Salt Lake City

With the colder winter season coming on, our marathon run of road trips every other weekend appears to have come to an end.  The longer I stay in Salt Lake City, though, the more I realize that it's a LOT bigger than I originally thought.

Having grown up in Los Angeles County, there were different mountain chains and rock formations so no matter how high up you got, there was no way you could see from one side of the city to the other.  Even if there weren't those mountains, the curvature of the earth, and--yes--the smog would keep you from being able to see it all.

Salt Lake City is just the opposite.

I live on the East side, closest to the Rockies, and the entire city is on a slight downward slope from east to west.  I felt like the fact that I could see it all sprawling out in front of me from one end to the other as I pass point of the mountain meant that it was finite, unlike my hometown.  ...Perhaps it is finite, but still not humanly innumerable.  I end up staying in my own little part of the city: Cottonwood Heights, Holladay, Murray, and occasionally Sandy.  For my non-Utah friends, that's like Northridge, Granada Hills, and Mission Hills.  Going into Salt Lake City proper happens about as often as you'd go down to Broadway.

Well, a few weeks ago, Dale and I went to worship at the Salt Lake Temple.

We go to the Jordan River Temple every month, even though we're physically closer to the Salt Lake Temple.

The downtown traffic isn't great, but this time we went with a group and they wanted to go here, so here we came.  Dale and I walked around for a little bit afterward, which was the first time I'd ever done that after a temple session, rather than as a part of conference or some BYU date. 

The temple grounds as a part of the city are really gorgeous
and I just couldn't help feeling awed by Salt Lake the same way I had felt awed by Mesa Verde, Yellowstone, or the Lewis and Clark Caverns.

Here's to going on adventures in your own city!  I hope my winter is filled with a lot of them!