Ogden, Utah

There are no Lutheran churches in Brigham,  it does have one Methodist church which we considered attending Sunday morning.  John, however, pointed out that there is a scenic canyon and waterfalls in Ogden which he wanted to see.  Coincidentally, Ascension Lutheran church is located in Ogden and we were quite blessed to have attended church services there.  Pastor Muter had some very interesting thoughts on Galatians 6:7-16, both in his sermon and Bible study afterwards.  In the epistle Paul talks about the fact that with Christ's death we have a new spin on the law, it becomes the seed of the gospel.  Now there should no longer be rigid laws and regulations within in the church, for Christ has made all things new.  The law of God brings the love of God to us and should build up the spirit of gentleness within us as we live in relationship with each other.  The kingdom of God is within us as we live out our lives- if we do not get it right there is always God's grace and love.  They were good words to hear once again, and I was thankful we made the effort to get to Ogden for church.  After Bible class the pastor spoke with John and I about his ministry at Ascension- what  was interesting to us was that the church has a drive- through prayer window!

 

The town of Ogden can be seen in the background of the picture above, I snapped it as we were starting to hike up the Waterfall Canyon Trail.  This is a great town to live in if you want to be active outdoors the year around.  Eleven national park's are less than a day's drive from the city.  During the winter season there are three major ski resorts within 25 minutes.  The Waterfall Canyon Trail is a favorite hike for many of the locals.  It is a strenuous hike with a lot of rock scrambling.  The trail is 1.2 miles one way- does not sound like much, but it took us several hours going up and coming back down.

 It was necessary for us to stop and rest at intervals- raspberry bushes filled with ripe fruit and small streams refreshed us on the hot journey upward.  As a side note here, we have found wonderful fruit orchards near Brigham and have been feasting also on sweet cherries and apricots.  Back to the trail- many of the young adults we met on its path were friendly and encouraging to us.  I did not realize how much I missed having young people around us, which is one problem for me with our gypsy life-style!  We did make it to the top, the hike was worth it, once we saw the 200-foot waterfall.

It is difficult to see the waterfall in the picture above as it is spread out in several streams over the width of the cliff.  It felt just great to sit on the rocks below it and let its mist blow over us.  There were also some beautiful wildflowers in this area,  pictured below is a patch of penstemons. 

On our way down we noticed a man coming up the trail carrying what I thought looked like a fat walking stick.  I was glad that I asked him what it was, for he promptly played us some toe-tapping music.

It is a didgeridoo,  a wind instrument from Australia.  The young man said that he wanted to find how how it would sound when he played it by the cliffs and waterfall.  I was tempted to follow him back up to hear some more of the music but we had another waterfall to see in Ogden.   A young man we had spoken to on the trail gave us directions on how to find it.  If we understood him correctly, it is a man-made falls created by diverting the Ogden River up a high cliff through a pipe which hangs over the highway.  There is certainly a lot to see and do in this part of Utah, but tomorrow we are moving on.