Colorado and Utah - August 2006

With only a couple of days to extend the weekend, I had initially intended to go to Mt. Rushmore and the Badlands, largely retracing a route I had done eight years ago with a friend. Then it turned out that this was the week of one of the most momentous and important annual gatherings of Americans any time during the year. Uh, no, not this one. This one.

So instead of heading north, we headed west. The northern part of Utah is basically a different state from canyon country. We like to imagine the looks on the pilgrims' faces when Brigham Young pointed to a desert and said, "This is the place." "Probably wife #13, you know, the new one, threatened to keep him waiting until we stopped moving. That's the only thing I can think of." But when you actually drive through there, you see what he was getting at.