Salt Lake City, Day 3

Day 3 started out just like Day 2 – only this time since we had a plan in mind on how to start off the day, we got ourselves out of the hotel a little bit earlier 🙂  The shuttle dropped us off about 2 blocks or so away from where the bus tour was located which worked out fine since we scoped out where the shopping area was on our way. The next available bus was far enough out that we time to walk across the street to the Nordstroms e-bar for a quick, light lunch before hopping on the bus.

Now, this is where I should tell you that our tour bus driver was a bit of a crank. Ok, perhaps a major crank! There was a video that was set to play in coordination with the route which played over the sound system so that even those of us who chose to sit in the back (and where else would you sit? It was a gorgeous day and if you wanted to take pictures, it gave the best views!) However, Mr Crank Pants thought that HE was the Source of All Knowledge quite superior to the canned video dialogue. And, perhaps he was – I mean, admittedly when we could hear him, his interpretation of history & perspective on the Mormon church and the local politics of the area was very colorful & entertaining and most CERTAINLY not covered in the video!

However, when we spoke up about being unable to hear him he EMPHASIZED that he wasn’t ALLOWED to STOP the bus for any long periods of time and they didn’t provide HIM with his OWN microphone to enable him to drown out the video or the traffic noise SO all he could do is shout and if we wanted to hear him we should MOVE UP FRONT!!

Yeah, no thanks

He also drove that bus as if he thought he was guiding Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride (for all my Disney fans, you know what I mean, right?!) which meant that a lot of my pictures are off kilter or blurred and I am kind of surprised I got as many decent ones as I did! Heck a couple of times as we crested over a hill almost all of us in back threw our arms up over our heads as you do when on a roller coaster because it seemed like the right thing to do! Still, it was a great way to see the highlights of Salt Lake City and as a result we figured out where we wanted to spend our Sunday.

After surviving the bus tour, we went back across to a place of serenity – Nordstroms 🙂 We left Florida mom there trying on UGG slippers while the rest of us wandered the length of the mall just for fun. A final meet up at the e-bar for more refreshments and then we called for shuttle back to the hotel.

We actually had to take a (shock!) cab out to dinner! Oh, the horrors of paying for a ride! Dinner was at the Copper Onion which was a rather hopping bar/restaurant which a copper ceiling and, since we were seated near the open kitchen, the smell of onions grilling (it lived up to its name). I…cannot remember what I had there! I do remember having a couple of lovely mixed adult beverages. I also remember that since this dinner was not as long as the last, we got back to the hotel in time to sit in the Jacuzzi after. And it was from that vantage point that I could look up into the tiny gym area and see the Torture Device that was waiting for me on the morning of Day 4 ;-/