Wednesday October 7 2015
We've had a last minute change of plan
and will skip Craters of the Moon National Park. These missed
attractions don't bother us, we look at it as a reason to someday
come back this way. We will drive straight to Salt Lake City today
and stay at the KOA campground in the city. The Mormon Tabernacle
Choir practice session on Thursday evening is open to the public and
we want to attend. After setting up in the RV Park we drove the jeep
to Costco and Kolhs, a combined shopping trip and familiarization
tour of the area.
Thursday October 8 2015
There is a light rail commuter train
stop right across the street from the campground that goes uptown
with a stop at Temple Square. We will use the train for all our trips to Temple Square. The thirty five acre complex is
beautifully landscaped and houses all things Mormon; library, museum,
visitors center, The domed Tabernacle which is the home of the choir
and the Salt Lake Temple, a six spired granite edifice which took the
Mormon pioneers 40 years to build.
We went first to the visitors center
where we met our young missionary tour guides, one from Argentina and
the other from Sweden. Note: the guided tours are not mandatory, but
I recommend it.
Our enthusiastic hosts walked us around
the Temple Square and into a few of the buildings while presenting us
with the basic philosophy of the Mormon religion.
Our guides didn't go into the history
of Mormonism unless in reference to a question. After the tour, which
lasts about ½ hour you can visit the museum and learn the history of
the religion. After satisfying our curiosity in the museum we went
next door to the Family Search Center.
The Mormon's maintain the worlds
largest repository of genealogical records, they do it for religious
reasons but share the knowledge with anyone. Millie has been
researching her ancestry for some time and she wanted to utilize the
Mormon database. In my family my fathers side has been researched and
shared by another family member. My mothers side is somewhat of a
mystery to me. My mothers parents both died when she was very young
so I knew very little about them and nothing at all about older
generations.
After researching for several hours we
reluctantly called it quits for the day. We had to return to the RV
Park to take care of our dog Maggie and to rest a while before
returning for the choir recital.
Once again we took the short train ride
uptown to the Temple Square. At exactly 7:30 the doors were opened
and the large crowd was allowed to enter. For no particular reason we
decided to go to the upper level and selected probably the best seats
in the house, 1st row, center stage. The rehearsal is a
semi formal affair, the choir was in robes but the orchestra was in
street clothes, the conductor in shirt sleeves.
The choir sounded top notch to me, but
the conductor would give direction after each hymn and sometimes stop
them mid song. That meant we heard each song 2 or 3 times, but that
was OK, the nearly 300 voices made each performance extraordinary.
Friday October 9 2015
We returned to the Family Search Center
and researched for hours again today, both of us learning something
new about our ancestors. Afterwards we enjoyed a fine dinner before
once again riding the train back to the RV Park.
Saturday October 10 2015
Family Search Center again today, We
learned how to transfer images from Ancestory.com to Family Search
today and finished up our research here in Salt Lake City. After
lunch we drove out to the great Salt Lake, it's not very impressive
but we can mark off another bucket list item.
Just the facts:
4 nights @ KOA RV Park= $227.43
Fuel at Willard Utah Flying J= $$2.78 per gallon, 50 gallons, $139.41 total
Dinner in town= $36.
Lunch at Mexican resturant=$22.
Total miles drive=211
end of day odometer=67621
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