On April 11, 2020, Dave and I ventured out of our coronavirus quarantine to visit St. George. Ever practical, even while on vacation, Dave left my car at Big O Tires to get the tires checked while the two of us hiked eight miles around the city.
All the LDS temples are closed while coronavirus stalks outside. The pioneer temples--St. George, Salt Lake, and Manti--are undergoing massive remodeling for earthquake protection and other stabilization. We hardly recognized the St. George Temple, usually so immaculate, with piles of dirt all around.
The St. George Tabernacle, built by my great-grandfather, Miles Romney, was in better shape.
Dave and I wandered down byroads near the temple, looking for quaint and odd sights. We paused at a wall onto which lovers had snapped padlocks, symbolizing their undying love for each other.
We passed this sign, stapled onto a huge, old tree. I didn't realize there was such a thing as a "protected street tree."
After our hike around St. George, Dave and I drove to Las Vegas. We had heard it was empty because of the coronavirus, but we had no idea how empty. This is the Strip, usually jam-packed with cars and pedestrians on a weekend in the spring!
And this is Caesar's Palace, usually one of the busiest hotels on the Strip, now totally devoid of people and cars. It was eerie. Las Vegas flies high and falls low economically. I remember the extreme suffering in Vegas during the Great Recession, when its hotels were one-third empty, residents moved out of Vegas in droves, and there were thousands of foreclosures. Vegas has fallen low once again.
No comments:
Post a Comment