To begin at the beginning, ever since January Joseph and I have been preparing for this epic event. We've had monthly trainings, a couple different firesides, a huge book about the handcart companies to study and read, and hundreds of emails from the stake to help us get ready. Plus, knowing we'd be walking many miles each day we've been preparing physically by running, hiking, walking and biking. And as a ma and pa we were in charge of gathering all the supplies our family would need for making our meals, setting up camp and tending to blisters and other needs of our kids on the trail. Our packing list was huge! We gathered and borrowed and shopped in May and June and felt pretty ready as trek approached.
Just a few nights before trek began we were assigned a big brother and sister for our family and we had them over so we could get to know them a bit and discuss their role as leaders and motivators in our family. After we met Kendall and Susan I felt so excited to be on trek—they are just really good kids and I could feel their enthusiasm about the whole event. It was such a good omen for how all of it would turn out.
Late Tuesday night Ruth Ann came to sleep at our house so she could watch our kids in the morning and get them to my mom's Wednesday afternoon. And thus, at 6 am Wednesday morning we were up at the stake center and ready for trek. It was quite a sight to behold—the chapel filled to the brim with hundreds of teenagers dressed in their pioneer clothes and ready to go. I was so proud of them and felt honored to be among them and joining them on the journey
Our families were announced and as we were family #8 (of 31), we got ours assigned rather quickly and met up with them in the cultural hall. Such a cute group of kids! They were all rather quiet and restrained except for our little firecracker named Girdy who kept the mood light for everyone. She was such a hoot on trek and I really think her totally random humor was good for our family spirit (and really, Joseph and I were the perfect parents for her—we think she's awesomely hilarious ).
Our trek family—all looking so fresh and clean!
Back row: Matthew, Hunter, Susan, Kendall, Girdy and Isaac
Front row after us: Alyssa, Katie and Caitlin
We had a light breakfast and loaded on buses and were off to Deseret Land & Livestock just outside of Evanston, WY. We bonded on the bus, all bright and eager to get to know each other playing some get to know you games.
Once we were at the ranch we had to work fast to load our handcart, arrange ourselves into companies (3 families per company), create our family name and flag, and start off on the trail. We named ourselves the Baby Blue Bandits (due to our family's baby blue handkerchiefs) and off we went. It was a crazy windy day which felt really good in the heat but it made for such a dusty trail. We stopped for short water breaks often and then trudged on and on.
love the sight of so many youth gathered up and ready for the trail
Susan was our resident artist and made our darling flag. We kind of had the theme of the letter "B" going along with our family name so we each wrote something beginning with "B" that we loved or better defined us. I wrote babies and Joseph wrote bike. We also had basketball, baritone sax, beach, ball (soccer), bacon, bow and arrow, broadway and Barbies (yeah, from Girdy who is obsessed and brought a Ken and Barbie on trek just because. I promise she's just a spitfire and likes to be unique–all of it's rather endearing and I love her for it!)
we walked and walked and walked and walked
Our boys were total men out there. They held the main axle the WHOLE time. They didn't want to wear the girls out and knew it was the hardest place to be. They traded around who was in the middle or on the edges but they killed it up there and made it very easy for the girls in the back.
Trekking over grass was such a welcome change—no dust! Loved the open trail and huge sky as we pushed and pulled . Well, mostly the kids pushed the handcart as we were advised to let them do the work. We only filled in when someone was needing a break or we had a hard hill to climb (and on the women's pull of course—no way I was letting my girls do that without me).
Our first day was an 8 mile trek before we set up camp in a beautifully green valley alongside a small stream. I had no idea how dusty I would be after just one day of walking—it was everywhere and I formed an amazingly stubborn layer on each leg from my mid calf up to my mid thigh which stayed with me for 4 days!
Again, a super windy and dusty day. Dust plus sweat equals a dirty, dirty pa!
Camp day 1.
That first night some families banded together to make bigger camp sites but it created a few problems so we stuck to keeping separated as families and there was much less commotion at night. I wish I'd seen how this all works or been on trek before to know to bring stakes and poles and better equipment for tying up our tarp to create shade...the things I know now!
We had a great FHE that night as dinner was being prepared by the stake and I think it helped unite us so much. Many other families were off doing whatever but we had the downtime and Joseph and I felt like we should get in the good stuff with our kids while we had the daylight and opportunity. I was really proud of my family for staying together and hanging out as a family as we had been admonished to do several times by the stake leaders. Like I said our family wasn't the most boisterous group but they worked together really well and helped pull each other out of their shells. Plus Girdy taught us all this totally ugly SNL song from a digital short called "I Broke my Arm" and it kind of became our family anthem—super random but it worked for us :) Once we finally calmed down for the night I was so ready to sleep. I fell asleep quickly but woke up so many times in the night due to the hard, hard ground, the crazy bright moon, and early morning sunrise. I have to say that waking in the middle of the night was out of control beautiful because the stars were so stunning. I can't remember the last time I saw so many being so far from the real world and sleeping out under a huge sky in the open rolling hills. Wow. It made me smile and grateful to my Heavenly Father for such beauty and majesty on this earth.
The scripture we read as a family in our FHE (and then Kendall quoted it in his prayer he gave to open our big stake meeting):
But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.
—Isaiah 40:31
4 comments:
Wish I had this detailed of an account of my trek. Love reading about it, can't wait for more
You had a good photographer along, love all this visual record of the beauty and the people. And glad you took notes so that you can recall each special moment.
This is so fun and interesting to read about your trek experience. Sounds life changing, awesome and just waaaaay hard.
I am already crying and I am on day 1!
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