We had a four-day weekend (seminary is our new part-time job) so Pepper and I decided to truck down to Utah to visit our kids and some family. It’s a little over nine hours from here to there, which is a healthy day’s drive but not too bad.
It turned out to be a grand old time. On Thursday we were at Kyra’s apartment, which is actually quite nice and a huge step up from last year’s hovel. Her roommate Aspen is a ton of fun.
While we were sitting around talking about where to go for lunch, Thom texted and mentioned that he was cruising through Provo on his way to Wyoming (as part of their 5,000-mile #vanlife road trip). I invited him to join us for lunch, and he said he already had plans: there’s an In-n-Out Burger in Provo, and apparently it’s the last one on their route north. Since there aren’t any near them in Washington, it was super important that they eat there. Kyra can’t stand burgers, and my experience with Thom at In-n-Out eight years ago was decidedly “meh”. So we agreed that he and his family would enjoy the culinary highlights of In-n-Out while my family and I enjoyed some pizza at Nico’s (which Kyra insists is the best pizza in town). But we couldn’t pass up an opportunity to see each other, so we swung by the In-n-Out to say hi.
So awesome to “run into” them at exactly the right time! We even got a tour (from Sefton) of the finished Sprinter van. After 3,000 miles it’s officially “broken in”, and they’ve been having a great time living in it for a few weeks. We parted ways, and they headed to Wyoming while we headed to Alex’s. He’d been working, and Kaitlyn had class, so we made sure to show up later in the day after they were finished. We enjoyed an afternoon together, had steaks at Outback, and called it a day.
Friday’s weather was gorgeous, but Kyra had to work so we hung out with Alex and Kaitlyn. We took a walk over to the nearby Provo Temple.
Dinner at Olive Garden seems to be kind of a tradition when we visit Provo, and that night was no exception. It was good to see Alex and Kaitlyn, but Alex had two mid-terms to finish by midnight so we headed north to Peter’s. He, Ryan, and Josh– my nephews– had all agreed to playtest Hexteria with me. They’re huge board gamers, so their input was really good.
A few hours later we headed north to Tara’s house, where we’d been staying each night. She has a new place up on a hill overlooking the Salt Lake Valley. The view is magnificent, although I don’t think I’m biased when I say it’s not as good a view as ours. Nonetheless, it was great to hang out with her and the fam.
And on Saturday we were trucking back to Montana. The 60- and 70-degree weather of Utah gave way to snow, and up in Montana it was coming down hard. Here’s the view outside our window on Sunday morning:
As our friend Amy remarked, “Well, we’ve had our week of fall, and now winter is here”. I guess so. The forecast calls for rain, snow, and cold for a while, so I guess we’ll hunker down a bit. But it was great to get out and see so many people over the weekend.