Dinosaur Hunting

"If you're home by 5:30, we can drive to Vernal for the weekend."  That was an offer I couldn't refuse, on Friday, April 13, 2012.  Vernal had it all--dinosaur bones, long desert views, a hotel decorated in modish 50s style, an auction--and it was my dad's hometown besides. 

We stayed Friday night at the Marriott in Vernal, which was newly decorated with metal chain curtains, orange walls and turquoise carpets, and bubble chandeliers.  It was the first time we'd ever time-traveled, in a hotel, back to 1955.  We expected to see TV dinners and tomato soup cake on the buffet and poodle skirts, bobby socks, and greaser haircuts on the guests!

Saturday morning, we cruised by the Coca-Cola plant my dad's family used to own in Vernal, and the old Calder home across the street.  I will describe those places in the biography I am writing about my father.

We then drove 20 miles out of town to see the new museum for Dinosaur National Monument.  We kept stopping to take photographs of the lovely, empty Uintah Basin, with its lazy rivers, blue skies, and gray mountains. 

The museum retained its striking centerpiece--a wall of rock out of which thousands of dinosaur bones had been halfway dug out. There were bones arranged into whole dinosaur bodies along the walls.

Dinosaur National Monument has other views and other animals.  We took a 20 mile ride high into the mountains and came upon a herd of elk, barreling across the road.  We also saw Native American petroglyphs.  We drove further, and were all alone in a campground with twisted old trees and gorgeous, long views down a canyon. 

Back in Vernal, we came upon an auction of farm equipment, paintings, and even water hydrants! 

We watched the auctioneer and his spotter sell a Coca-Cola cooler and other treasures. We could have replaced Grandma Calder's Ironrite or picked up a couple of cow skulls.

Vernal has a great natural history museum, with a hands-on dinosaur bone lab, movies, a huge dinosaur statue in the lobby and a dinosaur garden outside.

We stopped by the Vernal Temple, constructed as a tabernacle in 1908 under the supervision of the stake president, my Great-grandmother Calder's brother, Sam Bennion.  The old tithing house was now the Daughters of the Mormon Pioneers museum, but was closed on Saturdays until summer.  We vowed to reserve a weekend in June to come back and search for Calder family records.

I can never have too much of a good thing.  We considered touring the Home and Garden Expo, with buzz saw carvings, but decided we'd better hurry home.  Next time....

Easter with the Fun Bunch

Charlotte Alvey and Joshua and Ashley Moreland are very fun people.  They take after their mother, Dave's sister Janice, who, as the kids say, "lives to have fun."  Charlotte, Joshua, and Ashley joined us for Easter dinner--they were without parents here in SLC, and Dave and I were without kids.  We spent the evening talking and laughing about Joshua's mountain climbing, Ashley's job as an assistant manager at Nordstom, and Charlotte's new baby and pilot husband Tony. We wished Tony was with us, instead of in an airport or plane somewhere.  We then laughed and talked some more about Dave's and my kids and their odd exploits, from Camille spending three months driving through Europe with six kids in a van to Michael plotting the perfect vacation in Mongolia and Tibet. 

Since Charlotte, Joshua, and Ashley are vegetarians, we nixed the ham and lamb, and substituted grilled portobello mushrooms as our Easter entree.  The mushrooms were a bit slimy, but the vegetable and fruit salads and tomato soup were better.  Alas, the homemade angel food cake collapsed in the oven and was served as a cookie, along with the lemon curd and whipped cream.  It was "fallen angel" cake, Joshua suggested.  We planned for a couple of reunions--one for Joshua to bring his climbing ropes and lead us down Orderville Canyon in Zions Park, and one for me to serve a better angel food cake!

Geek Squad

Dave and I are becoming geeks.  During the first two weeks of April, we replaced our computer with a top of the line Asus.  I upgraded my iPhone to a 4s, and I hooked up my Epson Perfection V500 Photo Scanner.   I bought an inch thick instruction manual for my new Canon Rebel camera, and another inch thick manual for our new software, Photoshop Elements 10.  I even studied them.

Dave bought an iPad, which he outfitted with 3500 songs and some Skull Candy headphones to listen to them with.  On Sunday evenings, we Skype Michael in Australia.

And of course, with all that, we needed a very long, very inclusive tech support contract....or access to our tech-savvy grandchildren.

Jonny

"I want to go to Bryce Canyon," Jonny said, when we asked him how he wanted to allocate his weekend with us in Southern Utah, after spending Friday night in St. George.  When we actually arrived at the St. George house, though, Jonny felt torn.  He stood by the spot in our house where he had first met Jenny, seven years ago, and considered just hanging out in St. George all weekend, letting the good memories wash over him.

We decided on a road trip, and headed for Bryce on Saturday.  Dave and I were very flattered that Jonny would use this weekend, when Jenny was working and Jonny's classes were out, to fly to SLC to see The Parents. We stopped at a rock store in Rockville (or was it just down the road in Springdale?) to poke around in the piles of petrified wood outside the store and finger the geodes, sandstone book ends, and slabs of raw amethysts inside.  Jonny resisted the temptation to buy, but I emerged with a dinosaur tooth.

There are some places in Springdale that Dave and I cannot pass without visiting, and we shared them with Jonny--the Worthington Gallery, with its pottery and blown glass, and the David West and Fatali photo galleries.  We then ate a late lunch at the Switchback, with its tasty salads and salmon and its huge windows looking at red rock cliffs.

We arrived at Bryce in the evening.  It was dark and cold at Ruby's Inn, and there was ice on the pond outside our motel rooms in the morning. 

After breakfast at Ruby's Inn, shared with a busload of French tourists, we spent an hour or two walking to Bryce viewpoints, in awe at the beauty.  Dave pointed out Toquerville, beyond the canyon, where his grandfather was born.  Jonny prides himself on being a Westerner, and this was the ultimate West--rugged, isolated, dry, and gorgeous.

We then drove up Highway 89, through Escalante to Boulder.  We passed the narrow bridge of land where some drivers hesitate to cross, as cliffs fall hundreds of feet on either side of the road.  We passed the canyons housing Calf Creek Falls, and remembered fun times, when Jonny and Michael were little, swimming in the pools beneath the waterfall. 

We stopped at Hell's Backbone Grill, in Boulder, for a stylish Mexican brunch served by a handyman/waitress who carried pliers in her back pocket as she served our food, and then wandered outside to pull weeds.  We remembered the weekend, many years ago, when Dave had a conference at the Boulder Lodge and Jonny and Michael and I hung out here.

And there was one more highlight to a spectacular day, as we drove over Boulder Mountain and looked out at the Henry Mountains, far in the distance.  It was pure Utah!