Salt Lake City

We spent several days around Salt Lake City.  The Wasatch Mountains are just magnificent.

Ron's son Jim lives in the area and it was great to spend some time with him.

Ron wanted to do some genealogy research at the LDS Family History Library.  The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, headquartered in Salt Lake City, has an incredible amount of genealogical information.  Visitors are welcomed with volunteers ready and willing to help with your research.

While Ron was doing that, Diana and I did some sightseeing.  First, we visited the Capitol.

Because it was Saturday, tours were not available.  We could wander around, but the doors to the House, Senate, and Supreme Court were locked.  The Rotunda artwork was funded by the Depression era Public Works of Art Project.

The beehive is Utah's state emblem, symbolic of industry and unity.

I was surprised to see statues of gulls atop the bus stop shelters.  At first I thought maybe it was to keep live gulls away.

But Ron remembered hearing something about the Miracle of the Gulls.  According to Mormonism, in 1848, gulls miraculously saved the crops by eating the swarms of insects that were destroying their fields.

We also visited Temple Square, 35 acres in downtown Salt Lake City.  The actual Temple is off limits to visitors, but most of the other buildings are open.  It's hard to get any pictures of the Temple.  It's huge and surrounded by lots of trees.

The Temple took 40 years to build, from 1853 to 1893.

We checked out the roof garden of the Conference Center.

And saw the Tabernacle, home of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.

I think my favorite building was Assembly Hall, built in 1882.  How charming!

To complete our stay in the area, we visited Antelope Island.  At 15 miles long and 4.5 miles across, Antelope Island is the largest island in the 17,000 square mile Great Salt Lake.  The lake seems to be unusually low.

Bison were introduced to the island in 1893.  Now they have to thin the herd and sell bison burgers in the concession.

Just look at them all hanging out in the shallow lake.

You can see lots of calves, otherwise known as future burgers.

We got to see a bit of excitement.  We don't know if this coyote was eyeing up one of those babies or just passing through.

But when he got too close, a couple of the bison did stir themselves enough to threaten him.

Don't feel too badly.  Like Diana said, that was one healthy looking coyote.

We also saw a few of the island's namesake, the pronghorn.  (Formerly known as antelope.)