Ephraim, UT—We’ve been camping and climbing for the last two weeks in stunning central Utah, two hours south of Salt Lake City in a place called Maple Canyon. The nearest town for supplies is Ephriam, an old fort city with a population of about 6,000. The town is home to Snow College which has a quaint campus full of wonderful resources for both students and the community (not to mention visitors, like us). We’ve enjoyed showers at the rec center and spent many days and nights working at the school’s library, nestled up near the fireplace with lightening-fast WiFi.

During a work break last Friday evening, we decided to check out The Granery Art Center, an intriguing contemporary art space housed in a converted 1870s wheat storage building on the main street. After browsing the current exhibition—which was quite interesting—we stumbled out a side door and found ourselves in the middle of the town’s 2nd Annual Harvest Festival. What luck! Residents who had worked in an adjacent community garden all summer were reaping the benefits of the harvest and sharing the bounty with their friends and neighbors. Each family had brought a dish made from ingredients grown exclusively in the garden and they were asking just $5 a plate to share in the meal. After loading up a colorful spread we sat down to eat with some ultra-friendly locals who explained that the festival and the garden were new initiatives in the city, along with a seasonal farmers market. What a great addition to this small-town landscape.

During our visit to the Harvest Festival we got some incredible recommendations for stops to make on our way out of Ephraim including a place to get the world’s purest salt (35 miles south at the Redmond Salt Mine) and an unparallelled canyoneering excursion in Zion National Park. We purchased some organic tomatoes and a jar of homemade elderberry jam and left the festival very pleased with our Ephraim bounty.