Trek

Our pioneer trek was such an incredible experience. Glenn and I were on the main committee over the activities. We were called a year ago and we had no experience with Trek at all. I don't know how our names were thrown into the mix but I'm so grateful that they were. Our calling was pretty easy and I kind of felt guilty that we did so little and still got to enjoy the whole trek experience. Although looking through all the pictures has made me realize that the games and especially the hoe down were a big and fun part of the whole thing.

Glenn also volunteered to drive "the big truck" as he would say which was the refrigerated box truck so he was pretty valuable. By volunteering for that he also helped them pick up all the food the day before we left, then left at 4:30 the morning we left to make it up there in time to set up and also worked until 7 pm the night we got back after distributing all the extra food, cleaning the truck and returning it to Salt Lake. He's such a good guy! He and Mark the food guy were two peas in a pod so they had a great time together and struck a lasting friendship. (They were the two that were always making wise cracks during our meetings.)
Dylan and Garrett both got to go on Trek and we were so excited for all 4 of us to be going. It was a little hard to send them off to their new families but both of them did so well at being involved and getting right into things.


I was particularly surprised by Garrett because to me he's always seemed to be more of a quiet observer but I guess I haven't given him enough credit. When I think about it he has had some tremendous growing experiences over the last year and he has become more outgoing and developed great leadership qualities. I was so proud of him through trek. (And every time he saw me he ran over and gave me a big hug, that was awesome too.)

Dylan was a little more grumbly and didn't want much to do with us, but we had talked to him before hand about jumping in and doing whatever was asked of him and he definitely did that. I saw him on the extra jobs like loading equipment and I was proud of his attitude. Both of the boys had such great experiences. It was definitely one of those parenting moments when you say "This is what it's all about!"
The first day was probably the toughest one for the kids. After getting to the church at 5:30 am and driving up, about 2 hours, they then had their longest day of trekking. They put in 13 miles the first day and thanks to a solid week of rain, the roads were wet and muddy. (Water = blisters!) Those of us at the camp went out to cheer them as they came in. Glenn and I were both crying as those dang kids came in. They were beat but not beaten. It was an awesome sight.


I haven't mentioned that we had 450 youth, and roughly 150 adults for a group of 600 people. The sheer numbers made everything more challenging. At one point Deseret Land and Livestock threated to make us split into two seperate treks. Our Stake President handled that one with a nice phone call and we were allowed to stay together.
The rain was also a big challenge. It held off most of the first day except for light sprinkles until we got the trekkers in and mostly fed. Then it started in earnest and continued all night. By morning lots of tents were under water and kids were emerging with sleeping bags that were pouring with water. I honestly do not know how they made it through the first night in those conditions.
Since the roads were impassable even for the handcarts the kids got a chance to recoup, play some games and try to dry out all of the wet bags and clothing. They set up drying stations in the kitchen and a couple of the trailers and had at one count 200 wet sleeping bags. We thought we were going to have to cancel the hoe down because we didn't think the caller would be able to make it in but luckily by afternoon the sun came out and the wind picked up and dried out the roads. The hoe down was a big success. Even though the caller was wary of our numbers the goal was to get everyone dancing which we did. We were a little tight on space but everyone really had fun. Who would have thought that teenagers would have so much fun square dancing?
Here's a cool picture of the clouds and then a picture of the beginning of our hoe down.


This is a picture of the camp. Notice Glenn's truck on the left, the Ryder. Also the red tent kind of on it's own in the center was ours. It was pretty cool because it had a covered porch where we hung out in our camp chairs. Sis. Saltmarsh taught us a new term for that called "porchin'". Usually whenever we were out "porchin'" we would draw visitors so that was fun.

Here is a fun series of pictures of Dylan trying to ride the wheel completely around. He didn't make it on this attempt but he says he did later.



This is me during the women's pull. I jumped on with a cart that was struggling and I thought it wouldn't be too hard since I'm kind of in shape but it was really tough. It was also tough on the guys to watch and not be able to help.

On the third and fourth days I walked with a family because their ma had injured her knee. I had wanted to experience being out on the trail so I was glad to step in. I kind of liked this picture -not really so much the double chin but because I think the hair is funky.

Here's Glenn getting ready for kitchen duty. We helped on the food lines whenever we could.

This is Garrett playing three-legged stickball, playing "Do you love your neighbor" and then do-si-do'ing at the square dance. (If there was a game going on Garrett was there.)



This last series of pictures is of Dylan's unfortunate Trek Finale. We were trekking out on the last day with the buses in site and had to cross through one last mud puddle. (I'm sure you can see where this is going.) I say mud so as not to be coarse in my language usuage but keep in mind that we were on a cattle ranch and the run off that created this mud hole had definitely been in the vicinity of several hundred cows. Of course all of the youth could see this as their last trek hurrah and were running the handcarts full force through the pit. Here's how Dylan's turn played out:



Dylan got to ride all the way home covered in "Essence de Trek".
OK for Dylan's sake I won't end on that note, here's one last picture that was on the facebook page of one of his sisters. She posted this and corroborated his story that he made it all the way around on the wheel.

Way to go Dylan, and way to go Highland Stake Trek! We will remember these experiences forever.