Everybody who comes to Salt Lake City at Christmas time loves to see the lights on Temple Square. Our Salt Lake Christmas Tour “family” is no exception. Doing some reading about all the lights I marveled at the logistics of getting them up and down and thought you’d enjoy knowing too.
Some 35 acres are decorated; that’s Temple Square and the surrounding plazas. And over 100 smaller trees are brought in and positioned to further decorate the grounds. Over 100 workers are on the grounds putting up nearly a million lights. It takes four months (Aug-Nov) to put up the lights and two and one-half months (Jan-mid-Mar) to take them down. The one tree with the most lights is the (always red) Cedar of Lebanon with 75,000 lights. They are turned on the day after Thanksgiving and turned off January 6th.
And why do they take them down every year? Even with the switch to LED lights (since 2007) the lights produce heat which can damage the trees. A bigger reason is that the tree branches keep growing and the lights used one year might not fit the next.
Besides all the lighted trees, luminaries line the walk-ways and fountains and there are several different nativities, both large and small, positioned for the thousands of folks to visit.
My favorite is the reflecting pool in front of the Temple with the hundreds of floating bubble lights….. what is your favorite?
Donna, aka Mother Hen, until next peek.