Entries about donut falls

We had accomplished an amazing amount in our one full day in Salt Lake City, especially considering that the temperature had been hovering around a hundred degrees most of the afternoon. The one thing on my list we hadn't done was the hike to Donut Falls in the Uinta-Wasatch-Cache National Forest to the east of the city. It was reportedly an easy hike but we had to get it done early ahead of the three-digit temperatures that were once again being projected by early afternoon. We did a good job of slamming cereal into the kids and sweeping our belongings into the car and were on the road by eight. Big Cottonwood Canyon Road was a scenic drive through lush hillsides carpeted with aspen and maple trees in every shade of green.

The legal parking around the trailhead was full when we arrived. Rather than turning around and parking a quarter mile away we parked just outside the marker and hoped for the best. We weren't obstructing the flow of cars at least. There was a healthy stream of people heading towards the beginning of the trail, and some already returning, but it wasn't crowded or noisy. The first part of the walk was along a dirt and gravel path though a forested area that eventually ended in a short clamber down to a stream. Here we had to pick our way along the rocks that lay in the stream bed to avoid soaking our hiking boots. Fairly soon we came upon the waterfall, which wasn't very impressive from ground level. The adventurous part of the hike is the scramble up the boulders to the top of the falls where the water passes through a circular hole in a stone cave, which is the reason for the name of Donut Falls. I knew from my research that the locals sometimes said the name of the waterfall should be "Do Not Falls" because of the slippery, movable boulders and there had been more than one fatality among climbers in the past. Cleo wanted to try the climb but I vetoed the idea and we returned to the car, which was thankfully unticketed and untowed.

More than 80% of Utah's three million people live in the Wasatch Front corridor that includes Salt Lake City, Ogden, and Provo. Provo had been along our route from Moab and I had originally considered spending a night there, an idea that I eventually rejected after I was unable to find a single distinctive sight in the city. There was a hike to Bridal Veil Falls, a soap-making workshop for kids, and that was about it. We decided to have an early lunch at Provo's solitary food hall, which turned out to be a pretty basic place with fast food type items like burgers and fried chicken. The kids were fine with the chicken while Mei Ling and I had some pretty good Mexican food from Jurassic Taco so it wasn't really a disappointment.

From downtown Provo the mountains to the east looked close enough to touch, which fascinated us since our home state of Florida is flat as a pancake. We decided to drive eastward along the residential streets as far as we could to see what happened when we reached the mountains. Sure enough the orderly blocks ended abruptly and a winding road ascended the hillside past some impressive mansions. Eventually this road ended at a blind loop from which we could see over much of the city.

We could easily have left Provo at this point without seeing anything further but good luck took us through the center of town where we could see that a major road had been closed off and beyond that was what appeared to be a street festival. We found a place to park and walked past the barriers into a huge and energetic party which covered several city blocks. There were tons of food trucks, frozen drinks, crafts, live music, and even an axe throwing competition. Mei Ling was brave enough to try the axes but she couldn't figure out how to get them to stick in the target.

Our walk through the festival brought us to the center of downtown Provo where there were some beautiful and classical buildings like the Provo Historic Courthouse and the Provo City Center Utah Temple. The temple is a Gothic Revival rebuild of the 19th century Provo Tabernacle which was destroyed by fire in 2010. Next to the temple is a sleek black modern skyscraper that is the headquarters of the Nu Skin cosmetics company.

By now we were just a block away from the Soap Factory so we decided to let the kids give it a shot. We walked up a narrow staircase to a rather stale office suite which ironically had rather dirty white walls. A teenaged attendant took us through the process of selecting molds and then helped the kids mix their colors and scents into melted soap. They picked the most overpowering, unpleasant scents that seemed to be available and dutifully completed the activity. It seemed like the kids were having fun but for us it was a rather painful experience enduring the heavy air and the noxious aromas. Eventually we were handed a paper bag with the completed soap bars which joined the petrified wood in the spare tire compartment as soon as we got back to the SUV.

By the time we were finished having fun in Provo the idea of going to Bridal Veil Falls had lost most of its appeal. We'd already done one waterfall hike that day and it was getting on into the afternoon. Instead I decided we'd get back on the southern route and spend some time on a section of highway called the Nebo Loop which had the reputation of being one of the most scenic roads in Utah. The mistake I made was assuming that the Nebo Loop was a loop, meaning that it would start and finish at the same point. With that assumption in mind I plugged it into Google Maps and drove forty minutes from Provo to Nephi along the most boring stretch of interstate one could imagine. It wasn't until I took a closer look at the map in Nephi that I realized the "loop" was a winding north-south road from Payson to Nephi through the Wasatch Forest. We'd missed it entirely and taken the highway to the southern end. That was extremely frustrating but I had no one to blame except myself and whoever had made the decision to call the road a loop when it was certainly not a loop. We decided to make the best of it and drive back north along the Nebo Loop until we grew tired of it, knowing we would eventually have to return the same way we had come. The first part of the drive along the single lane road was a pleasant change from the interstate with colorful landscape features such as grey fins protruding from the hillsides.

After about ten minutes we began a steep, winding ascent into the mountains which soon brought us up to about seven thousand feet. The views over the greenery and the mountain peaks were so stunning we had to pull over at every turn-off to admire them. Some mountains still had patches of snow at the upper reaches.

We decided to end our drive at Devil's Kitchen, a steep hillside with a cluster of sandstone hoodoos that would be a preview for the amazing vistas we would later experience at Bryce Canyon. A short paved trail from the parking area led to a viewing platform from which we could closely evaluate nature's excellent handiwork. Afterwards we undertook the ear-popping descent back to Nephi.

I'm pretty sure we didn't miss anything between Nephi and Joseph, the town where we were staying. This was serious small town America, just a string of tiny burgs along the interstate none of which held more than a few thousand people. I had a short list of restaurants to stop at for dinner but none of them turned out to be open on the Independence Day holiday, even the ones that had Monday hours. We had to overshoot Joseph and drive another twenty minutes to Marysvale just to eat at a motel diner that had predictably awful fast food. The only thing memorable about that meal was when a teenaged waitress came over to our table to inform Mei Ling that she was "absolutely the most beautiful woman I've ever seen". All of us froze with forks halfway lifted to our mouths before Mei Ling could summon her wits and thank the girl. I'm not going to disagree with her assessment but Mei Ling hasn't gotten attention on that level since we participated in Carnival in Trinidad. I'm guessing that not many Asian women pass through Marysvale, Utah but I could be wrong.

Joseph made Marysvale seem like a booming metropolis. There was a three by five grid of residential blocks with houses scattered sparsely among fields and empty lots. Our Airbnb was deserving of its high rating as it was spacious and renovated with modern appliances. The only bummer was the absence of central air on the upper floor, which I partially remediated with a floor fan. There were no grocery stores in either Marysvale or Joseph, so we had to do a little research and came upon one in the town of Monroe a few miles to the east. This town had a more upscale residential section but didn't seem much less boring than the other two. The supermarket was thankfully open and we were able to stock up on snacks and breakfast food for the next morning. When we got back to the Airbnb the porch light was on across the street and we could see some people sitting in rocking chairs watching us. As we piled out of the car their low conversation stopped and I wondered if the most interesting thing that ever happened on that block was the comings and goings of travelers who stayed at the Airbnb.

I didn't decide to stay in Joseph for the exciting nightlife. The next morning we fed the kids in the house and then drove back south to a place called Big Rock Candy Mountain, where I had arranged another rafting trip. The colorful mountain doesn't look much like rock candy and originally was named as a joke after a popular song in the 1920's. This would be a slightly more adventurous experience than the float we had done in Moab, but still just class II at its roughest. We would also have our own oars to paddle with. Our cheerful rafting guide told us that one of the goals of the trip was to avoid getting "summer teeth". Summer teeth are the result of forgetting to keep one hand on the pommel of the oar at all times, resulting in the hard pommel crashing into the rower's mouth during rough waters. After that, sum'yer teeth will still be in your mouth and some will be in the raft. The kids thought that was hilarious. We had a good two hour trip with some swimming, and the rapids were just strong enough to toss the kids around the raft without ever putting us in any real danger. They all kept their teeth but Cleo did draw blood from her lip at one point after falling on her face in the raft. She wasn't too happy about it but I told her the blood in her mouth was "the taste of adventure" and she could tell all her friends about getting summer lips.

Close by the rafting spot was a gravel lot with a colorful assortment of decommissioned train cars that seemed to have been converted into housing. We found out that it's a lodging called Caboose Village that I hadn't come across at all while researching accommodation in the area. Perhaps they get booked up well in advance in the summer. I think if one of the larger ones had been available it probably would have been a better choice than the house in Joseph.

We had a scenic drive down to Panguitch along a one lane highway surrounded by open fields that were often filled with grazing cows. About halfway to our destination we stopped at the wood cabin which was the childhood home of Robert Parker, later to become known as the famous outlaw Butch Cassidy. It was a pretty basic place and not worth going out of the way for, but still probably the most important historical site in that part of Utah. We had a typically crummy rural Utah lunch in a cow town called Circleville and began the final push to Panguitch in the early afternoon.

The only stop we made between Moab and Salt Lake City was the small town of Price, which was the setting for the Great Brain books. This was one of my favorite series as a child and I bought them anew for Cleo and Ian who loved them as much as I did. The books tell the story of an early twentieth century family in Utah whose middle son is a prodigal if unethical mastermind. The books were popular but never to the extent that there would have been a museum or some tourist attraction in the author's home town to commemorate them. The modern town of Price was pleasant enough, surrounded on every side by low mountains that could be seen from every intersection, but bore no resemblance whatsoever to the bucolic frontier town described by Fitzgerald. We drove around for a little while to get the feel of a typical Utah town and then got back onto the highway.

By the time we rolled into Salt Lake City our stomachs were growling and it was clear our first stop had to be dinner. Salt Lake City had one food hall and since we didn't want to call around to find an open table on a Saturday evening that seemed to be our best bet. The HallPass food hall was located in a vibrant open-air mall called The Gateway and fortunately for us we emerged from the parking garage on the opposite side from our destination. That took us through the center of the mall underneath a beautiful installation of colorful umbrellas suspended overhead, where we passed a Japanese hot pot called Mr. Shabu. We spontaneously decided this would be a better bet than anything we were likely to find at the food hall. There was some whispered discussion regarding our lack of a reservation before we were shown to one of the few open tables in the large restaurant. We loaded up at the well-stocked food station and gorged ourselves for the next hour. We hadn't realized how much we'd missed authentic Asian food over the last three weeks. On the way out there was a long line for tables, so clearly we'd made it just under the wire. We did check out HallPass and it seemed to be a rather weak version of a food hall, with a layout resembling a sports bar and mostly generic greasy food. Afterwards we went to the upper level which had some recreational spots and nice views of the surroundings.

Our Airbnb was in a quiet residential neighborhood south of the city center. There was a surprising number of rainbow flags displayed on front porches, including our own. I later learned that despite its conservative reputation, Salt Lake City has one of the highest percentage of gay residents among major US cities. Perhaps that's because gay people throughout Utah gravitate towards the largest city. Our place was the basement of a rather generic-looking home with an attractive garden and a private entry. Despite the subterranean location our space was bright and cheerful and the kids made themselves at home promptly.

On Sunday morning, which also happened to be Independence Day, we went straight to the Wheeler Sunday Market at Wheeler Farm in the southern part of town. The farmers market section was pretty good, on a par with the markets in Flagstaff and Santa Fe we'd visited the previous two weeks, and there was an excellent crafts market and an enormous play structure. The kids climbed around in the playground and occasionally wandered over to us for bites of the food we'd collected from the various booths and trucks. Afterwards we checked out some creative artwork which included a potter throwing vessels right at his booth.

The centerpiece of Salt Lake City is Temple Square, a ten acre rectangle that was selected by Mormon prophet Brigham Young upon the group's arrival in the Salt Lake Valley in 1847. Within the site are the majestic Salt Lake Temple and numerous other architecturally impressive buildings that are central to the processes of the Mormon church. The area is somewhat reminiscent of the Vatican City on a smaller scale. On the day of our visit virtually everything worked against us being able to see the interiors of these buildings. It was a Sunday, many activities were still curtailed because of the COVID epidemic, and the square was in the midst of an enormous renovation project that had begun in 2019 and is not projected to be complete until 2025. We still had an enjoyable walk through the square and could appreciate the beautiful grey stone and white spires of the Assembly Hall and the glistening aluminum roof of the remarkable Mormon Tabernacle. Unfortunately the Temple itself was covered in scaffolding and surrounded by a dirty Plexiglas barrier, so that the only decent view could be obtained from across the street.

The Utah State Capitol, a few blocks north of Temple Square, is a typical American Neoclassical capitol building in the model of the United States Capitol. We'd already visited similar buildings in Wisconsin and Colorado and chose to just drive by as we only had one day in Salt Lake City. We then fortuitously stumbled onto the single road that leads up to Ensign Downs, a small residential enclave filled with large, stately homes that look down over the city. A hiking trail leads from the hillside to the summit of Ensign Peak, one of the highest points in the area and the site at which Brigham Young and other Mormon leaders laid out their vision of the city they planned to build. We were already flirting with triple digit temperatures and it was an easy decision to forgo the twenty minute scramble to the top.

Just east of downtown the Gilgal Sculpture Garden is hidden in the interior of a relatively nondescript mixed residential and commercial block. If we hadn't known it was there we would have walked right past the innocuous concrete path that led to the entrance. The garden represents the work of one devoted individual who built the eccentric and religious sculptures in his own backyard. After his death the property was eventually turned over to the city and made into a public park. Among the more notable works are a sphinx with the head of Mormon prophet Joseph Smith and a stone archway that threatens to drop an enormous boulder onto the head of anyone who dares to stand beneath it.

We were working our way through my list of things to see in Salt Lake City faster than I expected. I had to choose between the Red Butte botanical garden and the Tracy Aviary and went with the latter because we'd been to the botanical garden in Santa Fe just a week earlier. The aviary is located within Liberty Park just a few blocks south of the sculpture garden. It was a nice enough place but a little sleepy and quite hot in the peak sun of early afternoon. The highlights were some stunning black crowned cranes that welcomed us with a symphony of honks and the opportunity to hand feed Australian rainbow lorikeets. Despite the keeper's repeated warnings that the birds didn't like to be touched, the colorful animals had no reservations about perching on Cleo's head. Oddly enough I have quite a collection of videos with birds landing on Cleo's head, although I think this was the first that took place outside of China.

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We couldn't take more than an hour and a half under the sun in the aviary, so it was still mid-afternoon when we found ourselves back on the sidewalk trying to decide what to do. I knew I wanted to check out the Great Salt Lake, even though my research indicated it was foul-smelling and full of bugs. The most interesting part of the lake seemed to be Antelope Island, but it was a full hour's drive just to get there. Eventually we decided to go for it since the kids were probably better off having a nap anyway. The island is by far the largest in the lake and appears deceptively close to the city, but the only access is via the causeway that leads from the eastern shore of the lake to the northern tip of the island. The drive over the causeway is one of the best ways to see the unbroken expanse of the lake, a bizarre-appearing mixture of open water and salt flats with blue-grey mountains visible on distant shorelines.

Soon after we passed the park entrance booth we found a wide sandy beach with practically no one else around. As we walked towards the lake we found ourselves sinking through a layer of salt into sulphurous mud. We walked out as far as we dared until the mud was sucking our footwear to the extent that our feet were coming out of them. It seemed a lot of other people had had the same problem. There were deep footprints in the mud around us and on close inspection a few of them had abandoned sneakers at the bottom. Apparently some folks had panicked at the thought of sinking further into the mud and had sacrificed their footwear to make it back to the safety of the sand. Even more ominous were dozens of bird carcasses that became more frequent as we got closer to the shoreline. Apparently the salt water prevents them from decomposing so even birds that died months ago will wash up along the shore fairly intact.

One of the attractions of Antelope Island is the herd of some seven hundred bison, the descendants of a small population brought there in 1893 by the owner of the land to protect the species from overhunting and extermination. Bison are often confusingly referred to as American buffalo, although this is a misnomer as bison and buffalo belong to different genuses within the bovine family. True buffalo are native to Africa and Asia, but early European settlers mistook the bison for buffalo despite there being numerous substantial differences between the species. The park ranger at the booth had told me the best place to see bison was along the eastern shore of the island. We set off down the road in hopes of spotting one or maybe two of the animals, and were shocked when after just a quarter of a mile we came across the entire herd grazing along the area between the road and the shoreline. We pulled over along with a few other cars and got out for a better look, of course maintaining a respectful distance from the potentially dangerous animals. A little bit further down the road we had to stop because a group of bison was crossing in front of us. It wasn't as spectacular as the experiences one is prone to have on rural highways in Wyoming or the Dakotas where enormous herds can congregate around cars for hours, but I have no doubt that experiences like that lie somewhere in our future as well.

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We kept driving until the highway turned into a dirt road after the Fielding Garr Ranch but didn't see anything else remarkable and elected to return the way we came. Before we reached the bison again we turned onto a promising side road which turned out to be the access to the Frary Peak Trailhead. It was far too late to be considering any real hiking but we had just a short walk to a rocky promontory with great views over the lake.

We drove back across the causeway immensely grateful that we had found the time and the motivation to visit Antelope Island, which had turned out to be one of the most rewarding experiences of our trip. As usual the decision to push a little harder and further rather than take the easier path had provided us with invaluable memories. We wiped and scrubbed as much of the stinking Salt Lake mud off our shoes and drove straight back to the city center for dinner. We had a little trouble finding a restaurant that was open on July Fourth but eventually located the Copper Onion, a decent New American bistro. They only had an outdoor table available which we gladly accepted despite the blanket of hot air that enveloped us, as we were still afraid that some of the odor of the lake might still be clinging to us.

The original plan was to head to a park downtown to see a fireworks show, but by the time we got back home to change we were so wiped out that we couldn't summon the motivation. I felt a pang of guilt when we began hearing the explosions and the kids ran outside in excitement, but we were still able to see some of the display from the driveway. There will be countless more firework shows but it could be awhile before we have another chance to get up close to a herd of bison.