Rafting Weber Canyon

On a hot July afternoon, we headed up with Marissa and Matt to do some river rafting in Weber Canyon near Ogden.  The actual town is Hennifer, but you wouldn't know it by that name.  

You would know it as "the middle of nowhere".

It was a pretty calm section of the river, with just a few "splash zones" but it was relaxing and fun.

I thought it was going to be wetter than it was, so I didn't bring my phone to get pics. I should have though.

After rafting, we took the scenic way home, though the mountains and near where the Pony Express trail went, as well as the Mormon Pioneer trail - it was July 24th (Pioneer Day) after all!

We first stopped to see "Devil's Slide" which is right near the freeway. 

Here is some history about this strange geological occurrence: 

It is a giant size limestone chute which consists of two parallel slabs of rock about 20 feet apart, 40 feet high and about 200 feet long.

Looking like a large playground slide fit only for the Devil, it's actually a remnant of sediments deposited in a sea that occupied Utah.   This sea which originated from the north (180 million years ago), spread south over areas of what now are Montana, Wyoming and Utah. 

Over millions of years, massive amounts of sediment accumulated and eventually formed layers of limestone and sandstone.  About 75 million years ago, during a "mountain-building episode" (earthquakes), this thick layer of sediment (about 2700 feet thick), got tilted to a near-vertical position.  Further erosion and exposed the near-vertical rock layers to what we see today.

The middle of the slide is a different composition of rock from the outer layers.  The middle layer is softer, which makes it more susceptible to weathering and erosion.

It is a very bizarre looking rock!

We then head up through beautiful mountains.  At the top, we passed "Heartbreak Ridge" which the Mormon Pioneers had a sad day when they arrived here.

They saw even more mountains in the background they had to cross, thinking they were almost there.  

The plaque reads:

"The country west looks rough and mountainous,"
wrote William Clayton, describing this panorama of
the Wasatch Mountains. Modern historians have
dubbed this summit "Heartbreak Ridge" to describe
the feelings of many early Mormon Pioneers who
crested this ridge. After months on the trail,
traveling over 1,200 weary miles, it was heart-
wrenching to discover that the most difficult part of
the journey still lay ahead. Some people must have
broken down and wept. Others gritted their teeth
with determination and moved southwest down off
Hogsback Summit to challenge the mountains and
canyons that
lay ahead.

“...arrived [July 19] on the suummit of the dividing
ridge and put a guide hard up, "80 miles to Fort
Bridger"... The descent is not very steep but
exceedingly dangerous to wagons being mostly on
the side hill over large cobble stones, causing the
wagons to slide very badly.”

I don't know how they did it.  I know I couldn't have.  We drove this part of the route in about 35 minutes and it was steep, curvy, sides of the cliff. I can't even imagine doing it in a handcart and covered wagons...taking days...weeks....after already coming so far.

Later in the week, we went to the annual Mormon Tabernacle Choir and Orchestra Pioneer Day Concert.  They paid tribute to Rodgers and Hammerstein and performed many of their Broadway hits.  It was really good.  Gma and Gpa Gwilliam came with us to this.  We sat at the highest seat in the house!  It was very high!

It's a beautiful building at night

Salt Lake Temple across the street peeking above the trees

A little history about the Conference Center:  It's HUGE! It's the largest auditorium of it's kind in the world and has NO visible support columns. That means no viewing obstructions for the 21,000 people it holds.  It can hold two 747's side by side, and the distance from the top row of seats (where we were) to the stage is the distance of a football field.  The waterfall coming from the steeple outside is beautiful, and the organ inside has 7667 pipes!  There is also a 3 acre garden on the roof you can go see during the day.  The outside walls are covered with granite slabs that were quarried from the same quarry the Salt Lake Temple got granite slabs from in nearby Little Cottonwood Canyon.

We are thankful to all the pioneers who sacrificed and made the trek West to settle Salt Lake. They would be amazed at what it's become!

Stadium of Fire!

We got tickets to Stadium of Fire this year and for the first time in a long time, the main performer was not country.  This year is was pop group One Republic.  They put on a pretty good concert and and it was a great show.  

Meghan, Corey and Jane were able to come too!

We started off with going to watch the balloons lift off early in the morning.

We also visited the canyon for a picnic.

Then we headed to the stadium for the show and of course, fireworks!

Smokey The Bear balloon is always a favorite

I like this pic because you can see the moon

We had Corey's twin brother come with us.  We were always getting confused who was who....

Hannah's friend, Ashlyn, from Roseville, came to visit us for the week

The sun finally set and we were not in the hot sun!

Stadium of Fire

They had some bike, skateboard and pogo stick tricks!  (Wait until you see the video of the pogo sticks!)

It was time for the concert

One one popular song, the phone lights came out

Jane did fantastic!  Only crying a few times when the fireworks were really loud. She kept on her earphones and was pretty happy most of the time!

See that little dot in the middle?  It's sky divers. They usually have them at the beginning of the show, but this year, they did it in the dark!  It was pretty cool!

These lights were guiding the sky divers

And of course fireworks all throughout the show.  Stadium of Fire is the largest stadium firework show in the country!

On the way home, we noticed the Y was all lit up

VIDEOS:


Flyover - was extremely loud! These were the newest fighter jets the Air Force has. Hill Air Force Base (in Ogden) is the first base in the country to have these jets.  They flew over twice!

Bike Tricks:

Now time for the Pogo Sticks!

One Republic (my phone didn't take good pics when it was darker):

Jane enjoying the show:

One Republic favorite:

Another favorite:

This one got the crowd going:

Another crowd pleaser:

The crowd sung along to this one:

And this one:

Skydivers:

And of course, fireworks! This year, the fireworks were timed for music hits.

We had a pretty explosive 4th of July!

Ghost Falls

It was hot over the July 4 break, but we did want to get in at least one hike.

So I found a pretty short and close one and we headed out early in the morning before it got too hot.

We were headed to Ghost Falls.  Now the name comes from the fact that these "falls" sometimes disappear - just like a ghost.  So we were not even sure we'd see anything.

The hike is in Draper, immediately behind the Draper Temple, among very large houses.

I'm using a new app from AllTrails that "records" the hike and gives you all the pertinent info you'd want to know.

Here is the hike we did in red, and the stats are it was 2.8 miles, with an elevation gain of 453 feet, and we hiked for one hour and 22 minutes total.

The hike started out among trees, shrubs and lots of shade

Before long, we were high above the valley floor.  You can see the Draper Tempe there which is where we started

We finally found our turn off.  Most of the trails in this area are for Mountain Biking + hiking

Suddenly, the vegetation ended and we were in the sun up a steep part of the trail

Well, the falls were almost a ghost - there wasn't much to it. And most of it was hidden behind thick shrubs.  The entire falls was about 40 feet or so down a huge granite rock

Can you see the falls here? Behind all the trees and shrubs?  Hard to see

We headed back a different way since this was a loop

Along the way, we saw this old crashed truck. We tried to imagine how it ended up here, with  no roads around, and we couldn't come up with any answers.

This trail was not for hiking. They had trails for biking + hiking, just biking, and some even just for horses and hiking

One of the large homes overlooking the valley on one side, and the mountains on the other.  Yep, this is one house.

Overall, this was a good hike.  Mostly shaded and pretty easy.  The falls will "ghost" and dry up by the end of summer, so this is a Spring hike if you want to see the falls.