I had to take some aspirin and rest my aching knees until we went over to Joe/Katie’s house for dinner after Joe got home from work. Katie fixed up a nice taco salad dinner for us then we decided to make a tour of the Kennecott Mine a few miles from here. This is the largest open pit mine in the world, I believe, more than 2 1/2 miles across and over 3/4 mile deep, a huge hole in the ground. They have some of the largest earth moving equipment and trucks that operate day and night. They have gotten more than 19,000,000 tons of copper out of this mine, most of it was in ore that had 1% copper in it. They also have gotten lots of gold, silver and molybdenum. They donated all the gold, silver, zinc and bronze used to make all the medals for the Olympics games in 2002. This is a big operations and very interesting. I don’t think they have actual tours but the visitor’s center is full of lots of information, exhibits and such. We were there in time to catch the different shades of colors as the sun was setting, a pretty neat sight.

Saturday morning was no exception to our busy week here, we were off to see Antelope Island, the biggest of the 10 islands in The Great Salt Lake and the only one accessible by auto. This is a big island over 12 miles long and is pretty much just like it was when the pilgrims first saw it. There are over 600 bison in the herd started here with 12 imported years ago. They have a bison roundup every fall that would be nice to experience but we won’t be here. While on the island, Lorraine was able to get her foot wet from another body of water, I’m sure a picture will follow at the end of this blog.

After our tour of Antelope Island, we headed out to one of our favorite chain food place, Cracker Barrel, for late lunch/early dinner. Once again we came away satisfied, both with the good food and service but also with the good company of our friends. We decided we would meet over at Joe/Katie’s house after a little rest, we’ve been on the go and wanted a bit of rest.

We had a great visit once again at their house before calling it a night after making plans for the next couple of days. We sure thank Joe and Katie for their company and expert tour guiding for us. It’s sure nice to be able to explore an area with local tour guides, we had some good ones here.

The weather has been just short of fabulous here in the mountains. We just missed the stretch of hot weather, the highs have been in the low 90s with low humidity during the afternoon, getting down to the mid 60s at night. Like I said earlier, I think we are getting used to the higher altitude but we haven’t been doing a lot of anything except walking. Sure hope we are able to continue our planned tour of the Southern parts of this great state of Utah with no breathing problems.

Our plans are to stay here until Wednesday when we head to the Southeastern portion of the state to see the Arches in and around Moab. We will be in that area for week before moving on once again. Sure good to be back on the road.

And now to pick through the 500 pictures Lorraine took this week and get some posted in here. I’m sure there will be lots but we’ve sure seen lots too.

Ruby Mountains, outside Elko, NV

Driving Lamoille Canyon in the Ruby Mountains.

That’s a beaver dam on the left. Pretty high up at this point, almost 8900 Ft.

Inside the museum at Elko, Nv.

Part of the drive from Elko to Wendover. Our first view of the Salt Flats.

Tooele, about 35 miles from Salt Lake City. That’s Joe, Katie, Lorraine and Chuck in the back, Jared and Lance in the front row.

Our first view of The Great Salt Lake. Buildings in Salt Lake City and Temple Square.

Inside the Conference Center.

The largest theater in the world in terms of seating, 21,000 people can be seated here. That’s the pipe organ in front, behind where the Choir sits.

More from inside the Conference Building.

Our tour guide for the Conference building tour.

Back at the Conference Building, that’s the Mormon Tabernacle Choir practicing, we got to watch/listen for awhile. There are 350 people in the Choir and they can only be in it for 20 years. Some of them travel from as far away as Wyoming at least twice a week to be in the Choir.

The Salt Lake Mormon’s Temple, lit up at night. We couldn’t go inside as we aren’t members of the Church Of LDS.

Really enjoyed the paintings though out the different buildings.

Kennecott open pit copper mine.

At Antelope Island.

Yep, that’s Lorraine putting her feet in The Great Salt Lake. I’ve never seen so many sand fleas as there was in this area, it was like a giant swarm that flew away as you walked amongst them.