May 14 - United States: Heber City, Utah
Jon made us chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast. This is a good thing, considering we have 10 pounds of pancake mix in the trunk. (Jon went a little crazy at Costco). So at least we can now begin to make a slight dent in the package.
Heather's dog, Fancy, LOVES Jon. Heather thinks its great, but was really surprised by how quickly Fancy took to him. Last night, she walked right up to him and practically invited him to pet her. This is an odd thing for a Kerillian Bear Dog, which are traditionally independent and a bit stand-offish. But she just looooves to have Jon play with her. In fact, he got some quality play time this morning, too.
Jon and Fancy
Wind River Bear Institute
Then we went to the Wind River Bear Institute, the non-profit organization to which Heather has given all her time and energy for the past few years. It's a very small organization, run by a woman named Carrie out of her home. All the dogs live there and are trained there during the winter months. During the summer, the WRBI teams go to the cities and counties which have contracts with WRBI to train the local grizzly bears. (See www.beardogs.org for more information)
Carrie's House/The Wind River Bear Institute
Carrie's house is in a lovely spot in the middle of the valley, with a gorgeous view of the mountains. In addition to the eight Kerillians that live there, she also has three horses and a staff of WRBI employees - depending on who's on duty at the time. From the looks of things, they never get a moment's peace, either. There's always something to be done, and Heather was sucked up into the WRBI vacuum as soon as she showed up. Despite the fact that today was her day off.
Heather In the Kennels with Rio and Carmen
Almost immediately, Heather was involved moving trucks, rearranging dog locations, dispensing dog and horse advice, and conferencing with Carrie. Jon and I didn't mind, of course. This gave us the opportunity to wander around and take pictures.
Salt Lake City
After visiting WRBI and meeting everyone, we headed into Salt Lake City. There, we had lunch at a great pizza place called "Pie Pizzeria" and then went to Temple Square. There, we took a free tour of the temple led by two "sisters" in the Mormon church. But they're not nuns. People in the Mormon church refer to each other as "sister", "brother", and "elder". So these two girls, who are doing their mission in SLC, led us outside the temple, through the Assembly Hall and the Tabernacle, and into the North Visitor's Center.
Mormon Temple
The tour was full of information about the life of the pioneers who settled here, in addition to the history of the Mormon Church and Brigham Young. Of course, there were also the typical plugs for conversion into the Mormon Church.
After the tour, which was only about 45 minutes or so, we went to the "Family Search" center. There, Jon tried to do some digging into his family history. Heather and I tried to some too, but couldn't come up with a whole lot on what little information we knew. Besides, my brother has an entire family tree on his website at www.marstall.com. So we really can't add significantly more to it.
Back in Heber, we got a movie to watch for the evening, but we never actually watched it. Jon disappeared for a few hours to wash and wax the car, and I spent that time doing research on the Internet about Bryce and Zion canyons. And that was our evening, such as it was. But it was nice to spend quality time with Heather.