If it's a mine shaft, can you still call it speelunking?

Being a teacher has it's perks. We're on spring break, and when the rest of the 9-5'ers were working, Paperback Writer and I were cruising the highways and byways of Juab and Tooele (two-ill-uh) counties. It started out as a ghost town hunt. No, not as in the ghost town where the Brady Bunch gets locked in the old jail. Ghost towns are scattered throughout this area, towns that are still inhabited, but have suffered since the mining boon days. In Eureka, the first town we went to, there are dilapidated buildings right next to the functioning General Store. They even have a brand new High School in town, yet the old theatre is roofless and gutted. We ran into Mr. Davis at the Painted Lady knick nack store who told us all about the history of Eureka, with pictures and everything. Up on the hill, past the brand new homes being built, was what looked like an old power station. One corner was completely missing and there was nothing but structural beams inside. It was fenced in so we didn't get a real good look, but I got a few good pictures. Further down the road we came across an old mine of some sort. At first glance all we saw was what looked like a ramp for dumping the ore in trucks or trains, and a big hole where a mountain used to be. We went up to it and found a mine shaft. Maybe 100 feet long and straight through the solid rock. From the looks of things, it seems that it was the original shaft for mining, until they decided to do some open-pit mining, which kind of plugged up the back end of the shaft. Anyway, we walked all the way to the back, but didn't try looking out the back because that was the one area that didn't look to secure, and the opening didn't look that big anyway. From there we headed north around the Oquirrhs, figuring we'd head home through Tooele, up to I-80 and SR 201 past Magna. Somewhere around the small town of Vernon we got hungry, so we decided to stop at the Silver Sage Cafe and see what they had to eat. As a kid we went on a lot of road trips and my dad had this incredible knack for finding the best food where you would least expect it. It seems I've inherited the talent because as soon as Writer pointed out the place I knew it was the place to eat. And I was right. We ordered the special "Chick ala Rick", grilled chicken, onions and mushrooms topped with melted swiss cheese. The owner told us that one of their cooks had invented it just the other day, and believe it or not, I guessed the cooks name. Anyhow, it was excellent, and even came with those big, crispy fries that weren't soaked in grease. Excellent meal, and with a coke came to $6.44. Harland came in for a cup of coffee, two other people that the owners knew by name came in for lunch. The theme song to "Cheers" started running through my head as I realize Writer and I were the only ones that the owners didn't know by name. Great people, they didn't even flinch when I asked if I could move their rolling trash can out from between the gas pumps so I could get a picture of my '69 Ford next to their 1970's pumps. Remember the pumps that had the numbers on gears that turned as the gas pumped. Yeah, move the decimal from 3.27 to .327 a gallon and you'd swear I took the picture back in 1971. Well, it's almost midnight and the synapses aren't working at peak efficiency (no comments, please) so I think I'll head off to sleep. I have a bunch of pictures of the trip (no kidding?) and as soon as I get their captions done, I'll let ya know.......