We depart Vegas on May 17 and head north overnighting in an RV campground in Beaver Utah (at over 6,000 ft above sea level). It's late and we're hungry, so I fix up a quinoa jambolaya -- not bad for a one pot camping dish. How can you go wrong with lots of sauteed onions, peppers, bacon, fresh sausages and chopped tomatoes all stewed and tossed with cooked quinoa? We settle in for the evening.
Low and behold, we wake up to a load of heavy snow!
Breakfast at the Timberline Café, in Beaver (it’s too cold to put anything together in the campervan) and I experience my first order of ‘biscuits and gravy’. This is a common breakfast item in these and southern parts. Do I want a full order (two biscuits) or a half order (one biscuit)? I ask, "Does it come with any protein?" It doesn't, so I order a half order of bacon (in my world, bacon is protein when on vacation...). Well, as you can see from the picture below, a half order is pretty big and pretty beige (except for the itty bitty piece of kale in the corner). Carboydrates aside (and yes, I got enough for the rest of the week), this was very tasty. A homemade baking powder biscuit (scone) that's flaky and high, thick gravy mixed with pieces of chicken and hash browns that are awesome, more like a rosti or latke of freshly grated potatoes fried up to order. On a cold morning, the carbohydrates did the trick of keeping me warm. Hmmm, hmmm good!
We head to Salt Lake City and thank goodness leave the snow behind for pouring rain and tour the Mormon Temple Square. Non-members can’t go into the temple, but we did tour the church, tabernacle and welcome centres.
It’s still raining when we get back to the van. With time on the meter, we stop at a coffee shop that also houses Utah artists crafts, called Utah Artists Hands (at 61 West 100 South, SLC). Thanks Pamela, for preparing a superb Americano for me, latte for Jon and convincing me to buy two Magic Cookie Bars for our afternoon snack break as well as suggesting some places to stop on our travels. Personal testimonials for places to see always seem to result in great experiences.
It’s still pouring as we head to our campground for the evening. We try out our camper indoor stove for the first time since we have owned our VW. We don't want the van to get too infused with cooking odours so we usually cook outside at a picnic table using our Coleman stove. It’s too cold and wet tonight. The indoor stove works really well as I pan fry up some steaks purchased at Whole Foods and prepare a fresh guacamole, using an avocado given to us by a camping neighbour in Carpinteria (the avocado was grown in his own backyard back home). Simple good food for a simple day. Let’s hope for better weather tomorrow. This campground has some natural hot springs that we need to try out before we depart.
