Our Adventures in Trekking, Part Two

Part One is HERE.

On day two we had much less hiking planned. And boy was that a good thing. After having slept on pine cones and eating a quick breakfast, it was time to head out again. We'd barely made it past our campsite when the men were called away to the Mormon Battalion. Yep, we were really trying to recreate the toughest moments of pioneer trek history. Granted, our Sweetwater crossing was more muddy than freezing cold and it only lasted about twenty yards, and our nights weren't freezing cold, but the trek committee was trying to help us get something out of the whole experience. They wanted us to think of those that went on before us and had to make huge sacrifices so that we can now live in comfort. So in the morning of our second trek day, all of the men were taken away from us. This was symbolic of the men that were lost along the way-- either to the Mormon Battalion, to illness, or to death. There were many handcart families that had only women as leaders. These mothers, sisters, and aunts had to band together to keep going over the 1300 miles to get to Zion.

We had a small devotional where we talked about the pioneer women who went before us. So many women went as the head of their family, many came as single women, and many more lost husbands along the way. They then, had to do all of the physical pulling of the handcarts as well as the cooking that went with trekking. We got to hear the story of Emily Hill who crossed the plains with her sister Julia. They had joined the Church in England and were disowned by their family. Before leaving on a ship for America, Emily was given a blessing where she was told that, "she should write in prose and in verse and thereby comfort the hearts of thousands." Well, she and her sister helped one another get through their trek and sometime later, Emily married and wrote a poem that would eventually be known by virtually every LDS woman in song version-- As Sisters in Zion. When she first wrote it, however, instead of the first line reading, "As sisters in Zion, we'll all work together. . ." the original version read, "As sisters in Zion, we'll all pull together. . . " That song has always been one of my favorites, a celebration of women's strength and this united sisterhood, but after hearing about its origins, it has made it that much more of a meaningful song for me.

That was the end of the easy part of our morning, however. After that, we had to get back together with what was left of our families, and pull our handcarts up a steep hill for half a mile. Since I only had two daughters, we had two women volunteers jump on to help with our cart. And I am not kidding you when I say that hill was steep. The first couple of handcarts had the right idea and they just jaunted up the hill as quickly as they could. Unfortunately, our handcart was stuck behind a company that stopped a few times along the way. Let me tell you, it is not easy to get a packed handcart moving from a stationary position on a hill.

And where were the men in all of this? They also had a devotional where they talked about women, our importance, and how we are to be treated as princesses, because that's how our Father in Heaven sees us. And yet, at this juncture, they were not allowed to help us physically. They had to stand by on the sides of the road. They were allowed to whisper encouragement, that was all. They also hummed. They hummed the tune to "Come, Come, Ye Saints" (Make sure to select "words with music" before hitting play or listen to it here).

That is another song that has been a favorite of mine for years. I first grew to love it when I took classes at BYU that taught about the early history of the Church. It represented the hopes and dreams and realities that the early pioneer saints had to face when crossing the plains. One verse reads:

And should we die before our journey’s through, Happy day! All is well! We then are free from toil and sorrow, too; With the just we shall dwell! But if our lives are spared again To see the saints their rest obtain, O how we’ll make this chorus swell, All is well! All is well!

These early pioneers realized that not all that left on their journey would make it to their destination. Many would fall along the way, and yet they each made the choice to stick with their faith and make their best efforts to make it westward, no matter what they had to sacrifice. (That's dedication. If you want to learn more about the history of that hymn and hear modern renditions of it, there is a podcast HERE.)

So, as if I wasn't feeling emotional enough thinking about all of those early women who didn't have the extra help of a man with their handcart, I nearly lost it passing these men and boys humming and whispering to us, "You can do it", "You're doing great."or, "It's just a little further." Each of the young men and leaders that were standing there looking on had pained looks on their faces. Some boys apparently tried jumping in to help out, only to get pulled away. Our group of five got nearly to the top when one of the girls from my ward, Emily, came running down the hill, worn out from getting her cart up the hill. She could hardly speak, she was still so winded, but she went ahead and started pushing our handcart as well.

The women's pull was hard work. But it was also one of the most spiritual aspects of the trek. We women learned about our pioneer heritage, and we got to see that we could do hard things. The men, in turn, not only learned how strong we are, but many of them realized just how much they wanted to help us and how they respected us for doing what we did without complaint and without crying.

Huffing and puffing, but making it.

If you'll notice in the picture above-- I had to tuck my skirt and apron into the top of my skirt. The hill was so steep that I kept stepping on my skirts. And, don't we look awesome? :)

We got a break after that for about thirty minutes. That's when some of the girl's broke down and cried. Not my girls. We were tired, but thrilled that we did it, that that monumental hurdle was now behind us. We just tried to relax as much as we could before moving on. The boys all jumped up to help when we had to push off again, but we still helped later in the day. (Even after a lot of joking the day before about how after the women's pull, us girls were done.) It just felt like the right thing, to keep pulling, to keep helping, to work together as a trek family.

As an aside, Jon claims that our small band seemed to have the least trouble getting up the hill. He says that there were some groups of girls and women who had 9-12 people on their carts, and they really looked like they were struggling. To that I told him, "Maybe we should have made it look like harder work so that we would have had more help." But it does somehow feel like more of an accomplishment to have done it with so few.

That whole day seemed to be much more toned down after that. It was still over five miles of pulling that handcart over a few more hills, and down a long steep one, but we had a couple of breaks along the way. On one break, we were told a couple of stories of those that didn't make it to the end of the trek. Since we were each walking for a pioneer, they then handed out red hearts with the pioneers' names that didn't make it. Our jokester Tristen was one of the ones that died on the trek. He was trekking for George Padley, who was the sweetheart of Sarah Franks. Their story was one of the ones featured in 17 Miracles. (PS, if you want to cry, go see that movie.) So until we stopped for lunch, all of those that had "died" were not allowed to interact with the rest of their trek family. They couldn't push or pull the handcarts, and they couldn't talk to us. They had to just walk silently behind our cart. We weren't sure how well Tristen would do at this at first, but he was actually a great dead person. If he needed to communicate something with us, he was very adept at doing so with hand gestures and faces.

On our next break were greeted with freshly cut watermelons and the Pony Express.

Every child on the trek was given a surprise letter written from home. Well, one of our sons knew it was coming, but almost no one else did. It was interesting to see everyone's reactions. Our Sam took his letter from home and sat a little ways off from the group where he could quietly read what his parents had to say. Tristen got all excited, I think it was the biggest surprise of all for him to get a letter from home. And from what we could see, his folks went all out formatting it and adding a few small photos.

After everyone read their letters, they were then asked to write one home. Tristen, who shared on a few occasions how he hates writing, was the first to ask for a pen and sat down and started scribbling away. Two of our boys struggled with what to write, but Sam, Tristen, Kournee, and Mackenzie all took their papers and wrote real letters home. What a great surprise that will be for those moms and dads to receive a written response from their children.

We still had a little time after that, so I passed around small notebooks to our group and instructed them to write a few of their thoughts from trek down. I reminded them that it is because of the journals of the pioneer saints that we have a record of what transpired on the plains. I think it was a good practice for many of them.

We hit the road again after that and a couple of hours later, we arrived at our last camp. We had symbolically made it to the Salt Lake Valley. It was such a relief to know that most of our trekking was done with and that we'd have an evening to relax, to socialize, to play, and to eat well.

**I thought I'd get done writing about trek by now, but this post is already crazy long, so I'll save part three for later.

Our Adventures in Trekking

The first hard hard thing about Trek was having to put together pioneer clothing for Jon and I to wear. We managed a good balance of bought and sewn items, I think. I made Jon's vest, altered a couple of thrifted shirts, and sewed myself a bonnet and apron. We purchased a pair of linen pants for Jon, got him a clearance hat, and bought my skirt and one of my shirts. While in a lot of ways they really wanted our pioneer experience to be as close to authentic as possible, they also asked that we wear good hiking shoes and apply plenty of sunscreen. And sunglasses. That kind of thing.

The next hard part of trek was meeting up with everyone at 5:30AM. We then proceeded to wait until everyone showed up, then we got together with our wards, and we had a big devotional. We didn't actually leave for our trek site until just after 7AM. Oh the time I could have spent sleeping! Ah well. . .

Here we are ready to ship off.

The boys all fit in one car, and Sandy took half of our girls while Jon and I got the rest. We then left "Liverpool, London" for our "ship voyage" to the east, where we'd get our handcarts. In all actuality, we got in our cars and drove a couple of hours to the Kaibab Plateau.

Sandy couldn't get over us in our pioneer garb and the following was her idea: 

Jon was the lone man in this photo.

When our bishop saw this photo, he asked if we were all getting ready to head out to Wal-mart. (My local friends will appreciate that.)

When we got there, we had to get one shot of all of our ward's youth before we all got split up into families for the next two and a  half days. 

We've arrived!

And then each of us ma and pa couples were given the children that would be our family for the trek. We ended up with six kids, while everyone else had eight or nine. We had two that didn't make it last second that were on our list. Apparently our family assignments were something that the people in charge had prayed over extensively. The family we had was the one we were meant to have, so they left our number smaller than everyone else's.

Check out the handcarts all lined up. These things carried all of our possessions for the length of our trek.

Here we are lined up and waiting to take off. Well, you can only see me clearly, because Jon cut out most people's faces in this shot, but you get the idea.

Kourtnee and Mackenzie are in the top right of the frame.

Jon and I went from being newly weds to being the parents of two girls and four boys that day. It was quite the ride, and more than we planned on in a lot of ways, but it was a good experience. Our kids were: Parker, Sam, Zak, Tristen, Mackenzie, and Kourtnee. Besides having our six children we were also given a baby. Well, a baby doll-- symbolic of the babies born on or carried across the plains. We had to watch over the physical welfare of the baby, and not allow her to ride on or touch the cart.

This was Tristen's way of following those rules--

Baby Phoebe wrapped onto his arm.

Something else about Trek was that we all got to walk for another person. We were each given a pioneer name to walk in memory of-- and if we had a personal name, we could add that to the list. So I walked for Mary Haydock as well as my grandma Janina Miecznikowska Rospierska. She was a pioneer in a lot of ways-- she left behind her family and the life she knew in the country to start a new life for herself in the city, where she met and married my grandpa and eventually had a daughter who would grow up and move to America (my mom!). It was neat to walk for an actual pioneer and to have their story given to us, but it still felt more real for me thinking of my grandma as I trekked.

Me wearing my name tag. Mackenzie is in the purple.

The first day was the longest length and time wise. We got up so very early and then had to wait first to get to our trek site, then to get our families, then to get our handcarts and our gear. . . and then we had to pull our handcart eight miles. We started off on a dirt road but eventually we had to take a detour down a steep hill on account of Indians or something. We got each of the handcarts down one by one, each family helping another until all of the handcarts and families were accounted for.

See Jon helping, and me trying to while hitching up my skirts?

At the bottom of that hill we had to pull our carts through thick trees and tall grass. It was my favorite part because it seemed the most authentic to me. Those poor pioneers didn't have roads cut for them. The other reason I loved that section was because the grass dampened the sound of the handcart wheels. When traveling on the dirt roads across rocks and gravel those handcarts got loud. Which meant I had to talk loud, and I'm not a loud-talker, so that was hard for me.

A little while after the hill we came across a small "settlement" where we were given a loaf of bread, some peanut butter and honey to make sandwiches, and apples for everyone in our family. I'd just sat down and started working on making lunch when all of a sudden a mob appeared. Like the Mormon pioneers, we were run out of town. Tristen had just finished putting together his honey sandwich and was putting it to his lips when a mobster snatched it right out of his hands. It was funny only because we still had enough bread to make more sandwiches. We were tired and so very hungry by then. Besides the food we'd brought to snack on in the car, we hadn't eaten since 5:30AM and it was after 2PM by then. And sandwiches and apples were all we were given. Oh, that and a quart of cream in a mason jar that we had to shake for the next few hours so that we'd have butter for dinner.

Post-mob quick break/babysitting.

About a mile from where we were supposed to camp the first night, we had a couple of leaders say that they found a short cut and they decided we should take it. So we walked half a mile only to discover that the supposed short cut didn't actually lead to camp. They had made a mistake. Only it was on purpose, because they had a lesson prepared to share with us about Levi Savage and how he had wanted to winter in one place, but his leaders wanted to continue to journey across the plains, so he made the decision to go with his group, no matter the consequences. The lesson was something about how sometimes men can lead us astray, even when they have the best of intentions, but if we follow Heavenly Father we'll never be lead down a wrong path. And so from there we had to go back the half mile that we'd traveled incorrectly to then walk another mile to our camp.

Brother Traveller was the guy who had been in charge of organizing the Ma's and Pa's for months before trek and he said that he'd tried to talk them out of actually taking us down the wrong rode. He thought that just hearing the story would have been enough. I have to say that at the end of a day of hiking, I have to agree with Brother Traveller's assessment. A few girls had breakdowns when they heard that they'd have further to go than they were expecting. Not any of the girls in our family, though.

Brother Traveller felt so bad for us that he helped us pull our cart for a while near the end of the day:

He was super excited to pull the cart.

That night we pulled into camp and had to quickly set up our camping area and then grab dinner, family by family. We were given beef stew in sourdough bread bowls. I usually love bread bowls, but this was really sour sourdough and the beef in the stew was super chewy. I ate it all anyway. I just pretended to be a pioneer and was grateful to get more than gruel. What's more, we had pound cake smothered in strawberries for dessert. It made up for a chewy sour dinner. Mostly. 

We had another devotional and then we got to go to bed. We had a small tent we put up for the sole purpose of changing in, and we all quickly got into our jammies and brushed our teeth. My face wipes were really popular with all of our kids. Then we said a family prayer and all snuggled down into our sleeping bags under the stars. I put in my earplugs and was drifting off to sleep when I could feel Jon giggling next to me. I took an ear plug out and asked him what was going on. 

Jon: You didn't hear that?
Me: No, what?
Jon: That bugling? 

Me: What?
Jon: Someone was playing a bugle, you didn't hear that?

Me: No. Was it funny?

Jon: Well, no, but then someone yelled out, "That's not a very pioneer thing to do!" 

But finally everyone had their sillies work out of their systems and we got to sleep. I woke up a few times in the middle of the night, once with my head freezing, and once when I was sure someone was standing over me with a flashlight. Even when I was totally awake and I turned my head to better see, I could have sworn that's what it was. Turns out the moon was just really bright. And in the morning? We all woke up dew-covered and cold. It was hard to motivate ourselves to leave the relative comfort of our sleeping bags, but managed to get back into pioneer garb and then it was time to face another pioneer day. 

Part two of Trek  2011 to come next. 

Trek and stuff

After all the craziness of sewing and planning and packing and attending meetings, it is finally here. We leave our house at 5:15 in the MORNING to meet up with everyone at the Stake Center and we leave from there no later than 7AM to head out to the trail head. There, Jon and I will be assigned a family. We'll go from not having any children to have eight teenagers. I'll let you know how that goes after the fact.

While we're a little nervous, we're also really excited. We'll be dressed up as pioneers, we'll be pulling a handcart, we'll be sleeping under the stars, and we'll be playing games and participating in reenactments. Jon's favorite part of it so far is knowing that we don't have to pack our own food-- every meal will be provided for us. He says that alone will make it the easiest camping trip he'll be a part of planning.

It should be good. Wish us luck!

Also, a happy bit of news that I don't feel like I can share on my photography blog yet-- I have been asked to share a photo of mine in one of the next newsletters that will go out by The Impossible Project. I've been photographing all kinds of subjects with film by the Impossible Project for over a year now, and it has been exciting to see how far they've come. I'm so excited to be a part of their history.