Trek 2016 - Two Places At The Same Time

Sometimes I just want to remember a story, so I write it here.

Have you ever wished you could be in two places at once?  Well, this summer my Moab world, my church world, and my Stansbury Park world collided in such a way that, at least in some people's mind, I was, for four days, in two places at the same time.

This year our stake did a handcart trek somewhere in the mountains near Logan, Utah.  Last March or so I was called to do the music for that trek, which meant I would figure out songs to sing, get people to sing them, and then go on the trek and . . . well, make sure they sang them right, I guess :)  but as the time for the trek neared and my summer became more and more complicated, I began thinking and praying of a way I could still fill that calling, but not actually go on the trek.  I finally talked with the trek specialists and asked if they thought it would be a problem if I still did the music, got people to sing, practiced with them, found MP3 accompaniments they could sing to, basically do everything to prepare the music for trek, but then hand it over to a very capable and willing young couple in our ward who were already going on the trek as Ma's and Pa's.  In my mind, I would do all the work, all they would have to do would be to press play on an MP3 player.  The stake specialists said that would be fine, the my friends, the Gowen's said yes, and I got to work.

I formed a Trek Choir to sing some of the songs.  The Choir sang a song I found on the internet that another stake had written for their trek called He Is Pulling, Too, Link to the song is here.  http://oursaviorispullingtoo.weebly.com/choir.html and they sang a fun medley of Shall The Youth of Zion Falter/Carry On.  The boys sang Jenny Phillips' Let Me Carry You at the water crossing, and the girls sang When Faith Endures to the tune I Know That My Redeemer Lives at the Women's Pull.  I had a trio of girls sing Oh How Lovely Was the Morning to the tune Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing, a young man soloist sang Savior, Redeemer of My Soul, and young woman soloist sang Jenny Phillips' He Will Hold You Up.  Everyone was practiced, excited, ready and I sent them off to trek while I stayed behind and thought about them every day, wondering what song they were siging today, and how it went.

I teach the 14-15 year old youth Sunday School class in my ward, and today, as we were chatting before class started, I asked them to tell me about the trek.  One of the young men - who was in the Trek Choir, incidentally,  looked at me kind of puzzled and said, "Carri, you were there with us."  I said, "No, I wasn't."  He said, "yes, you were."  I said, "I don't think so, Jerrit.  I did all the music for it, but I handed it over to the Gowen's.  I had to stay here and work."  He said, "Really?  I thought you were there . . "  And then his sister spoke up and said, "Are you sure, because I thought you were there, too." I have laughed about that all day.  Apparently I was on the trek last week after all.  Yay me!!  And, just as a side note, I really love my Sunday School Class.  :)

A Little Trip To Boston, Day Four

Day four was Saturday.  We had planned to do a session in the Temple, but we slept in, so didn't have time.  We stopped by to take a few pictures, anyway.  

Then it was on to Boston where we had decided to do a 90 minute historical boat tour of the Boston harbor and surrounding areas.  

It was a crowded boat, but nice and cool.  And pretty!  

I have a fascination with sailboats.  If I lived near the ocean, I think I would have to own one. 

These two pictures of Brennan and Emma are on two different days.  The one on the right is aboard our tour boat.  The one on the left is one I forgot to include when we were on Castle Island.  Notice Emma doesn't have any shoes on.  There's a story there, only not mine to tell :)

After the boat tour we tried to hustle over to the other harbor to tour the USS Constitution, but realized a few metro stops into it that we weren't going to make it, so we walked the Freedom Trail a little bit, then headed back to Concord and the North Bridge Park to take some pictures of this cute couple.  

It was later this night than we were there the evening before, and we were chasing the sun as it was setting, so I was having focusing issues.  Of course.

But I think we got some cute ones.  I just included a few here.  There are more!

It was worth it to get Brennan all cleaned up with a nice, new hair cut.  I think you guys are good for each other :) 

Thanks so much for the vacation guys.  We didn't even know we needed it until we took it.  It was SO much fun to hang out with these two for a few days and have then show us around their little corner of the world.

A Little Trip To Boston - Day Three

 One the third day we went to Salem and learned all about the witch trials.  I didn't pull my camera out much this day because we were inside much of the time - and mostly in dark dingy dungeons where they kept those who were being tried as witches until their trials or until they were hung.  We also toured a pirate museum, which I thought was very fun!  And we toured two different homes of people from two different cultures - one of a wealthy American ship builder and businessman built in the 1700's and another of a wealthy merchant from China built in the 1700's.  It was interesting to see the comparison between the two men of wealth in two different cultures.  Like night and day!  After Salem we went to Concord to see The Old North Bridge where "The shot heard round the world" was fired.

It was a beautiful place and we were there at a perfect time for evening photos.  Here are a couple of pictures of us on the bridge.  Still wearing my comfy sandals, as you can see.

Brennan and Emma on the bridge.  

It was fun after a day spent inside in small spaces to finally pull out my camera and take some pictures.  These two hammed it up for me.

Cute couple on the North Bridge.  Below, Brennan's face is being nicely shadowed by Emma's hat.  

It was so pretty there, we decided to return the next day and do a photo shoot with Bren and Emma. After a haircut for Brennan! 

 This was such a pretty little area, I decided to do a little Dave photo shoot :) 

                                                 

A cute old tree.  There is a story behind the tree shot.  When we were in Plymouth the day before, we saw a sign explaining some of the things to see around that area.  One of the sites was The Engagement Tree, an old tree that a girl, in 1806, planted when she was engaged.  Then, when the engagement fell through, she pulled the tree up and threw it out in the road.  A man passing by saw the tree laying in the road, picked it up and quickly dug a hole with the heel of his boot and replanted the tree.  And IT LIVED FOR HUNDREDS OF YEARS!  Only someone who has babied trees along, loosing many of them in Utah's desert would be so fascinated by that story,  We looked for  the tree, but apparently the it was so diseased, it was cut down in 2007 and only the stump remains. So the tree above, in Concord, not Plymouth, represents the memory of that tree. 

This is the site where Paul Revere was captured by the British, in the midst of running around Massachusetts telling the revolutionaries that the British were coming.

The British took him to Boston, but later let him go.  So he lived to see the war won, but didn't get to finish telling all the surrounding town about the British army.  Other people carried his message, tho, so all was well.  

This was an old colonial graveyard literally in someone's backyard.  I mean, step off your back porch step and onto a grave kind of in the backyard.  The headstones were made of slate and were mostly from the 1700's.  

And that ended our third day.  

A Little Trip To Boston, Day Two

Day two started early, because Brennan had an agenda!  We drove to Plymouth where the pilgrims landed when they came here for religious freedom.  Above is a picture of Dave and Brennan by a statue of William Bradford, whom they are related to.  I am not related, which was kind of a weird thought, but true.

This nondescript little rock here is the famous "plymouth rock"  which supposedly the pilgrims used as a stepping stone to get from their ship to dry land.  I've never been aboard a boat for any length of time, so I guess it's possible they would remember which rock they stepped on when they got off the boat.  So, I'm just going to believe that this rock was stepped on by pilgrims in the year 1620. 

Just a picture of me in Plymouth.  Because I didn't get to be in the picture of those who are related to William Bradford. 

And a picture of Brennan and I in front of a replica of the Mayflower.  We didn't tour this ship because, like the Eiffel Tower and Washington's Monument and other such famous things, I think the beauty of them is in the outside.  When you're on board or inside, you can't see the beauty.  But that's just me.

At Plymouth, there was a replicated pilgrim colonial village.  THAT was very cool.  Here we are at the replicated Indian village.  Dave is standing in front of what was a hollowed out log canoe, and the Indian girl on the right is telling us about life as an Indian in the 1600's.  Everything there is made how and out of what it would have been during the 1600's time period.  Very fascinating!!

Inside the visitors center, there was an authentic, working pilgrim kitchen, which was closed by time we got there, but they make actual food (mostly bread type stuff I think) and sell it in the gift shop.  And there was this guy, from some Indian tribe in Montreal, Quebec.  He was making headdresses from Porcupine hair.  Not quills, but the hair of Porcupine.  They were beautiful!  He learned this art from his grandfather. 

This was an Indian house, built out of the bark of trees on the outside.  It was too dark inside to get a good picture, but it was round like the Native Americans would build hogans in a later century.  The beds were built around the outside walls of the house and covered with furs.  They generally only used their houses in the cold winter months.  When it was warm, they were traveling and hunting.  

Dave and I in front of the Indian house.  

In this picture you can see my cute sandals that saved my life- or rather, my feet- during all the walking we did on this trip!  After a full day of walking around Lowell the day before, even my flip flops were hurting my feet.  But these yoga sandals, which I only bought to match the skirt I was wearing, were the most comfortable shoes ever!  They are all fabric, so nothing to rub and make your feet sore.  And very cute to boot!!  Just a little FYI.  

The pilgrim village from the top of the community center/defensive fort at the entrance to the village

One of a few picture I got of all of us.  We're in front of an old pilgrim house.  It was one of those "set the camera on a log, set the timer and run to get in" kind of picture.  

Another shot of the three of us in the backyard of a pilgrim house. I remembered to take my sunglasses off for this one. Our feet are cut of by the log the camera is setting on. :) 

This boy know how to work a wheel barrow.  Even an old colonial one.  

There were reenactors in the village.  This one was mudding the chinks in the wood inside the house.  We lost Dave here for a while.  He stayed and watched the man and his son while Brennan and I continued to look around. 

We found this log pile of split wood ready for the cold winter days ahead.  We think need one of these at the cabin!

We were going to go to Martha's Vineyard after Plymouth, but we spent longer than Brennan's agenda planned for us to here, so we just drove out to Cape Cod.  Here is Brennan looking much like a beach bum.  

It was beautiful.  I don't think those who live by the ocean could ever appreciate how much those who don't love just walking the beach and listening to the waves and watching the expance as it disappears into forever.    

                                 

In my effort to be IN more pictures, I stood in the ocean in my skirt and let Dave take blurry pictures of me.

It was the perfect end to a perfectly lovely day.  

A Little Trip To Boston, Day One

 I decided to repent and do this right.  Forward.  From day one.  So, here we are landing after an all night plane ride with little sleep. But, it's how we roll.  Because it's a waste of time to fly during the day when you could be enjoying your vacation, after all.....

We spent our first day in Lowell, the city where Brennan lives.  Lowell is named after Francis Cabot Lowell, the man who put the town on the map.  He went to England in 1810 to learn about their textile machinery, but because British law prohibited the export of the machines, he had to memorize the designs, and then return home and build a replica. He then built a mill that was the first one in America to use power looms. That was successful, so he started building all these manufacturing plants and a canal system to power them.   

 

Today the canals are just a pretty part of the town, but back in the early 1800, they were a power source for all those looms.  

Luckily, many rooms of looms are preserved as a National Historic Park.  This was a room filled with running looms.  Actually, they only had about 1/3 of the looms running, and just those 1/3 made so much noise we couldn't talk to each other.  It was fascinating to watch them work.  And very LOUD!

I decided this trip to jump in front of the camera more, so here Dave and I are in the room of looms.  One picture where I look pretty normal...

And one where I look Zombieesk, but Dave looks pretty normal.  The women who worked the looms worked 10 hours a day, six days a week.  Many of them eventually developed health problems from breathing in the cotton fibers all day long, and hearing problems from the loudness of the looms

After touring the museum, we went on a fun canal boat tour.  If you look really close, you can see Brennan peeking around the corner of the building above.

This is the dam system they used.  When they water gets too high, it pushes the boards forward, which, in turn, bends the metal bars, and allows water to run off the canal back into the Pawtucket River.  Whatever works for you, guys!

Some ducks enjoying the canal.  The canal is still owned by the company that built them so many years ago, and they don't allow anyone to swim or boat or play in them at all.  So it makes a nice place for the ducks to swim :) 

A round building built around the turn of the canal...

These are the locks.  You wait on one side in your boat while the water on your side fills to level of the water on the other side.  The the gates will open and the boat can go on through.

Today the manufacturing plants have mostly been converted into beautiful apartments, stores and office buildings.  And Brennan and Emma live in one!  It was so fun to finally see where they live and learn the history of their town.  Such a fun little gem near Boston that we probably would never have known about if Brennan and Emma hadn't found an apartment there and moved in.