Our honeymoon started and ended in Salt Lake City, UT. We traveled to Jackson Hole, Grand Tetons, and Yellowstone National Park in between. Even though our time spent in Salt Lake City was short, there are a few stand out places worth noting.
Where We Stayed
Kimpton Hotel Monaco
This hotel was an absolute dream! I could not stop taking decor pictures. The hotel is right in the middle of downtown SLC. And we loved being able to walk around town. Staying at this hotel was really what I was most excited about for our time in Salt Lake City.
It was such a special treat to find a bottle of champagne, a personalized note, and fancy water waiting for us in our room. And we obviously couldn’t miss the complimentary wine happy hour in the hotel lobby.
We asked for as late of a check out as possible. I wanted to spend as much time as possible in our cozy room. We really wanted to relax after all of our travels and hikes. And this gave Jon more time to watch golf.
Where We Ate
Pig & A Jelly Jar
We found this restaurant by searching on google/yelp and decided to eat here because it looked cute (yup..) Such a hipster spot! We ordered basically the only things on the menu that didn’t have pig in them. And OMG so delicious!
Pleiku
Back to searching google maps (true story – I do almost all research on Google maps and Instagram), we found Pleiku. It had some really great reviews and was a 5 minute walk from our hotel. We shared the pho appetizer and general tso chicken for dinner.
Bambara
After sleeping in, we eventually made our way downstairs to Bambara, the restaurant inside the Kimpton Monaco Hotel, where we were staying. Everything on their brunch menu looked so good, it was so hard to decide what to order. I ended up ordering savory (omelet and potatoes) and Jon ordered sweet (french toast, pictured below) and we shared. The decor, the service, and the food are definitely worth a visit, even if you aren’t staying at this hotel.
Red Iguana (2)
I had asked for dinner recommendations for Salt Lake City in a travel facebook group. And multiple people said we had to go to Red Iguana. We were on a bit of a time crunch as we had to head to the airport but I really wanted to squeeze in a stop and check it out. Reviews of the restaurant talk about how its so good and they get so busy that they opened a second restaurant literally around the corner. We went to the original restaurant first but they had such a long wait. They suggested going to their other location because its bigger. They also had a lobby packed with people waiting for a table. We ended up sitting at the bar and only waited a few minutes.
They’re known for their mole sauces/dishes. Ask to try them all and they’ll bring you a plate like the one pictured below. You can then pick one and order one of the mole meals or do what we did and order whatever you want and dip your chips in the sauces.
What We Did
..not much.
We didn’t spend too much time in Salt Lake City and our one full day in town was Sunday. So most things were closed.
We walked to the Temple Square for a quick visit. We didn’t take a tour or go inside (even the places we were allowed in), but just checked it out on our own. As you walk around, there are so many beautiful flowers.
We walked over to the library to see an art exhibit. And then found a sports bar that was open to watch the rest of the golf tournament. Shitty food & service, but they had beer and tv’s.
We then went back to our hotel to collect our things and rental car and drove over to the Hall of Breakfast. Again, with my instagram researching skills I found this temporary art exhibit and just had to add that into our itinerary.
Other things to do in Salt Lake City:
- Go hiking. If we had somewhere to shower and weren’t going to be sitting on a red eye flight, I definitely would’ve wanted to check out the mountains and hiking trails around Salt Lake City.
- Family History Library – Salt Lake City has the world’s largest genealogy library.
- Utah Olympic Park
Read more about our trip:
