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Published: January 25th 2008
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Obfuscator writes: We weren't in any particular hurry, so we figured we should check out downtown Beaver a bit. There didn't seem to be much to see, but we did manage to find a big pawn shop. At first we just figured we'd check out the guns and such, but we rapidly figured out that this was much more than a simple gun/pawn shop. This was in fact, the closest thing to a general store I think I've seen in the modern day, that wasn't some sort of large retail chain. This shop had everything. Tons of camping gear, clothes, books, stereo and electronics, guns, tools, etc. Most of it was pawned, I suppose, but much of it was like new. This pawn shop was two stories and sprawling. Really pretty nifty.
We drove north toward Salt Lake City on I-15, until we saw signs for historic Cove Fort, which offered free tours. We can't pass up free anything most of the time, especially if it's historic and a fort. This was right about where I-15 meets I-70. We pulled off and were met by a nice LDS Missionary lady who gave us a very personal tour of the whole
fort, and showed us a short video about it. Cove Fort is a little four walled fort made from local volcanic rock, with thick, strong looking walls and big wooden doors. The doors were evidently originally filled with sand, and there are gun slits around the walls. This makes it sound quite formidable, but the fort was never used in any fighting. The Mormons built the fort as a way station and secure point along the major north-south highway through Utah, as they were spreading in both directions. It also served as a post and telegraph relay station. Mainly, the fort seemed to serve as a good way point, where travelers could rest and get a meal. Basically a fortified Motel 6. They have a few original pieces in the fort, aside from the fort itself, and a lot of period appropriate pieces as well, and the LDS have done a great job restoring the fort. Of course, there was a bit of the usual conversion attempts, but nothing too obnoxious, and the tour was well worth it.
We continued north until we got to Salt Lake City, where we headed first for the state capitol. The signage in
downtown Salt Lake City is terrible, basically never warning you with enough advance notice of turns that you can plausibly change lanes to get where you're trying to go. Instead, you end up circling around the city endlessly trying to find the Salt Palace, or what have you. We eventually gave up trying to use the signs, and pulled out the atlas, and got ourselves up to the capitol. Utah's state house doesn't look a whole lot different than any other. It's big, has a dome, and two wings. It's not entirely conventional though. For one thing, the whole exterior is terra cotta.
The interior of the state house is very open and well lit. It was a grey day, but on the inside, the capitol felt sunny and warm, despite all the white terra cotta, which I would have expected to give a cold feeling. On the main floor, you just have one big central rotunda with two big wings immediately adjoining. It's sparsely decorated. Four statues, and murals on the ceiling of the rotunda, and that's about it. The House, Senate, and Supreme Court, were all similarly spartan. They had some nice paintings, and some gold trim,
but that's about it. Nothing too ornate. It was pretty in its simplicity though. We also picked up an election board game in the gift shop too, which could be amusing.
We went more in to the downtown and headed to Temple Square. We stopped in to an LDS museum for about an hour, and that was pretty interesting. We didn't really have adequate time to see it thoroughly, but we got the gist of it. We headed across the street as the sun was going down, and got some twilight pictures of the Temple and surrounding buildings. There were missionaries all over the grounds talking to people and answering questions. Pretty, young, foreign missionaries. We saw through their schemes. Apparently the Mormons think a lot like advertising companies.
We debated coming back the next day to see more, but I voiced the opinion that a.) since they weren't going to let us into the Temple, the rest of it was only so interesting, and b.) we had seen enough LDS related stuff since leaving on this trip to last me a lifetime. Thankfully, Onaxthiel didn't seem to mind skipping further Mormon stuff, at least for the time
being. Instead, we headed north, toward Ogden, hoping to find cheaper motels for the night. On the way we passed the industrial part of Salt Lake City, where fire burns from smokestacks belching their vile clouds into the air. It was almost like being in Gary again.
We eventually found a decent looking motel, and with a coupon, got it at a decent price. We snagged some dinner at the diner next door, and went back to the room to upload. That's where the day's frustrations really began for me. The wireless network that I could pick up in the room gave me a strong signal, and worked fine, as long as the only sites I was using were Google. Anything else wouldn't load. After one useless call to the help desk, I took the laptop down to the lobby, where they had a different wireless network, that worked fine. Of course, after one entry of uploading, Travelblog went down for maintenance. When it eventually came back online, I resumed work, sifting through about 1100 photos to select 50, only to have them all sized wrong when I uploaded them. That's when I gave up for the night.
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