I tried to fit as many cool things "unique" to Utah in our trip to give the boys the full experience. It was SO fun to "tour" Utah and see some of the sights. We visited Hill Airforce Base and the Kennecott copper mine. They were SO cool, and of course perfect places to go with a bunch of boys.

I couldn't believe how many amazing planes they have on display at the Museum.  The boys were ecstatic.  My Step-dad, Kurt, was in the Air Force in Vietnam and so he had some special insight into most of the planes we got to see.  It was fun to have a personal tour by someone in the know!

   

Levi loved the fact that the tires on a lot of the planes were "Goodyear".  

 

A personal favorite of Levi and Calder:

A lot of planes had a "Kill" count.  The bombs painted on the side of this plane is the kill count for this particular plane.  The kill count is how many enemy aircraft were destroyed by each plane.

This was a WWII plane, I love the cartoon Hilter in a coffin.  Funny!

One of the retired Air Force one planes:

Looks like KK can't be a fighter pilot yet... He can't wear the "ejection" seatbelt!

Boys in love with a "Top Gun" fighter jet

The cool thing about the museum was the simulation port and the hands on part where kids could climb in old planes and play with the gears.  Here is KK all dressed up and ready to fly!

KK in the Cockpit.  (we couldn't get him out of it without a minor war of our own)

Calder and Ansel WAITING and WAITING for their turn....

Finally they get to make their own rockets and launch them.

 

Too much happiness for little boys!

The  Kennecott Copper Mine 

The entire time I lived in Utah, growing up, I never got a chance to see the copper mine.  It is one of the few landmarks visible from space and the largest open pit mine on earth.  It was VERY amazing.  I couldn't believe the extent of it, even when I stood there looking at it.

If you look closely in this picture, you can see rows of drilled holes on the ledge of the flat part of the bottom of the pit.  These are blast holes.  They blew them up while we were watching it was startling.

These trucks were amazing!!  The picture doesn't do them justice, but they are enormous!!!!! They only go a couple  miles an hour and it takes them 45 minutes each way to go down and back up again.  I found it very funny that their ideal candidate for the drivers of these behemoth machines were middle aged women! That cracked me up.  I guess they are responsible enough not to mess them up and patient enough not to go crazy sitting in these things going nowhere all day long.  I know I couldn't handle it.....

Each tire is $500,000.  They were enormous... Look at the size compared to the boys:

 

A close up:

Ah, here is a good perspective photo of the size:

Look at how minuscule that school bus is compared to it! Don't ask me why a school bus was going down into the pit... but it was.  I heard that the employees kids attend school on site, but I still can see why the school would be at the bottom of the pit...

At the end we went into the gift shop and the boys each got to buy their own copper souvenir.  After watching the entire process and viewing the pit, the kids had a new appreciation of all things copper/gold and silver.  What a process!