In the beginning......

I'm getting a late start on this series.  There are two mitigating factors.  One, just getting to St. George Utah was pretty exhausting.  Two, the initial accommodations is a former girl's dorm at Dixie State University were so deficient in their amenities that there was not even a satisfactory place to set up my computer to write!  More about that, later.

Not at all true to form, I was pretty well packed and ready to leave the night before D day, August 27.  My flight to Phoenix, Arizona was scheduled to leave from O'hare at 7:15 am.  Counting backwards from that time, two hours before flight to get through security and check in, an hour to the airport (just in case), an hour for early morning ablutions and final inclusions, meant that rising time was 3:00 am.  Everything went perfectly!  I was up at the correct time, called the doorman to signal a cab at 4:00 am, sharp, in the time it took to descend in the elevator, the taxi was waiting, and a very friendly and chatty Nigerian cabby got me to the airport at 4:50.

I had some concerns about checking in since this was the first trip I'd taken in a long time without a passport, but Bill, the trusty travel agent and coach assured me that I'd be able to check in with my driver's license.  Wrong!  The driver's license will get you through security, but it takes a credit card to check in.  Fortunately I have one.  I arrived at the gate with an hour to spare before boarding, just enough time for two McDonald's Sausage Biscuits and a cup of Starbucks's dark and a glance at the A.M. news.

The flight left, exactly on time, and was pretty uneventful.  No food, of course, and meager beverage service, but the flight was smooth and afforded some interesting sights from 35,000 feet.  As we neared Phoenix, I started to notice buttes and bluffs emerging from the landscape and wondered why I was so unaware the of rugged typography of the southwest.  We landed in Phoenix a little early, and had just enough of time to change to a much smaller plane to Saint George.  We landed in Phoenix on one side of the airport and the departure for St. George was at the other end, a goodly distance, I can assure you, with nothing but moving sidewalks to traverse the distance.  Still I made it with only moments to spare.  A quick trip to the bathroom, at we were boarding.  Soon we taxied out and there the story stalls.  We sat or inched our way to the take off for the next 50 minutes.  I began to fret about the arrival in St. George because I had hired a taxi/shuttle to take me to the motel and start of the tour, and my appointment with it was 1:15 pm. (an inflexible time frame, according to the shuttle company)

I had nothing to worry about.  We gained an hour flying to St. George, and the taxi/shuttle was delayed. And so, it didn't pick me up until 1:30.  I had built in some wiggle room in case there was a delay in retrieving the hold baggage.  I needn't have worried about that either.  The St. George airport is so small (and efficient) that my luggage was delivered withing minutes of me arriving.  I arrived at the Dixie State Motel (!!) at 2:00 pm local time, exactly twelve hours after my wake up time.

The end of the first day was spent in dismay over my motel room; (no morning coffee, no television, to courtesy goodies, table or desk, one lamp at bedside, oi weh!) having dinner in a university dining room, and a welcome session of introductions and orientation.  I couldn't wait for it to be over.

The worst room I've had since church camp!

Day two promised to be a little more interesting.  It began with breakfast (basically a cold buffet with a toaster and oatmeal) and a lecture on the geology we were going to encounter on the tour, given by Dave who had a career in mining before he switched over to captivating old people with the story of rocks.  One of his more illuminating discussions was to illustrate the history of the earth with a 25 foot tape measure.  Human history is less than the last 32nd of an inch of that tape.  The point being that rocks are a lot older than we are.

Dave illustrates earth's age.

We walked through the Snow Canyon State Park outside St. George and took in some of the desert beauty of the region and got a brief introduction to the plant life of this arid place.  Some of the terms we heard in the geology lecture started to have meaning as we saw actual ash cones from inactive volcanoes and took in Navajo Sandstone up close.  Impressive in its magnitude and beautiful in its own way.

 Million year old Navajo Sandstone in Snow Canyon State Park, St. George, Utah

The rest of the afternoon was spent getting an introduction of the Mormon historical sites of St. George, including one of the original homes, the original court house, the temple, to tabernacle, the irrigation system and it's rules, and the opera house with a "visit" from one of the original apostles who told us about the arduous trip across the prairie in hand carts and covered wagons.  There is no question that the early pioneers started with nothing and built a pretty remarkable functioning village in the middle of no where.  It proves, I guess, that a well organized and obedient group of committed people can accomplish amazing things.  I was particularly impressed with the extraordinary quality of the workmanship displayed in the tabernacle, which was build to seat 1,000 people when there were only a few hundred living in the area.

Mormon Tabernacle at St. George, Utah.

We finished our day off with dinner an Chuckarama, a local "favorite" eatery.  Buffet with many locals.  Bedtime couldn't come soon enough.  Tomorrow will be a better day!  We leave for Zion National Park in the A.M.