In the a century old, inspired not by some wild college all-nighter but from the pages of a fifth-grade Weekly Reader. A genteel tea service -- delicate cups on saucers, complete with sugar bowl and creamer -- rests on a tray floating by a bathing-suited couple lolling in sunny Great Salt Lake.
A wedding finally gave me the chance to experience my own briny baptism in Great Salt Lake, a remnant of prehistoric freshwater Lake Bonneville. In the time of mastodons some 20,000 years ago, Lake Bonneville stretched over what is now Utah, Nevada and Idaho.
The capital of Mormonism:
The traveled to Salt Lake City to celebrate the marriage of my New York friends Scott and Nancy, who planned a late-September ceremony in the near by Wasatch National Forest. The snow and Sundance crowd were months away.
But the Mormon impact is felt year-round. Temple Square is the heart of Salt Lake City, with a street system based on a grid that sets longitude on the temple's eastern edge and latitude on its south.
There is no problem, however, finding the Mormon Temple, despite its location on West North Temple Street. Begun by Brigham Young in 1853 and home to members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Neo-Gothic structure boasts a 210-foot tower topped with a gold-leaf statue of the angel Moroni.
Resorts rise and fall with the water:
After serving breakfast that included freshly baked, sweet croissants and yogurt, the Armstrong Inn cook recommended the marina at Great Salt Lake State Park in Magna, about 20 miles west of the city. I had to admit: I hadn't seen any advertising or commercial attention devoted to the lake. I wondered if it was safe to wade in, even for a veteran of Lake Erie. De Freitas of Friends of Great Salt Lake concurred. "You can swim in Great Salt Lake without any fear of any sort of contamination."
The Utah Division of Water Quality oversees the water quality, she said. "There's this myth that the Great Salt Lake is dead. But it's very much alive. A very special biodiversity is there."
A tempest instead of a teacup:
Let's the salt air is a good example. The elaborate Saltair Pavilion was built on 2,000 pylons, with a bridge leading to the water for lounging, swimming and dancing. At fresher morning good air to breath take mind relaxe and cup of tea.After a massive fire in 1925, the resort was rebuilt. But its days of grandeur were over.
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