Rudi got some time off to clear his head yesterday morning, and I got some this afternoon, when I spent a couple hours at a cafe reading and luxuriating in the sunshine.

This is the view behind me of the Uintas:

And this is off toward the west and the Oquirrhs (pronounced like ochres):

Our drive north today started later than we’d planned, as it nearly always does. To be fair, 4:30 in the morning isn’t the natural departure time for either Rudi or me, so the fact that we were on the road at 9 a.m. is really impressive.

But it also meant there were more people, some of them doing crazy things with their cars. Luckily, we were really only caught in standstill traffic a couple of times, but we’ve made this drive enough times over the years that we have a solid understanding of alternative roads. It’s just that those alternatives put you onto state roads that are just slower and less direct.

We detoured through Princeton and opted to stop at a used music shop for an hour. Their Christmas cd collection was a lot lighter when we left!

In the end we pulled into my parents’ driveway nearly a dozen hours after we left the Burrow. While it was a slow trip, it wasn’t a horrible one.

But I am glad we don’t have to drive back until Monday.

I have Thursday off in celebration of Veterans Day and Rudi and I are going to head out of the city for some together time.

But we’re torn between heading to the mountains (we’re past peak color, but there are still leaves on the trees) or to the beach (temps in the mid-60s and getting progressively cloudier as the day goes on).

Unsurprisingly, I’m leaning toward the beach. After all, I was just in the mountains.

Before I get too far away from my trip to Salt Lake, I thought I’d share a few more photos:

These are all from the same road, within half an hour of each other in Big Cottonwood Canyon:

I don’t think I’ve ever eaten inside Silver Fork Lodge before, but there was a foot of snow on their deck and they showed no inclination to serve us out there. I parked myself as close to the fire place as I could.

This is Silver Lake. It’s encircled by a boardwalk, some of which goes along the shore, while other parts skirt the marshy sections along its edge. As you might be able to guess, we couldn’t tell which was which and which was just straight up pond. We followed some tracks for a ways, but then turned around before we fell in.

This is one of the few maple trees in the area.

You’re just driving along all content in the knowledge that October is fall, and then, boom, someone plants a wintery Rocky Mountain in your path.

Tomorrow afternoon, I’ll head east again, and Rudi will stay here to continue our work for another 10 days or so.

We’ve nearly filled three dumpsters full. We’ve found many of the things Rudi was hoping to, but not the thing his mom’s been asking about, which distresses me.

We’d originally hoped this trip would allow us to get the house emptied and on the market, but I’m less optimistic that’s goong to happen than at the outset. But maybe one more trip after this.

And that’s nothing to sneeze at.

Three beautiful things from my past week:

1. Several beautiful days here in Salt Lake.

2. The crews, a team of professional organizers and a group of haulers, Rudi hired to help us clear out his mom’s house here in Salt Lake have been as good as promised. The ground they’ve helped us cover would have taken us months.

3. Rudi needed a pair of shorts, so I took a look at tops for Rudi’s mom. I found two, both of which she liked.

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world lately?