Thursday, July 9, 2015

Goodbye Lower 48 - for now

We took four days to transit north to Salt Lake City where our first port of call was Temple Square. Temple Square is the home of the Salt Lake Mormon Temple and the Tabernacle. Temple Square is a picture perfect setting in the centre of the city and is something of a tourist mecca even for the non LDS Church members. The Temple is off limits to everyone, including LDS Church members without special permission so any chance of our scruffy lot getting inside was strictly out of the question. The famous choir is on tour at present and won't be back until August some time. Meanwhile I had to make do with an organ recital. The Tabernacle is a spectacular building and the organ is magnificent. Can't wait 'till the choir gets back. The choir concerts are on a Sunday and are free to the public.
Colin's bike is playing up again and is in the BM agent here in Salt Lake City so we are staying a further night. In the end they replaced the throttle position sensor which as the next day was to prove was not the problem - it needed a new fuel pump. Just to add to his woes Colin got a puncture on the Interstate as we headed out of town. The interstate is no place to have a puncture. What with one thing and another we only made it to Logan the first night out of Salt Lake City. I once attended a VROC rally in Logan and remember a McDonalds burger place which must have been the oldest outlet in the country - an absolute 1950's classic. It's gone; just a patch of dirt where it once stood. Didn't get a picture of it last time either.
Next day was kind of a long day. We made Bozeman for the night via Jackson Hole, the Grand Tetons and Yellowstone National Park. The buggers want $25 to get into the park these days.We got to Old Faithful geyser just after it had given a display so had to hang around for over an hour before the next performance. I've seen it before and I wasn't sure then and nor now that it is worth a special trip. It's certainly popular - there were 100's of people watching the show. The motel in Bozeman was the Lewis and Clark (Lewis and Clarke were explorers of this area in 1805) and it cost us $120 for the night. At 66 cents to our dollar this place was not cheap. In fact USA is no longer a cheap place to go. For example a motel that cost $35 ten years ago was $50 two years ago and is now $80. Petrol is cheap however; less than $3 a gallon. There was a time when I paid over $4 a gallon.
Thankfully our accommodation the next night in Missoula, MT was much more in line with our budget. Tomorrow - Canada via the Ice fields National Park and the Highway to the Sun. We have done 4,500 km in the lower 48. Colin and I will be back here around the end of August.
Salt Lake Tabernacle - home of the famous choir.

Salt Lake Temple of the LDS Church


Our organ music master with some sort of construction worker.

Old Faithful at Yellowstone NP.

Blue sky Montana

Highway to the Sun

Ditto

Logan Pass, Icefields NP

Seems everyone wants to go to Canada.