Star Valley Wyoming Temple
This trip to the Star Valley Wyoming Temple was made possible by Frontier Airline’s $150 round-trip airfare from Washington DC to Salt Lake City. I love it when I get those fares!
The Accomodations
Contrary to my normal approach, where I land at 11:30 PM and just sleep at the airport until I can get some kind of transportation the following morning, my wonderful sister insisted on picking me up and taking me to her home. The accommodations were necessary because my rental car can’t be picked up until 8 o’clock the following morning. So I took her up on her offer without much of a fight!
She and her husband picked me up and drove me to Sandy where I quickly hopped into bed in one of her spare rooms. That’s the good news. The bad news is it was a full-size bed and my feet hung out quite a bit at the bottom. That made it hard to fall asleep. After about 30 minutes I took the thick bedspread off the bed, folded it in half, laid it on the floor, brought down the pillows, threw a blanket over me, and quickly fell asleep. Still much better than the airport!
The Drive to the Star Valley Wyoming Temple
The Star Valley Wyoming Temple is 210 miles from the Salt Lake airport. After sleeping at her house, my sister and her husband drove me back to the airport where I picked up the rental car at 8 AM. She hopped in with me and we were off. Did I mention it was her birthday? This wonderful sister of mine decided to spend her birthday driving 200 miles one way to go to a temple and then turning around and coming back the same day.
The drive up was actually fun. The roads were great and the snow covered hills and mountains were beautiful.
We went through Montpelier, Idaho and a town called Ovid. Somewhere along the way we got close to Bear Lake and saw this handsome dude standing alongside the road. I assume it’s a life-size replica of this famous local bear.
Welcome to Afton and the Star Valley Wyoming Temple!
We arrived in Afton, Wyoming (population 1911) at 11:45 a.m. We missed the 11:30 endowment session just barely, so she went in and did three initiatory’s; I did five, we spend a few moments together in the celestial room, then it was off for lunch. We had a lady take a picture of us just as we were leaving. It turns out she’s a native of Afton. At the time it was 7° outside. I asked her how cold it gets in Afton. She said one time it got to a -65°. Then she said, “A -45° is tolerable; but when it gets down to -65° even the rabbits get ticked off!”
Time for Lunch!
We went to lunch at the Salt River Grill. I got the Hawaiian Barbecue Burger; she got the Club sandwich. We were both very happy! After lunch we headed back home and this time came through Evanston, Wyoming and Park City, Utah. We got back to her house around 5 PM, giving her awesome husband Steve enough time to go party with her that night for her birthday.
It was a wonderful experience not only to go to the temple in Afton Wyoming but to spend a day with my sister just the two of us. She summed it up the next day very well. She said, “I will always remember this day!”
After leaving my sister, I stopped in at A& W and got a root beer freeze, a staple for any of my visits to Utah. I then drove an hour south to Spanish Fork where my mother was thrilled to see me. The Star Valley Wyoming Temple is my 70th temple visited since January 2017 and my 22nd temple visited for “2019.”