Keep On Trekin'

Nick and I went on our stake trek last week. We went hiking and camping about an hour and a half south of Utah Lake. We were Ma and Pa of a group of kids. Unfortunately for the first day, Nick was a single father. I got really really sick on Wednesday. I was throwing up about every half hour and thought it might be a little scary if I was trying to push a handcart and camp. I did get to join the group on Friday however, and it was really fun, but muddy.

Nick was in his element, out in the wilderness, sporting his gear. Here he is putting up some tents to sleep in for our family.

On Friday night, we had a big meal and a "hoe-down." It was beautiful outside, as the sun was setting.

Here is Nick with our family,a nd the kids pushing the handcart. It had rained quite a bit the few days before the trek. So it was really really muddy. A couple of kids actually wiped out and were covered in mud head to toe.

On the last day of the trek, they randomly had people die. Nick and I were chosen to die. We were taken away from our families and had to walk along a short cut to the end of the trail. We waited there for our families until they returned pushing the handcart. I felt bad for our family because at that point, there were only three kids left pushing (a few had to go home).

The last day, we woke up in the morning and it was raining and it was freezing. Like 40 degrees. I really thought it might snow. Luckily, the weather calmed down and it actually turned uot a little bit nice that day.

Overall, it was a nice little spiritual experience. And it was fun to do something with the youth. However, there were still a couple funny stories from the trek:

1. The last night at the hoe down, there was a couple that was like really serious into the country line dancing and swing dancing. They actually started doing lifts. Nick and I were tempted to try it, but then realized we would probably get hurt.

2. After they were done playing fast songs, the band wanted to end with a spiritual song. So they played How Great Thou Art. Nick and I were joking around with each other about how we should go slow dance to it. Sure enough, a few couples went out and started slow dancing to it. Nick and I were mixed between laughing and being completely baffled. We were like, um, is this appropriate? We realized just as we were making fun of the couples dancing, the stake president was standing right next to us and probably had overheard everything. It was a weird 5 minutes.