No trip south without this favourite: Arizona hot springs

It's noon, and I'm trying to concentrate here in my motel room at "The New Pioneer", a casino-cum-motel in Laughlin, NV, where we are staying for a couple of nights before moving on to Yuma (not to gamble, just because it's a handy place to stay). Concentration is difficult, however, not because of any human activity but because of a very vocal great tailed grackle right outside my door who is using the whole big spectrum of its language to entertain me, at the top of its voice to boot. 

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 Afraid that on a weekend in March – spring break time in much of the US—the Arizona hot springs would be inundated with visitors, we had delayed our hike deliberately to Sunday afternoon. Although we didn't stay in Boulder City as we had done on previous visits we still needed to check if the bighorn sheep were around. Boulder City has a resident herd which has increased steadily so that the population is healthy now and even has it made possible to establish sheep in other parts of the state. We didn't hold high hopes: every other time so far we had looked in vain. On our first visit to Boulder City someone told us about Hemenway Park on the outskirts of town as the most likely place to see them, so that's where we were headed. We didn't quite remember where to turn off the highway, however, and ended up a street or two too early: no park, only a beautiful residential area, so we turned around and drove back down the hill. Lo and behold, though, in the grassed draw between the houses and the highway there was a beautiful ram, horns curved almost all the way around.

Johann stopped the car and I got out to take photos, not totally successful because he was a bit far away for my small camera. As I turned around, however, three more sheep strolled leisurely down the middle of the road in the turning lane, on their way to the same grassy draw. After so many years we finally had found them! And this was not the end of it either: on the way down the hill towards the Lake Mead visitor centre we did pass the turnoff to Hemenway Park, and here a whole herd was grazing peacefully. By then we were eager to get to the trailhead for our hike, however, and decided to come back the next day. So what might have been the reason for the abundance of sheep down in this area now when we hadn't seen any in the other years? Then, we were told that the best sightings were in the summer when food up in the mountains got sparse. Was it drier this year than it had been?

When we arrived at the parking lot for the trailhead at the Mile 4 marker we were appalled: not only was the parking lot itself full but cars were parked along the road before and behind the parking lot. If all these people were down at the hot springs there would be standing room only. Had we made a mistake? Would one of our favourite places be spoiled for us now?

It was about three in the afternoon, and we had yet to pack our backpacks, so it would be a while until we were ready to start on our hike. We were hopeful that people would soon start flocking back after a day at the springs. We were not mistaken: group after group came wandering back up the draw, tired and hot and slow some, others still with a spring in their step. A few – not many - hikers were still leaving to go down, too, among them a family of six, the kids ranging in age between maybe five and ten, the dad, a very fit looking black man, pulling a four-wheeled cart with a cooler. Were they thinking of going down and back again this late in the day? They certainly didn't have any camping equipment with them. We wondered how this was going to turn out.

When we finally left with our backpacks around four the sun was slowly getting lower. We still met a lot of people on their way out on our hike, climbing – some obviously struggling - the steep part we descended carefully. When we entered the canyon at the bottom much of it was in the shade already. We still were a bit anxious: would we find our tenting spot occupied this time? That would be a sad thing indeed.

We needn't have worried, however: we obviously were the only ones crazy enough to do this hike with a big backpack, at least on this day. We pitched our tent and walked down the rest of the way to the hot springs, only a couple of hundred metres more, to check out the situation there. The first people we saw were the family that had left shortly before us, having a bite to eat before heading up to the parking lot again. We were in awe: not only had the dad pulled that cart down the steep, rocky decline and was going to do the same thing in reverse, but the kids all seemed happy and content and not at all balking at the thought of having to hike all the way up when it was likely going to be dark before they were done.

The pools weren't exactly empty, but it was not as bad as we had feared, and with the evening progressing there was a good chance that it would get even quieter. We went back to the tent and had a bowl of soup—our trusty 'pocket rocket' was with us, of course, since there is no wood to make a fire—and returned to the pool when the sun had disappeared behind the mountains. Now, only a handful of people were left, and most of those, too, didn't stay long anymore. We lit the teelight in its glass bowl we had brought with us, enjoyed our red wine and watched the stars appear in the narrow space above. Slowly the Seven Sisters moved to the right, and the moon, a bit over half full, cast its silvery light on the water. It's hard to imagine a more perfect ending to a day. Thoroughly heated through, any stiffness from the hike alleviated by sitting in the warm water for a couple of hours, we made our way back to the tent shortly before ten. It was still warm enough to sit outside for a while under the starry sky, much more of it visible here than in the narrow part of the canyon that encloses the pools, and listen to the rhythmic song of the insects.

I found this beautiful dead moth right above the hot springs

In the morning, we were alone in the springs for a little while before we heard a quiet splashing in the hotter pool you have to cross to get to the one we were occupying. The man who had just arrived waved a brief 'Good Morning' and stayed out of sight in the hot water. Soon the distinct smell of marihuana drifted down to us but dissipated soon. A few minutes later two men climbed up from the lower part, scout leaders from a camp down by the Colorado who wanted to enjoy the pools before the 40 or so kids in their care woke up. Next were a father and son we had seen the night before already. The son fights forest fires in the summer and enjoys rock climbing in Joshua Tree during the winter, and the dad, a former teacher, saw the attraction in the life his son leads and was now retraining to be a paramedic for the firefighters. It is not often that a father follows in the footsteps of his son instead of the other way around.

When the self-appointed caretaker of the hot springs arrived (no longer Mike whom we had met twice before) and started the cleanup we headed back up for our breakfast bowl of soup. Rearranging the sandbags people had felt impelled to move to a different position he noted drily, 'everyone likes to be an engineer here.'

By ten o'clock we had packed and were on our way. The sun was out, but in the canyon it was still cool.

 Brittlebush (Encelia farinosa) was in bloom wherever the sun could reach, humming with pollen-laden bees, and as I got close to take photos I noticed more and more small flowers in bloom, from phacelia to lupin, primrose to the first California poppies. Except for the brittlebush there were not a whole lot of them yet, so maybe we were too early, or it was drier than in previous years.

It was lovely to walk at this time of day, and while we encountered a few people heading down we were all alone for most of the hike and met nobody after we turned off the regular trail at the fork where we arrived after the descent the day before. Now, we were headed for the petroglyphs and hoped to be on the right way to take the alternate route out. Last time Mike was with us and showed us where to climb up after the two dry waterfalls. Would we find the right spot? I was a bit apprehensive since I remembered how afraid I had been last time when I was faced with that steep wall I needed to climb to get up and around the last dry waterfall. Then, it turned out to be easier than I had feared: Johann climbed up first, and Mike brought up my backpack while giving instructions where to set my feet from below. This time there was no Mike.

We found the wall, quite sure we were right because there was no way we could have scaled the dry waterfall that closed off the canyon ahead. Also, a small pile of rocks at the foot of the wall was obviously meant to make the first step up easier. I watched Johann climb up and disappear around the corner, then heard his returning footsteps when he came back to fetch my backpack so that I could climb up unimpeded. There was nothing for it: I gathered my courage and slowly placed my feet on the rocks that offered themselves as footholds and found the ones to hold on to with my hands. All was well—as long as I didn't look down, which was easy enough to avoid since I needed to concentrate on the way up. After a few minutes I was on level ground again, pleased with myself for overcoming my fear once again, actually having enjoyed it. The rest of the trail was easy, and we arrived at the parking lot around noon. Already it was starting to fill up again, so our timing was perfect.

We had been looking forward to having a meal at the 'Coffee Cup Cafe' in Boulder, a breakfast place popular with locals and tourists alike, mostly for old times' sake: we had enjoyed delicious breakfasts here when we were in Boulder City for the first time and also when we visited with our German friends a few years ago. Alas, when we got there the waiting time was half an hour, and it closed in an hour. We decided to forego it this time and stop once more at Hemenway Park for a picnic lunch instead. We also wanted to check on the bighorn sheep again, and again we spotted a large group.

Off to Laughlin, then, where we had booked a room at 'The New Pioneer', which turned out to be an excellent choice: the room is large and comfortable and surprisingly quiet. We ended the day with a walk along the river promenade that connects the hotels along the Colorado, a pleasant stroll in the still warm evening.  

Grandeur: a hike in Kolob Canyon, Zion NP

 

Saturday, March 12

It's hard to believe: this morning our car wore a thin coat of frost, and now I can see palm trees from the window of our motel. St. George, at a thousand metres lower elevation than Parowan, greeted us with +20 degrees when we rolled down the hill to our motel early this evening. What delighted me more than the palm trees, however, was a big tree covered in a cloud of white blossoms I spotted when we waited at a traffic light several blocks north of here. I guess I need spring to come before summer. This is not likely to happen in the next week or so: bound for Arizona we will definitely encounter summery conditions, and I won't complain a bit.

Today, however, we still got a taste of winter, even though it was strongly laced with spring. We arrived at the entrance to Kolob Canyon, just off I-15 a bit south of Cedar City, at noon. Our first stop was the visitor centre where we bought an annual 'America the Beautiful' park pass; we will need it for the other National Parks and National Monuments we hope to visit during this trip, and with any luck we can still make good use of it next year in March.

The ranger, who, upon seeing Johann's hoodie with the words 'Going Downhill Fast and Still Farming', suggested he wouldn't have associated Canada with farming (he is not the only one here in the US who has that misconception), told us that the road was closed because of a rock slide a bit further up, cutting the five-mile scenic drive short by maybe three miles. The hiking trails were also affected. Only two were open right now.

We chose the Taylor Creek hike, about five miles round trip, that leads up into a canyon and ends at the so-called 'Two Arches'. We changed into our hiking boots, I also took a hiking pole, and we were on our way. As the name implies the trail leads along Taylor Creek, and by the time we had descended to the creek our boots were muddy from the slick trail: it was warm enough that last week's snow had largely melted here, and a slow but steady flow of hikers turned the trail into a mud slide. These conditions prevailed off and on for maybe a kilometre, which didn't make for the greatest hiking conditions, but the scenery was stunning right from the beginning. The sheer red and golden cliffs rose steeply to both sides of the valley, moving ever closer together as the canyon narrowed. Asked about the creek crossings mentioned in the brochure the ranger assured us that these were easy; only at the time of snow melt the water rises above ankle depth. 'Several' turned out to be many: I forgot to count in the end, but there were easily twenty or twenty-five as the trail followed the creek sometimes on one side, sometimes on the other. Stepping stones aided in the crossings, but often enough the water was shallow enough that we could just walk through, a good way to get rid of some of the mud on the boots.

It was so warm that I soon shed my light down jacket, but as the walls of the canyon slowly closed in on us the mud gave way to first a thin layer, then probably up to three feet of snow. The trail became a trampled path, and every descent to and ascent from the creek at the crossings was icy, which, on the steeper ones, was a bit scary. Had the ranger mentioned the snow we would have brought crampons, but we had not expected these conditions at all. Inexperience, I guess. My pole was some help, however, and I was glad I had taken it along.

For the last kilometre and a half or so the sun no longer reached into the canyon and it got considerably colder. The creek was still covered in ice thick enough to walk on for the last two crossings, but even here the first pussy willows timidly peeked out of their tight brown covers. We were nearing the end of the hike, the 'Double Arch Alcove', the high red wall visible through the trees. 

One more turn in the trail, and there it rose before us in all its magnificence, an amphitheatre of enormous proportions, in rich hues of red striated with white and black, fringes of icicles hanging from ledges high above. Looking up I had an even stronger sensation of being in a cathedral: the ceiling, nature's amazing work of art, was, in its way, as magnificent as any painted by a painter of the baroque. I walked down and stood for a while in this vault, and I felt very small. Every sound was amplified, the dripping of water the most prominent noise, and even our low voices were projected back to us.

Along the high wall across from us two golden eagles slowly winged by in the distance, and a little while later, during a creek crossing, movement caught my eye only a couple of metres from my face: a wren, totally unafraid, hopping in the branches of a willow. The double arches, the biggest and the smallest of the birds of these mountains—I felt like I had been granted the full measure of things on this hike.

For a while we were the only ones at the amphitheatre, until a young hiker joined us; the whole trail wasn't very travelled on this Saturday at the threshold to spring. It likely was a very different story in the main part of Zion where even before the park closes completely for car traffic on March 15 shuttles are running on the few weekends before.

Sometimes the creek seemed to run almost golden even in the dark part of the canyon, a hue derived not from the sun but the surrounding mountains.

The trail had not improved on the way back. Once the canyon opened up the muddy sections had become even muddier, but some stretches were dry already, and if there isn't a major snowfall in the next while the trails will probably soon be in much better condition.  Again we passed the two log cabins that bear witness of early white settlers, Fife cabin about two thirds of the way up, Larson cabin about one third, both from the 1930s. What might these people have been searching for here? Were they hunters/trappers, or were they looking for gold or silver? What they found for sure was solitude and the grandeur of the nature in which they lived.

It took us nearly four hours to complete the hike, including the time spent at the double arches, which seemed rather long for a not so difficult hike. By the time we reached the trailhead it was warm enough again that we shed our jackets, and during the 45-minute drive to St. George the temperature increased steadily.

Sunday, March 13

Today it will get even warmer: we will soon be on our way to Boulder City, Nevada, a drive of a little over two hours, drive past the Hoover Dam and park our car on a parking lot a few miles south of there. Tonight we will pitch our tent at the Ringbolt hot springs.

A day of out-of-the-way places: Meadow hot spring and Parowan, Utah

 

Friday evening, March 11

It's been a day of out-of-the-way places, which, so often, are the very best. Asked about other hot springs we could visit on the way south Jay suggested Meadow hot springs not far from the village of the same name.

We found the turnoff to Meadow, about 150km south of Spanish Fork on I-15, without a problem, but without any signage we had to ask directions to the hotsprings at the last house in the little town.

 Then, we had no trouble finding it since the dirt road leads directly there after about ten or twelve kilometres. It's hard to believe that anything but pasture and cows could be found in that flat, nearly treeless landscape, but we did arrive at a place where three or four parked cars indicated that something right there in the middle of nowhere must be of interest. And indeed there was! A short walk along a deeply rutted, after recent snow still partly muddy road we found the hot springs, maybe 10m diameter maximum but quite deep at about 6m. Only three people were soaking at the time, two of them self-proclaimed hippies (the pool is on private land and clothing optional, though officially that isn't permitted in the state of Utah), and Johann quickly joined them while I decided not to, today. One of the 'hippies' wore a cowboy hat and turned out to be a rancher from the area, and he and Johann exchanged their farming experiences - that certainly hasn't happened in any other hot spring we have visited so far. The water is crystal clear in these springs that are actually a crater, the temperature a pleasant 32 degrees Celsius, 'like a bathtub that doesn't get cold', said Johann. My greatest pleasure was to see and hear the Western meadowlark, a rare treat since these birds don't live in north central Alberta.

After this hour-long interlude we were headed south again, still not sure if we'd find a place to stay in Cedar City or St. George. The distance we covered today wasn't that important; our plan is to spend a night tenting at the Ringbolt hot springs, likely our favourite place on this whole trip, Sunday night. Along the way we are trying to find opportunities to hike for a while every day. Both Cedar City and St. George are bound to be busy on a weekend because of the proximity of Zion NP, and we couldn't decide where to book a motel. Where else could we stay, then? The GPS showed that close to the town of Parowan, just north of Cedar City, the “Parowan Gap” was a point of interest because of petroglyphs in great density and number. Dinosaur tracks can be found at the other end of the three-mile long canyon. We decided to check it out.

Driving along wide main street – towns in Utah are built with a lot of space, as we already saw when we stayed in Nephi a few years back – we spotted a sign for the 'Ace Motel' which turned out to be transformed into a series of small shops. But yes, there was another hotel, the Mountain View Lodge. ONE other hotel, no more, although there is a B&B, too, which asked for reservations before you could even look at it, with the owner nowhere in sight. Great luck: the hotel had a room for us, and a very nice one to boot. We took this as a sign: Cedar City and St. George could wait. A stop at the visitor office netted a brochure for the Parowan Gap petroglyphs, and by four in the afternoon we were headed out of town to see what we could find.

According to the brochure , the gap is a three-mile long pass that connects the Parowan and Cedar Valleys, “a classic example for a wind gap—an unusual geological landform marking where an ancient river has cut a 600-foot deep notch through the Red Hills.” A sign for Dinosaur Tracks close to the beginning of the gap was our first stop. Beautiful red and golden Navajo sandstone rocks towered above us, the valley floor strewn with huge boulders sculpted by sun and wind and rain; some looked as if they belonged in an outdoor art gallery. 

We followed the narrow trail, but even knowing that there were dinosaur tracks we couldn't see anything resembling them. After a little while we found small markers shaped like duckbill dinosaur tracks near some of the blocks, and with a lot of goodwill (and still some speculation) we were able to detect the tell-tale footprint on a couple of them. I'm sure that without the markers we would have left without finding a single one.

The petroglyphs a couple of miles further west, on the other hand, were well marked and easy to find and were indeed remarkable. While there is documentation of human occupation as far back as 12,000 years, the majority of the figures are believed to have been carved by the Fremont people who were closely related to the Hopi and other southwestern tribes. They were replaced by the Paiute who still reside in the area.

We were the only visitors to the site and could study the carvings and the different interpretations offered at leisure. There is no one explanation regarding their meaning, but judging by the density and quality of the stone writings this area must have held special significance for the people who occupied it over the centuries.

By now it was a little after five pm, and a cold wind made it uncomfortable even with the sun shining from a deep blue sky. We hadn't really attended to our daily dose of hiking; neither the walk from the car to the hot spring nor the stroll through the dinosaur track and petroglyph sites were longer than a few hundred metres. I needed a tiny bit of convincing to find the thought of hiking in that cold wind attractive, but once I had made up my mind I was fine. Several trails, likely made by off-road vehicles, led into the hills. While it's nice to have a destination to hike to there is a sure attraction in just moving without any plan but to follow the trail to wherever it might lead. In this case it was steadily up towards the next rise, and then the next. Piñon and cedar were scattered on the hillsides, gnarled and stunted and ancient looking. A few piñon cones still clung to the branches, but the pine nuts were hollow and dry by now. The view of the surrounding area was ever more stunning the higher we got. The wind in the trees was the only sound; only close to the bottom of the valley did we hear the faint hum of cars on the highway miles away. By then the wind had died down and it was no longer unpleasant – but maybe that was the result of all that uphill hiking, too ...

A special treat were a group of mountain bluebirds darting in and out of the trees along the road, brief sparks of metallic blue unlike any other blue I've seen in a bird.

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Saturday morning

We'll soon be on our way south again, and next night we will stay in St. George, so we have only an hour's drive at most. That should give us plenty of time to explore Kolob Canyon, the more remote part of Zion National Park. We visited the main part of the park several years ago, and I was very much taken with the colours and rock formations. The word canyon alone is enough to get me excited. 

Cold and hot: a winter hike to Diamond Fork Hotsprings

 

So, have we found spring yet?

When we left our hotel this morning at 7:30 heading for the hills east of here it definitely didn't feel like it: it was overcast and -8, a few thin snowflakes sailing through the air. Even so, the snow-covered mountains to the north and west wore a faint blush from the just-risen sun, a narrow seam of blue sky suggesting that things might change where we were headed, too.

The Quality Inn where we are staying is right on Hwy. 6, and within minutes we were headed out of town. We kept a lookout for the marker to Diamond Fork, which is at about mile 11, and since Johann remembered that the turnoff to the hot springs comes right before a right curve and a hill we found it easily. Another 9 miles or so on the well-maintained narrow paved road brought us to the parking lot. Once again we thought of the first time we had visited here, when the first gate was closed and the road not plowed and we walked 11 km to get to the springs, more than half of it on a paved road. Thankfully this is no longer the case.

We had made arrangements to meet up with Jay, a retired dentist from Salt Lake City whom we had met the first time we were here in 2017 and then again a couple of years later. He comes here three times a week during the winter months. He had once again alerted us to the fact that it gets really busy late in the morning, so he goes as early as possible. When we arrived at the parking lot there were two cars besides his, so all was well.

The area had received a nice snowfall a couple of days ago, and apart from the well-trodden trail it was still pristine. The trail obviously had been quite icy in spots before, but the new snow and cold temperatures combined improved conditions considerably: it was a joy to walk, especially after three days of driving!

It was very quiet, apart from the creek running alongside the trail, its clear waters becoming more and more milky as the trail ascended. Icicles hanging from rocks and tree trunks fallen across looked like trimmed beards or bangs: the rushing river water must keep all of the ones in a group at the same length. Snow covered the branches of maples and oaks, Douglas firs and cedars alike, and from time to time a breeze showered me with a veil of snow, taking my breath away for a moment. My hope of finding a few acorns to take along dwindled quickly when I saw that the sides of the trail were still covered in a few inches of snow.

We encountered nobody, and when we reached the springs after a good hour and a half we found Jay waiting for us, as expected. Only one other guy relaxed in one of the other pools, other than that it was totally empty. Jay had warned us already that we wouldn't find him in the uppermost pool since that was too hot: a lack of snow in the mountains had caused the cold creek from which he used to divert a bit of water to cool down that pool to diminish to the point where it wasn't enough. That is a worrisome development, and Jay told us that after several years of drought Salt Lake City was contemplating limiting even culinary water. Drought is only in part to blame, of course: the Salt Lake City metropolitan-Provo-Ogden area has more than 2.6 million people, and Utah and Idaho are the fastest growing states in the US by percentage of population. High-tech companies from California and elsewhere are moving in, and when there are lots of people they need lots of water. Snow storms like the one a couple of days ago are better than nothing, but a lot more moisture is needed.

Wreathed in steam, our hair frozen, we enjoyed the hot water and Jay's company for a couple of hours before we headed back down the mountain. Amazingly, only five more people arrived during that time, which is highly unusual according to Jay. We encountered a few more coming up on the upper part of the trail, and then suddenly a couple of huge groups of college-aged kids, likely nearly a hundred altogether. Thank goodness we didn't have to share the pool with them!

The sky had started to clear already when we were soaking, and on the way down the sun shone from a deep blue sky, a beautiful sight with the white trees outlined against this backdrop. Some of the snow was starting to melt on the steep southern slopes , and I kept looking for acorns in the now exposed leaf litter under the shrub oaks but found only a couple. The trail was already soft in spots, and here and there some smaller rocks and mud had slid down the hill, leaving a reddish-brown trail in the clean snow. As for the question if we have found spring yet: during the hike down, when the snow was soft under our feet and the sun shone warm on our faces, I felt as if it might be just around the corner. Who knows, maybe it is.

After a half-hour drive we arrived back at the hotel at about three and decided we had done enough for the first day. Tired and happy, we declared the holiday as officially started.

How many days of travel does it take to find spring?

 

After two years of staying largely within the borders of our province, with a couple of breakouts to neighbouring Saskatchewan and one to BC, we are now trying to pick up where we had to leave off in March of 2020. Once again we are on our way south to the warm and sunny American southwest.

So far there is none of that yet, however; in fact, it is more wintry now than it was when we left home two and a half days ago. Then, the newly fallen snow glittered in the afternoon sun which warmed us at least through the windshield. As so often before we asked ourselves why anyone would want to leave now that spring so obviously seemed to be on its way.

Fondue with friends south of Edmonton was a great start to our holiday: one should not have to be in a rush at the start of a long trip. When we left from there around noon the next day the weather had changed considerably. A review of forecasts in the area we planned to travel had already caused us to change our route: a snowfall warning for the Crowsnest Pass and very snowy conditions for the route from Kalispell to Salmon, Idaho didn't sound like a good prospect at all. Reluctantly we decided to give up on making the Goldbug Hotsprings our first major destination of the trip. Maybe we can go back that way if it works out.

We now would cross the border in Coutts/Sweetgrass instead of Roosville south of Fernie, exchanging forests and mountains for prairie, where we could expect less snow. Well – less snow, maybe, but very strong winds instead. Hwy. 2 greeted us with a slew of cars in the ditch on the first 50 km, blowing snow creating hazardous icy conditions. We almost contemplated turning around and spending another night with our friend but persevered and finally found it a bit less challenging. The further south we got the less snow was there to blow across the road, and with warmer temperatures the stretch between Calgary and Lethbridge was no problem.

On the outskirts of Lethbridge my heart beat a bit faster when I spotted a group of geese looking for a place to land: they know that spring will arrive, as, after all, it always does.

We had checked for accommodation just north and south of the border, depending on how far we would get. It would be nice to get the border crossing behind us that evening and spend the night in Shelby. But then the winds picked up again after Lethbridge, and soon visibility became a bigger problem. The blowing snow seemed to meld with the grey sky, and the prospect of driving in these conditions in the dark was not pleasant at all.

Reason had made me give up on the secret hope of spending the night at the chosen option north of the border, a B&B with the interesting name 'The Old Church' in Warner, about 40 km north of the border. Now, that option was suddenly on the table again, and just in time before the turnoff to Warner we found out that they had room. Thank goodness! The prospect of driving another 100km in these conditions would have been daunting.

In Warner, a little village of maybe 350 people nowadays – though, judging by the buildings along main street, it must have been of more importance once - we found the church on 3^rd Street. A bit surprised that there was no sign for a B&B, I nonetheless walked up to the house and was greeted by a woman who laughed, ''Oh, you are at the wrong church!” She pointed me to another one a couple of blocks up the road, and here it was, a well-maintained building with a small square tower on the side, 'The Old Church' displayed prominently on a sign in front.

Stepping through the large wooden doors into a small lobby I felt as if I did indeed enter a church, an impression that was at the same time maintained and dispelled when we pushed open the set of swinging doors leading into the house – well, church. The owners, Pam and Dan, have done a wonderful job integrating the features of a church – the high, open wooden ceiling and beautiful wooden beams, and, as we were to see during a tour of the house, other characteristics like keeping the confession booths and turning them into closets or transforming the choir loft into a bedroom that still is reminiscent of the former use – with the amenities of a cozy yet modern B&B. Coming in from the cold (-12) and wind I immediately appreciated one of those modern features: the heated tiled floor. Our room, too, was comfortable and quiet, and, by a twist of fate, we felt right at home: we were in the 'Latin American Room', ponchos, wall hangings and decor from places like Peru, Chile and Mexico where our hosts had spent time, as we have so often.

How lucky we were to have landed here! Our hosts told us how they had fallen in love with the church when it came for sale, still with pews, the old furnace, a septic system that had collapsed – but also the steep wooden ceiling and a beautiful stained-glass window facing east, how they had transformed it bit by bit to what it looks like now. Dan, who is a stone-mason, built a huge free-standing fireplace between the main area and the kitchen/dining area that, together with the in-floor heating, keeps this big space warm. Pam designs, and he puts it into practice. 

The high wall on one side features 'Downton Abbey' floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, and beautiful antique furniture add to the ambience of the place. After a delicious breakfast and more interesting stories from Dan and Pam's life we were on our way south again, well sustained to face whatever the day would bring us.

While the wind blew the snow around when we first looked out the window it proved to be not as bad as the night before once we were on the highway. The sun had started to shine, still veiled, but the wind was by far not as strong anymore, and we reached the border without problem. After the usual process, in our case longer than it needed to be since we had forgotten to take care of our ESTA online, conducted by friendly border guards, we continued on our way south.

We briefly stopped in Dutton, about 100 km south of the border, where Johann spent a summer working on a farm in 1973. Until three years ago we still visited the farmer's wife who lived at the seniors centre, but she passed away since then, and her daughter wasn't home, so we continued on, with a fuel stop at Costco in Helena. Here, we thought we had finally left poor roads behind – but once again we had to give up on that hope. We were glad when we finally arrived in Dillon at about six last night, light snow falling once again, the wind whipping the big flags across from our motel.

It looks a lot friendlier today, and even with the Monida Pass at the Idaho border still to cross we will hopefully have no trouble reaching Spanish Fork south of Salt Lake City tonight. The motel is booked, in any case.

                                                ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This is how far I got this morning. The internet in Dillon didn't let me post it, and by now it is Wednesday evening.

We are now at the hotel in Spanish Fork, after finally travelling on good roads, for a good part of the day in the sunshine. We started out from Dillon in -18 degrees Celsius, this cold staying with us until we had descended from Monida Pass (which, btw, was no problem at all). The country looked beautiful in its thin coating of new snow under the blue sky, the play of light and shadow on the round hills. Travel is easy and traffic very sparse until about Idaho Falls when the first hint of what is to come in the Salt Lake City area can be felt. 

Our timing wasn't perfect: we arrived on the outskirts of this huge city right around rush hour. Yet we managed to get through relatively well without any major holdup and arrived in Spanish Fork still in the light. 

By the time we reached Utah the temperature had climbed to +3 degrees, and with puddles on the side roads and water standing here and there in pastures, with geese, ducks, even swans, and starlings flying in groups, with kestrels and red-tailed hawks hovering over fields that from time to time showed some new green - well, who can blame me for seeing 'SPRING!' spelled out in capital letters, even if a snow shower greeted us when we got out of the car at the hotel?

Tomorrow morning we'll hike to Diamond Fork hot springs which we never reached on our last trip when we turned around to go back home from Arco, Idaho. It'll be great to get moving after three days of driving, to sit in hot water surrounded by snowy landscape.