A Very Mormon Road Trip - Part II

I have an epidemiology midterm tomorrow.  I've done very little studying so far.  Naturally that means I should take more time from studying to share more stories from the road trip I took three months ago.  Makes sense, right?  On my first full day in Colorado, Sister Berg and I drove up to Echo Lake on Mt. Evans.  My car was really struggling with the elevation changes, but we made it.  Instead of driving up to the summit, we decided to hike up to Chicago Lake instead.  I had a slight bout of altitude sickness along the way including a few minutes where I couldn't hear anything which was a little terrifying, but I was okay soon after that.  We finally made it up to Chicago Lake and it was gorgeous!

We sat out by Chicago Lake for a long time as we chatted and fed the fish.  Unfortunately, even my Italian skin was overwhelmed by the effect of being in the sun at almost 13,000ft and I got a terrible sunburn.  I very rarely get sunburned and when I do it usually tans by the next day so when this one didn't tan right away I knew it was bad.  Fun fact: It's now almost November and my legs are still super tan.  The bad news is that I had sneakers on and the sun was hitting me only on one side so I have super awkward tan lines.  Oh well.  It was a great day and fun to get to spend time with Sister Berg as a non-nametag wearing person.  On our way home we got frozen yogurt and then when to dinner at Sister Berg's friends house.  Yes, we got frozen yogurt before we had dinner.  That's how it should be done.  After dinner, I got a text from Brianne saying that she was in Denver!  She had been on a road trip around the Pacific Northwest and Canada with her parents and they were flying out of Denver the next day.  So we decided to meet up with them to catch up for a bit and so Sister Berg could meet Brianne.  We spent quite a while talking to them and it was wonderful to catch up!  It was also fun to think about how the summer before, Brianne and I had been on a cross country road trip together and spent several awesome days in Denver. 

The next day was a wonderful one!  In the morning, Sister Berg, one of her younger brothers and I went to the Denver temple.  It was the second temple I've been inside (DC was the first) and it was really nice.  And very busy since it was the first day it was open after a maintenance closing.  It was such a nice morning and we had a lovely time.  We all went out for lunch afterwards and then Sister Berg and I went to visit another friend of hers.  After dinner that night, Sister Berg and her brother sang duets while their dad played the piano.  They are so talented!!  Seriously.  Like some of the best voices I've ever heard.  It was so great!  Later that night we made a fire and roasted marshmallows.  I like fire.  I guess President Monson and I have that in common.

Denver Temple

On my last full day in Colorado, we got up early and went for a bike ride to the Aurora Reservoir.  I literally thought I was going to die.  I think I could taste blood.  I tried to tell myself that it was because I wasn't used to the altitude, but if we're being honest, I'm just really out of shape.  But it was worth it once we got to the reservoir.  It was beautiful and nice to just sit out on the dock.  Later in the afternoon we explored downtown Denver for a little bit, but we had to get back after a few hours because Sister Berg was reporting to the High Council about her mission that night.  All I have to say is it was awesome to be there for that.  Especially because she taught me on her mission.  Thankfully, I was not mentioned at all...I'm sure I would have been awkward and embarrassed if I had been so I'm grateful that I wasn't.  Afterwards we went back to the house, played Frisbee, made s'mores and watched a movie.  I was so sad to be leaving Colorado the next morning, but I was also excited to get to Utah to see Megan!!

A Very Mormon Road Trip - Part I

Well apparently I'm terrible at keeping promises about blogging, but in the spirit of procrastination, I've decided to finally update about my trip this past summer.  The first day of my road trip began with me driving my cousin Jen and her then fiancé (now husband!) Steve to the airport after they had spent a few days visiting me in DC.  After dropping them off around 8:30am, I began the 1700 mile drive to Aurora, CO.  And so begins my very Mormon road trip!  (If you'd like to learn more about The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints so you have a better idea of what I'm talking about in this post or just because you're curious, visit Mormon.org)

On that first day of my trip I drove for about 15 hours and NEVER got tired at all.  I think I was just so excited to get out to Colorado that nothing was going to stop me.  Sleep is for the weak.  On that first day, my first stop was at the Columbus Ohio Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  Unfortunately, that temple is in kind of a weird spot and I would have awkwardly had to stand basically in the road in order to get a good picture so I don't actually have any pictures at all.  But you can always Google it.  After that, I continued on, stopping only for gas and food until I got to St. Louis Missouri.  I actually drove just past the city because I wanted to see the St. Louis Temple.  Ironically, the temple is next to, and basically on the campus of,  Missouri Baptist University.  I got quite a kick out of that because one of my best friends is Baptist and we like to chat about how sometimes Mormons and Baptists don't get along very well.  But the patrons of an LDS temple and a Baptist university are proving that Mormons and Baptists can, in fact, peacefully coexist!  What a shocker!  I pulled up to the temple around 10:30pm and, trying not to be super sketchy, parked my car illegally and got out to take some pictures.  It turns out that some other people had the same idea.  As I watched them taking pictures, I was obviously thinking, "What are they doing? It's almost 11pm!  Why are they here right now?"  Forget the fact that I was there taking pictures at 11pm too.  I ended up talking to this family and they asked if I was heading east or west.  When I said that I was going west, they assumed (correctly) that I was going to Utah.  It turns out that they had just come back from a BYU reunion in Utah and were headed back to North Carolina.  We chatted a bit about how I was going to visit Megan and how she had just returned from serving her mission in Ukraine and then we parted ways and I went to look for a hotel.  But the moral of the story is that the St. Louis Temple is beautiful.  I absolutely love it!


The St. Louis Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

The next morning I woke up bright an early, had a great chat with the woman at the hotel reception desk who told me she was proud of me for getting such a good education, and then I headed to Kansas City, MO.  When I arrived in the KC area, my first stop was Liberty Jail, where the prophet and founder of the LDS church, Joseph Smith, was imprisoned for several months.   It was such a cool and powerful experience to be in the place where a prophet was imprisoned and to learn more about what he and the other prisoners went through and how they persevered with faith.  From there I went to the KC Temple which is also gorgeous!!  I ran into a couple who had been at Liberty Jail with me as well and we chatted for a bit.  They told me I should go to Adam-ondi-Ahman, but it was too far in the wrong direction so that will have to be on my next trip!  After that I went to the Visitors Center in Independence.  There's a TON of church history associated with that site so you should look it up if you're interested.  I chatted with a sister missionary briefly, but only spent a few minutes there because I was eager to get out to Colorado.  I did get to see a first edition of the Book of Mormon though! 


Liberty Jail



Kansas City Temple

Several hours later I finally made it to Aurora.  The reason I went to Colorado was to visit Sister Berg, one of the missionaries who had taught me when I was investigating.  She had just gotten home from her mission a few days before I arrived so I was basically her surrogate companion as she adjusted to life as a returned missionary.  My first night there I got to meet her wonderful family and we all just hung out, chatted, played card games and it was really nice.  The fact that she was wearing jeans, didn't have a nametag on and was being called by her first name (Laura) was only slightly overwhelming haha.  We also realized that she and Megan were in the MTC choir at the same time!  After that I finally went to bed and got some much needed rest (after two straight 15+ hour driving days, sleep was no longer something for the weak) before a big day of hiking the next day!  More to come about my very Mormon road trip over the next few days!