How to REALLY get to Glitter Mountain

Last week, Scotty went on a trip to Disneyland without us.

Without us!

But no worries. Due to my excellence in wife-ness, I was fully supportive of this abandonment. Scotty went with three friends, and while slightly jealous, I was absolutely fine with it since it meant I'd get a picture of four grown men riding Winnie the Pooh.



While the fellas were in Disneyland, I took off on a southern journey to Saint George with my Nameless Sister-in-Law. I've been to Saint George lots of times, but I haven't really experienced Saint George. I've been to plays at the Tuachan, attended Time Out for Women, and spent a few moments in Zion, but there is a lot of Saint George that I haven't discovered. It's usually just a stopping point on the way to somewhere else, so this is the first time I've gone to Saint George as a "destination." That, of course, meant I had to google "things to do in Saint George," and in doing so, I came up with this idea to go to a place called Glitter Mountain.

I found a couple of obscure blogs with directions that seemed reliable, and Nameless found the same sources and also assumed them reliable, so one night, after dinner, we attempted to go to Glitter Mountain. The whole spiel about Glitter Mountain is that it is a former gypsum mining site, and it sparkles in the sunlight. It's supposed to be beautiful... amazing... and glimmery. It was supposed to knock our socks of.

Our attempt to go to Glitter Mountain went bad right away. The first error in the directions was an incorrect street name. "Turn on Washington Fields Road" it said... Well, let me tell you something about this Washington Fields Road. It's not called "Washington Fields Road" at the intersection where we needed to turn. It's called 300 Freaking East (or 300 East, as the sign reads). So if you drive up and down the street for half an hour looking for Washington Fields Road, you won't find it. But don't worry, 300 East magically turns into Washington Fields Road a few miles later, so if you have psychic powers, you'll probably know that immediately when you see the sign that does not say Washington Fields Road at all.

So let me tell you how to really get to Glitter Mountain.



Once you're on 300 East, within a few miles, you will come across some construction with a sign that says "Local Access Only." You can just ignore that because you've already been driving for an hour. You'll drive through the construction and formulate a story about "going to that house right there" in case there is a question of why you are driving on a road you're technically not allowed on.

The construction will pass, and eventually, you'll go under an overpass, and then you can get on the dirt road. But see, the obscure blog directions don't tell you that you are supposed to turn right onto the dirt road, so when the road straight in front of you turns to dirt, you will definitely think you're going the right way.

You can then drive 10 miles at 15 mph and wonder why one of the blogs said you can take a van when clearly everyone else who drives there owns a truck or an ATV. People will pass you and look at you funny, but mostly, you will be completely isolated and wonder how long it will take to hike back to civilization by foot in an emergency.

At some point, you will find cattle.

   

They will block the road. They will moo in your window. Their babies will look at you like you're a monster. The babies will run away from you, and as a result, head the opposite direction of their mommies and blame you for a lifetime of insecurity.

 

You will only have to drive for like forty minutes before the road ends in the middle of a cattle corral. You will almost drive into the corral but then you'll think, "Wait, why am I driving into a cattle corral?"

At that point, your sister-in-law will look at her phone and realize she has one tiny bar of service. You will hold absolutely still while she looks up the directions on multiple blogs to compare. One of the blogs will mention turning right after the overpass. You will look at each other and discuss the possibility of a second dirt road 10 miles back that you didn't notice. You will drive back. The kids will be very upset. You will have many feelings that you should just return to your hotel, but pride will keep you on the hunt for Glitter Mountain. You will think, "By darn! Even if I arrive by dark of night, I am finding that stupid mountain, and then I am writing hate mail to all of these bloggers with their useless directions!"

 

You will drive forty minutes back to the underpass where you will discover that, indeed, there is a dirt road to the right. You will rejoice because the road is smooth and you can drive fast. But then you will be sad because it gets washboardy and you will have to go slow.

At some point, you will realize you are heading north, which makes no sense because you are supposed to cross the Arizona border. You will come to a place where the road narrows and only ATVs can continue on. You will turn around and drive back to a fork in the road where you turn south. You will find the Arizona/Utah border, and at that point, maniacal laughter will flow from your very soul.

  

You will continue on for who-knows-how-long, and just when you begin to question your path, you will see a few cars parked by a small, rocky hill.

You will realize that there is nothing about the hill that stands out. If you hadn't seen cars there, you would have missed it, but sure enough, upon closer inspection, it is Glitter Mountain, but there is no glitter because the sun is behind the clouds and it's nearly dusk.

You will yell at Glitter Mountain for being stupid. You will also curse all those people on the internet who said Glitter Mountain was cool, because good heavens! You just spent three hours lost on dirt roads to end up at a small hill that didn't even shimmer!

You will swear to go home and write correct directions on your blog to help all the people on the internets who want to see Glitter Mountain. But then, you will go to get your baby out of the car and decide to change her diaper, removing it promptly, only to discover that she is poopy (unbeknownst to you), and while you are attempting to find wipes with one hand, your baby will stand up in her car seat while you hold her dirty diaper to her bottom with the other hand. And right in that instant, you will feel something wet splattering on your foot, and it will be your son standing next to you. Peeing.

At that point, you won't really remember how you got to Glitter Mountain. You will just know that you did, and that it took a really long time.