Adventures in BFE

Last weekend we had a plan to go camping. Head south. Warm up. Dry out. I was dying for a weekend surrounded by saturating heat waves, red rocks, and singing cottonwoods. But alas, the call of sleep and parenthood won over and we stayed home. We had been sleeping for a week on the couch downstairs while trying to get Stella to sleep through the night. Our tiny home that easily housed Calder and me for the last few years now feels like it has been stretched to its limits with the addition of a third person to our family. With Stella just around the corner from our bed, its hard to not wake with her every move or noise. So for several days we moved our bedding, toothbrushes, and pajamas downstairs and didn't venture upstairs after putting her to bed. By Friday (when we were hoping to depart for the trip) she was just starting to get the hang of it and I didn't want to chance relegating those uncomfortable nights downstairs to the "in vain" category by getting her out of her newly developing groove. So, we opted to continue with the "sleep training" a euphemism only parents can understand, and hang around for the weekend. Calder promised to spend a project-free Saturday with me and Stella on a family adventure. The late late arrival of Spring made venturing around our mountain home a snow-ridden prospect so we searched out something downhill and ended up at the Great Salt Lake admiring the work of Robert Smithson in the Spiral Jetty. The lake was picturesque, with wispy cirrus sky slipping to flat salty pools and barely a hiccup at the horizon between the two. The gnats nipped at our necks and ears and the four-wheelers added some undesired character, but it was lovely to see a little more of lake that is the biggest natural landmark around.Bless the bureaucratic souls who set aside public lands in our great nation. Even if our state tax revenues suffer, I find it a privileged to reside among so much open space and wouldn't trade it for cash of any kind.

While in BFE we figured we had to stop at the Golden Spike National Historic Site to see where the railroad finally connected East to West. They have real live replicas of train engines from back in the day that are even coal powered...pretty cool. We missed the May 10th anniversary and a ride in the train by just a couple, but we did get to hear the whistles blow while we were hiking on an old track. Funny how I feel like I know our State so well, yet still have so much land and sites to cover. And with Calder in tow we couldn't drive past Thiokol without stopped to see the rocket display. Calder found a way to get a little projecting in because what would a trip to the valley be without a stop at Smith and Edwards and NPS? (though his favorite stores didn't have the hydrolic rams he was looking for) Stella was a rockstar of a traveler, and luckily hasn't developed the propensity for carsickness as she can face backwards and read at the same time while we bumped along the freeway and over gravel roads. Topped off with a burger and fries at 5 guys, it really turned out to be a really great day.