Salt Lake City Utah
Trip Dates
November 17 – 20 2016How I got there
I got to Salt Lake City on the same Turbo Prop Alaska Airlines plane that took me to Carson City the month before. It was a pleasant flight, and since it was longer than the 45 minute flight to Carson City they had a beverage service.I learned that Alaska airlines (on Horizon Airlines flights) serves free local beer from Alaska, California, and the Pacific Northwest that is in rotation. I enjoyed a refreshing IPA, they even asked if I wanted a refill!
How I got around
Salt Lake City has one of the best public transportation systems that I have ever seen in my life. I mostly used the light rail to get around, and took a Lyft a few times.Where I stayed
I stayed at the Courtyard Hotel in downtown Salt Lake City.What I did
I arrived on Thursday evening without checking the weather. Nathan warned me that Salt Lake City could get a bit cold this time of year, but I did not listen. In any case, I showed up wearing a hoody in the middle of a snow storm. I made my way to a store and picked up a hat, scarf, and gloves to make it through the rest of the trip. Thursday and Friday I worked, so I did not get a chance to explore most of the city on these two days. The only notable thing was that on Friday night I grabbed dinner at this amazing Mexican place called Red Iguana.Saturday was tourist day. I started off by exploring Temple Square, after I got my fill of the Church of the Ladder Day Saints, I had a delicious homemade turkey pot pie for lunch. With a full stomach I trekked up north a few blocks to visit the state Capitol building.
After that I went to Trolley Square and bought a couple of books from Weller Book Works. I then took the light rail back to the Arena station and went to the Clark Planetarium. I watched a Beautiful Planet on IMAX and it was absolutely breathtaking. I had Chicken and Waffles for dinner at a place called Avenues Proper and then I called it a night.
On Sunday I had an late morning flight so I spent the rest of my time in Salt Lake City packing up and hanging out at the airport.
what was the fuss?
Salt Lake City is nestled in between a breathtaking mountain range and is one of the most beautiful cities that I have ever visited. It has a world class public transportation system, great food, some lovely shopping centers, a robust and lively downtown area, and a rich history. The most surprising thing about being there was the feisty homeless population. That says a lot coming from me since I live in SOMA.
Salt Lake City was the host of the 2002 Winter Olympics and you can see relics of this proud moment throughout the downtown area. When most people think of Salt Lake City and Utah, they think of Mormons. While they do have a strong presence here, there is a whole lot more to the city than just the Church of Ladder Day Saints.
Thank you for reading! Share your thoughts with me on bluesky, mastodon, or via email.
Check out some more stuff to read down below.
Most popular posts this month
- SQLite DB Migrations with PRAGMA user_version
- Using cgit
- My Custom Miniflux CSS Theme
- Setting up ANTLR4 on Windows
- Making cgit Pretty
Recent Favorite Blog Posts
This is a collection of the last 8 posts that I bookmarked.
- Pluralistic: Enshittification and Reverse Centaurs go global (29 Jul 2026) from Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow
- AI Mania Is Eviscerating Global Decision-Making from Ludicity
- No-One Escapes the Permanent Underclass from Fernando Borretti
- Is it ethical to use AI? from charity.wtf
- The logical destination of LLMs from Andy Bell
- Revised rules of engineering leadership. from Irrational Exuberance
- The circus freaks of open source from Drew DeVault's blog
- Clanker: A Word For The Machine from Armin Ronacher's Thoughts and Writings
Articles from blogs I follow around the net
Hacking Workshop for September 2026
I'm pleased to announce that David Rowley will be joining us in September to discuss his talk Optimizing code in the hot path; with examples from tuple deformation. If you're interesting in joining us, please sign up using this form and I will send you an...
via Robert Haas July 31, 2026One and one thing only
I wanted to show you a year’s worth of messages from my barber’s software, because this is what software should be. No spam, no upsells, no growth hacks, no unwelcome cuteness or puzzling verbosity. It’s so curt and straight to the point it should be set i...
via Unsung July 31, 2026Pluralistic: Better to beg forgiveness (31 Jul 2026)
Today's links Better to beg forgiveness: Don't ring the doorbell at the house of no unless you absolutely must. Hey look at this: Delights to delectate. Object permanence: RIP Poul Anderson; P2P at PC Forum; Waitress handed her own stolen ID by carded dine...
via Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow July 31, 2026Generated by openring