Trekkin' (Days Three and Four)

If you haven't checked into my blog for a while, scroll down to Trekkin' (Day One) first, then go up to day two before reading this post. It will make a lot more sense and make me feel better (whether or not I ever even find out). Just do it, OK?

So, day three of Trek was Friday, but we pretended it was the Sabbath. We spent the morning in camp, which was a really good thing for several reasons. First, we were all still exhausted from Thursday's events, emotionally and physically. Second, after the hoe-down, it started to rain, and rain, and rain, and rain. It wasn't just a sprinkle, either. It really came down and didn't stop until about 7am on Friday. The entire camp was soaked. Most of the tents flooded, sleeping bags, pillows, clothes, and everything else was drenched. Fortunately, we stayed dry because we borrowed army spring bar tents (way to go, Dad!) but we were the lucky few. We were told to not pack up our things in the morning, but to wait until after the Sabbath activities and they would make the decision then.

We attended several "church meetings" on various subjects like prayer, family unity, and gratitude. They were all very good. We were then given free time to ponder, read scriptures, or pray.

We then gathered together by the stream where we witnessed a real baptism. A little boy in our ward, whose dad was on Trek helping out, was chosen to be baptized here. It was such a neat experience to watch! The bishop tied it to our Savior and his baptism in the river Jordan. The talks and music again brought my emotions to the surface. It was a wonderful morning!!

The word was then sent out that we were not going to pack up our tents and move on to the next camp. Things were simply still too wet. But we were to pack our buckets (what we used to sit on in camp and also put our personal things in) and water and head out into the hills for a short walk. It sounded wonderful! Our tents kept us nice and dry, but they were also SO heavy! Our handcart was so much lighter with only our buckets. We also were only going about 4 or 5 miles instead of our original 8 to 10 to get to our next camp site--another bonus. And don't forget the joy of not having to take down our campsite and put it back up somewhere else. We thought it was great news! So this is us heading out of camp with our lightened load.

We first went back to the giant kilns where we heard a talk on keeping your promises to people and keeping your covenants with God. Good stuff.

We then went up the road to Piedmont, the ghost town and heard from a pioneer who was one of the rescuers of the handcart saints. He was sent from Salt Lake by Brigham Young to help those freezing and starving in the mountains. He told us he felt it was a privilege and an honor to have been called to help those people.

This was the rest of the ghost town...a few houses and a school. Pretty neat.

We then started up another hill and at the top, we met Miss Fortune for the last time. This time, she took the life of our little baby, Ephraim. He was just a doll that we had to carry around and one of our sons even used him as a pillow. We hadn't taken excellent care of him along the trail (often putting him in his "cart seat"), but when it came to burying him, it became real to me. Ryan and I had to speak at the funeral. I, being a big boob, cried through it and expressed my feelings about what the pioneer had said just moments before. I, too, felt so honored and privileged to be called as a mother in real life, and also to be called to be a Ma on Trek...to be allowed to feel the spirit so strong and to have the experiences that we were having was a gift. There were so many great people who could have been asked to go instead of us, but we were given the opportunity, and I was so grateful. I cried when they put my baby in the ground, it was tough to watch.

We then went further on and found King Lamoni. He was a king of the Lamanites in the Book of Mormon who led a group of people who had made a covenant with God to never fight another battle. They buried their weapons in the ground and when their enemies came upon them, they kept their covenant and perished. But by keeping their promise, many of their enemies were converted to the gospel. At this trailside, we were asked to make a covenant with God of something we would do to draw closer to Him. We wrote our promises down and put them in the hole, to be later buried, symbolizing our own personal commitment. It was neat to see all the youth make promises to Heavenly Father to do a little bit better in their lives.

That completed our journey of day three. We walked back to camp and had the rest of the afternoon to hang out with our families. We had a great time. We had really bonded the past few days while pulling that handcart, and it was so nice to just be together. We played games and just talked. It was so neat to hear them opening up to each other. My love for them grew even more. I was so glad we didn't move camp--we wouldn't have gotten that chance to be together in that way.

Chris and Brittany changing hats...the bonnet looks good on you, Chris!

Hanging out at our tent...sitting on those very uncomfortable buckets and just chillin'

So, that concludes day three. Day four was Saturday and "going home day"! We had a morning fireside and testimony meeting with both our company and then the whole camp. We then packed up our handcart one last time....

And here is one final shot of us heading to the buses. On the handcart was our family flag...it was the Wilson Family flag. We walked all that way and had all those experiences in honor of Ryan's great, great grandpa, Thomas Wilson. He crossed the plains with his family when he was just fifteen years old! I looked at my sons, and knew that each one of them could have done what Thomas had done. I was so proud of all my kids!! What a great experience!

OK...so I wanted to write a few more things down, so hang in there with me---almost done!

What I LOVED about Trek:

• My youth "kids". It was amazing to me how wonderful they all were. They each had such different personalities, but they all came together. Some have been through some tough things in life already and they are so strong. Stronger than I was at that age. Being with them made me miss serving in Young Women.
• Having my wonderful hubby there. What a neat gift to be able to share all of these experiences with the one you love. I felt bad for some of the adults that were there helping along the way, but without their spouse. I loved spending time with him, every minute with him is so precious--I don't get very many sometimes. I was lucky to have him there!
• All of the hard work people put in to pull this off. What a huge undertaking to feed, corral, and herd hundreds of people in the wilderness!! It was marvelous and I don't know how they all did it!
• Of course, the spirit that I felt almost every minute of the Trek. What a spiritual shot in the arm!
• No cell phones, computers, TV, or any other distractions! This was especially great for Ryan who is swamped at work. I'm so glad he could get away from "crazy central" and come out here for some peace and quiet!
• Another big shout out to my dad who scored us three huge army tents! They kept us nice and dry! Yahoo!

What I didn't LOVE about Trek:

• Sitting on those horrible buckets. We sometimes had to sit on them for hours and let's just say, that it's not so great for the back or the behind.
• Trying to open the buckets. It was so frustrating!! I always needed help getting mine open!
• My bonnet tried to kill me all along the trail. It would fall off my head and immediately try to choke me---luckily I survived.
• My feet didn't make it through Trek. All along, we kept telling our kids to make sure they weren't getting blisters. If they started to feel a "hot spot" on their feet, we would stop and put padding called Mole skin over the area to prevent it from turning into a blister. Well, after the second day, my toes were really sore, but they didn't feel like blisters, just jarred from all of the walking. But upon further inspection, I had blisters all over. My baby toes were the worst, they were completely liquefied! The ENTIRE toe....liquid!! OOOUUUUCH!
• To go along with the last entry, I'm going to have to say my hiking boots. Apparently, they weren't as good as we previously thought.
• Outhouses---that's all I'm going to say about that one.
• Cow Pies---again, 'nuff said
• Wait, I lied. I have to say a little bit more about the Cow Pies. They were bad enough the first few days, but after the huge rain storm, they all became "fresh" again! Watch out!
• We were given Gatorade powder to mix with our water out on the trail. It was really refreshing, but the powder would get everywhere because of the wind! I was so sticky and smelled like Gatorade for a large portion of Trek (I guess that's better than smelling like BO)
• Bloomers!! What a pain in the butt! I feel sorry for anyone who had to actually wear those things on a daily basis!
  

So, there's my synopsis of Trek. It is more for me than anyone else. I wanted to jot these things down while they were fresh in my mind so I would never forget these four days. I'm glad to be home with my kids in my nice warm bed, but I am also so grateful for the chance to go.

Trekkin' (Day Two)

Day two of Trek was a lot more emotional than day one. I hope I can blog about it adequately. The day started early...we had to pull down our camp, eat breakfast, hold a family devotional, and load our handcart before 9:00 am. We had had a horrible time the first day with the bedding falling out of our handcart, so we were excited at how well we packed our handcart the second day...everything was organized and easily accessible, should we need something (it's the mom in me). We were the third company scheduled to be moving out, so we spent the morning playing pioneer games in our camp.

In this game, everyone wore aprons and threw water balloons to each other with their aprons. You also had to catch the balloons with your apron...our family was not so good at this game, but it was fun to watch, especially since Pa had to wear the "Ma" apron.

We then moved on to rifle shooting and axe throwing. Maybe some people would worry about teenagers using these weapons for sport, but I thought it was fun to watch.

This game was called "Amoeba". We held hands in a circle around the garbage can, and tried to make everyone else touch the can without you touching it. If you touched it, you were out. I have some really strong kids. It came down to Pa and McKay....they called a tie when they were both too pooped to go on.

Then, of course, was the stick pulling. It has been told that this was one of Joseph Smith's favorite games (he was known to be very good at it). Our kids had fun, and Brittney kicked my butt. Either she is really strong, or I am a huge wimp....the jury is still out on that one.

Brittney and Wilson were fun to watch walking on their stilts...

This game was called the "A frame pull". Someone stood on the A frame with about a dozen ropes attached to the top. We then needed to work as a team to get the A frame to move, some by pulling on their ropes, others by moving their ropes. It was harder than it looked, but really fun. We had to communicate really well, so the person in the middle didn't fall.

This was a reoccurring theme...Pa's hat trying to choke him to death. My bonnet had a death wish for me as well.

After the morning of games, we got ready to cross the river and start our journey to the next camp. I love this picture of my family's tootsies....

So, here is where the day gets hard to write about. We started our walk at about noon and faced a lot of challenges, some we knew would be coming, others we didn't.

We met up with Miss Fortune shortly after leaving camp. A baby in our company passed away, and we attended the funeral. The Ma talked about her own kids and how precious they are and how this little rag doll represented a real baby who died on the trail. It was touching.

Our misfortune was that our handcart became stuck in the sand, and we therefore had to remove everything from our handcart, pull it empty 10 yards, and re-pack it. Ugh! This was after we had done such a great job packing our handcart in the morning---oh well, the real pioneers really did get stuck in sand, mud, ravines and snow, so I won't complain. The second packing job wasn't a good as the first, but we managed--it took us over a half an hour to complete the task.

Once back on the trail, we ran into "John Taylor". He was a prophet of our church and was in Carthage Jail the day Joseph Smith was murdered. He sang "A Poor Wayfaring Man of Grief". It was absolutely beautiful and touched my heart.

We stopped to rest a little while later...here is where the actual pioneers came through on their way to the valley. There were several people buried here and a member of our Stake Presidency talked about how their sacrifice made this spot of desolate land sacred. He told us we need to make our homes and secret places sacred and a place we can go to where we can escape from the temptations of the world.

I really wish I had a picture of this next part, but I don't. Shortly after this, we came upon a huge hill. We all stopped at the base of it, and gathered around a lady who was standing there. She told us she was a pioneer and she had lost her sweet husband during their long journey. One night, she woke to find him not breathing. No one in her tent could help her, so she laid beside him until morning. The next night, she couldn't bear to sleep in that tent, so despite the bitter cold, she sat on a log with her three little children, one on her lap, and one on each side of her and sat there through the night. During that long, cold night, her husband came to her in a dream and told her to cheer up, that all would be well. Eventually, she and her children made it to the Valley together.

She then told us that our husbands and sons had all "died" and that we would need to pull our handcarts up this hill without their help. It was so steep and long. I was scared, to say the least, but was determined to succeed. She told us to return to our handcarts and wait our turn. Our handcart was the last in line, so we went back there and waited. When we looked up, every other woman and young woman in our company was pulling the first two handcarts up the hill without us. We felt really dumb about being left behind and not helping with the rest of the group, so we took the next handcart in line and started up....just me and my two teenage daughters. The cart was about 300 pounds I would guess and it was really hard, but we were slowly making progress. We got about half way up when we heard shouting and encouraging words....it was our men cheering us on and telling us we could make it. It made me start to sob, and I mean sob. Our wheel fell into a huge rut and we used every ounce of strength we had. I couldn't believe how strong my girls were, but we could not get that heavy handcart out of that hole. Finally, the rest of the women had pulled the first two handcarts to the top and were on their way back down to help us. We pulled the handcart free and went the rest of the way up.

We then had two more carts to go, and I didn't know if I could do it. I was still sobbing and had no strength left in me. I could hear that sweet Pioneer woman singing "Come, Come Ye Saints" and some of the men joining in. It was just too emotional to take much more. I slowly made my way down the hill and helped the fourth handcart to the top, where I was shaking from exhaustion. I just sat there and cried. Ryan was finally allowed to come and see me, and he was so overcome with emotion, that he could barely speak. He couldn't believe that we would pull that handcart halfway up the hill without help from the other women. We spent several wonderful minutes in each other's arms crying and sobbing, sobbing and crying. Our spirits were one, it sounds so cheesy, but it's true...it was all worth it for that moment. I could really feel his love for me and I knew he was proud of me.

I felt bad that I didn't help get our handcart up the hill, which was the fifth and final one, but I honestly don't think I could have done it...I was disappointed in my lack of strength. I caught a little bit better glimpse of what the pioneers actually went through, only it was everyday, without good hiking shoes and enough food to eat. What amazing people they were! How I learned to love them on that hill!

Ryan said it was one of the hardest things he has ever had to do, watching me pull that handcart and he wasn't allowed to help. But his frustration didn't end there. Before we could even catch our breath, Ryan and our TWO strongest sons were called to go on a "mission" to England. We had to watch them leave while we were forced to move on without them. They caught up to us a little while later. It was again, so emotionally taxing, but we made it through. Oh, to have the faith of those pioneers!!

Here is a picture of me and my two daughters shortly after the "Women's Pull". They are both so strong, spiritually and physically. I was so proud of them!!

The rest of the day was no where near as exhausting as earlier---we made it to Piedmont, which is a small ghost town. Just outside of camp were these HUGE kilns that were used when the trans-continental railroad was being built. They were neat to see, and we were allowed to go in them.

Once we got to camp, we set up, ate dinner, and had a hoe-down with the whole camp. I just watched, I had used all of my energy earlier in the day.

I went to bed with emotions still very close to the surface. What a wonderful experience! One that I will certainly never forget. I am very grateful for the opportunity to experience a little of what these pioneer Saints went through, and honored to be called a Saint as well. I hope I can live up to that name!

Trekkin' (Day One)

I'm really excited to post about Trek, but I'm also worried that my thoughts and feelings won't adequately come through in my writing. My emotions are very close to the surface, so I hope I can figure out how to journal this amazing event.

For those of you who don't know, Trek is something our church does as a youth activity. We go up to Wyoming, wear pioneer clothes, pack our stuff in a handcart, and pull it several miles to re-enact the Mormon Emigration of the mid 1800s. Sounds strange, I know, but the Mormon pioneers went through a lot to get to the Salt Lake Valley and they did it because of their faith in God and their belief in our religion. We re-enact this event to help our youth understand a little of what they went through and help them gain a better understanding of our ancestors and for them to gain a stronger testimony.

Ryan and I were asked to go as "Ma and Pa" to a "family" of teenagers. We went as a group, pulled the handcart together, ate together, camped together, and really grew close to one another. Ryan and I had seven "children" ranging from ages 14 to 18. Five boys and two girls. We were also given a "baby" (rag doll) who represented an actual baby who died along the trail.

We left Wednesday morning and returned Saturday night. What an amazing, exhausting, emotional, sometimes painful and very spiritual four days!!!! I am going to post one day at a time, so I can keep my thoughts in order.

When we arrived at the church on Wednesday morning, we didn't really know what to expect. We didn't go on Trek when I was a youth, so I had no idea what it would be like. We had had several meetings for the Mas and Pas, but until you actually go, you don't really have a clue what is involved. We were assigned our "children" right off the bat, most of whom I didn't know. Then we separated into families and got to know each other a little bit. Most of them were excited to go, a few didn't look thrilled at all. It was interesting to me to see their personalities come through so early on....they were all so different. Shy kids and outgoing kids. I really hoped we could mesh as a family. At about ten o'clock, we got on the bus and headed for Wyoming, just past Evanston. When we arrived, we found our stuff waiting for us, and we began to load the handcart. We had a hard time fitting everything in. The actual pioneers coming across the plains in handcarts were only allowed seventeen pounds of personal items. Um, we exceeded that by a long ways. (My air mattress was probably half that much!! I have a bad back, OK?!?!)

This is our family packed and ready to go...we were excited to begin.

Loading the handcart was only the first obstacle. We were all eager to get going, so off we went. But the excitement of pulling and pushing the handcart through the sagebrush, cow pies, and rocks wore off quickly. We had a few "whiners" and some of the other kids didn't take too kindly to them. I hoped this was not going to be a theme for the rest of the week. We walked for about an hour and a half and then stopped for lunch. We then walked until about 7:00pm when we finally made it into camp!! We had pulled that handcart for almost seven hours in the heat!!

Here are some of the highlights of day one:

--We had to get our handcart through a huge and treacherous ravine. It took a lot of our strength. Our whole company, consisting of five handcart families worked together to get everyone through and up the other side. It was neat to see so many people helping each other.

--We pulled our handcart down a steep hill called "Gravel Hill". It was steep and very rocky. The pioneers had journaled that it was the steepest hill on the entire Mormon Trail. It was really hard to keep that handcart from rolling down the hill. We had ropes tied to a pole in the back that helped up "pull" the handcart from behind, but it took all nine of us to get down successfully.

--We also got to see "Brigham's Arrow". It is a landmark on the trail of a bunch of rocks placed in the shape of an arrow, signifying the turnoff from the Oregon Trail. Until this spot, both used this route, but at Brigham's Arrow, the Mormons went one way and those going to Oregon went another. A member of our Stake presidency was there and he talked about the crossroads in our everyday life and the decisions we make. Every day, we have a choice to follow where the world goes, or follow where the prophet wants us to go. It was a powerful lesson.

This is my cute family pushing the handcart on the plateau...nice to have a little break from the hills....

--We also ran into Miss Fortune on the trail. She was handing out misfortunes to each handcart. One of our sons was injured near the eyes, and had to be led behind the handcart for thirty minutes until he recovered....not too bad...it could have been much worse.

Like I said, we got into camp at around 7:00pm, set up our camp, ate dinner, went to a fireside about our pioneer ancestors, and crashed....It was a very tiring, but very good first day.