Wales

Now that it's March, it's time to celebrate the patron saint of a Celtic nation with a significant diaspora in the United States. 

Yep, it's time for St. David's Day!

Yesterday, March 1, was St. David's Day, the national holiday of Wales. I had heard passing reference to the holiday throughout my life, but it really came on my radar in 2017 when I was doing research on Wales for The Saints Abroad. I somewhat celebrated it that year and again in 2018.

To observe the day this year, I decided to take a trip to Wales, Utah, in Sanpete County. I have wanted to do this for many years, and since this year it fell on a Saturday, this was my chance! I picked up my friend Ron, and we headed down. 

We stopped at the town's little park, where there was a Daughters of Utah Pioneers marker from 1948. This marker claims that Tabiona gave Brigham Young "a black rock, saying 'heap burn'." I'm going to guess that the DUP ladies imagined "heap burn" from the westerns they watched and not from an actual source, but I would love to be proven wrong.

We walked around a bit, because Google Maps told me there was a historic home called the Smith Home, but when we got there, it was just a modern home. 

It appears that all of Wales's mailboxes are together. The town is so small that it wouldn't be a burden for the residents to go there, I guess. 

Then we went to Wales Cemetery. It was fun to see the pioneer-era graves with Welsh names and people who were born in Wales.

The cemetery directory was behind plastic that you couldn't read through, and there was a wasp nest in it

Then we went into nearby Wales Canyon, which looked cool. There were some conglomerate outcroppings with very large cobbles. We walked around a tiny bit, which made our shoes very muddy. 

We went to another cemetery at a settlement called Freedom (because the name Draper was already taken). I was surprised that this cemetery is better maintained than the bigger Wales Cemetery. 

We also drove through little Jerusalem, but there were just houses and dirt roads, so we didn't get out. We passed various poultry enclosures (probably turkeys), since Sanpete County is turkey country.

Then we stopped at a Bigfoot-themed restaurant called Poutine Yeti's in Fountain Green. We got Navajo tacos made with foot-shaped frybread.

It was a fun way to spend the first day of meteorological spring and see parts of the state I haven't seen before.

Also this week, I started a Bluesky account! I'm in charge of finding people to review books for Utah Historical Quarterly, and I hope that it will help me find qualified reviewers, since I've already exhausted the people I know from the University of Utah, the Church History Department, and UHQ's list of contacts. I used to stalk Twitter, but then Elon Musk has singlehandedly ruined it. I have a great deal of schadenfreude for him.

And to close, here are this week's dreams.

people light aerial fireworks in January for no apparent reason

Mark moves in with messy college roommates

Mark has to sleep on a mattress on the floor because the bed is covered with junk

Mark sees water go uphill up the street

Mark comes up with the word "ex-ceed-fab-gasty" (I'm impressed it got this one! This word was a combination of excel, exceed, flabbergasted, fabulous, and gasp.)

Mark carries David in a basket on a pole at a trailhead at the golden hour

Mark drives Lindsay's car to the video store and plans to run home

Mark has to clean the house on Christmas morning because his professors are coming

the rock singer autographs a pen and gives it to Mark

the rude woman bus driver tells a woman she can walk farther