New York (the Second Trip)

Our first day of High Adventure, we met at the church parking lot at 5:30am, loaded up everyone and their gear according to the seating chart Craig and I had made, and headed first to the Priesthood Restoration Site on the Susquehanna River in Pennsylvania!  I'd thought trying to make everyone leave that early would never work, but one of our more gungho priests assured us it was no problem since they could all sleep in the car (I wanted to wail-- But what about those of us who are driving???).  Naturally he decided not to come after all.  But everyone else made it relatively on time and even in pretty good spirits! 

See?  Happy crowd as that early summer sun rises!

We had a car full of girls (Kendra, McKinley, Madeline, Marianne, Olivia, Jadyn, and Sister Huff) and sure enough, the girls slept for a good chunk of that first drive while Megan and I chatted and Craig drank Coke to stay awake.  It worked!

Topher and Bentley inside the Visitor's Center

The monuments.  The sister missionary who addressed here is an actual descendant of Hyrum Smith, so that's pretty cool!

Madeline and Marianne (with McKinley barely visible in the back).  Mostly I'm including this picture so you can see how pretty Pennsylvania is!  I could very happily live here.

Kendra, Madeline, Olivia, Marianne, and McKinley

Truman and Megan

Most of the group, waiting to see a movie at the visitor's center

Amy and Edwin Gaskin.  They had Bentley and Topher in their car (while their own kids, Olivia and Sawyer, rode in other cars), and apparently had a fabulous time together, which pleased me no end!

Nate and Megan Hunsaker, who planned and cooked ALL the food for the entire trip.  They were incredible!

We also got to time to wander around the sugar bush there, which had a really lovely spirit to it.  Once we'd seen everything at this site, we got back into cars and it began POURING but by the time we'd driven to our next stop, the Peter Whitmer Farm, it was all clear again!  Such great timing!  

Kendra and Jadyn

All the youth plus our two college-age girls that are technically not youth, but mix in pretty easily still!

Me, Megan Huff, Megan Hunsaker (how confusing is it to have TWO Megan Hu-ses?), and Alisha (Megan's daughter!) (And no, I wasn't putting on mascara when I woke up at 4 in the morning!!!) (Actually-- we had two Megans AND two Amys on this trip!  How...???)

The Whitmer Farm was actually really cool, even though we were only there for a short time.  We watched a movie about their help and support for Joseph Smith while he finished translating The Book of Mormon and I learned some stories I had never heard before, so that was awesome.  (Just when you think you know most of Church history!)

And then it was on to our campsite on Lake Seneca!  This took us through Ithaca, which looked like a super cute college town (although I have a hard time taking Cornell seriously thanks to Andy Bernard in The Office!).  And then driving along Lake Seneca totally reminded me of driving through or along Sunrise Drive on Bainbridge where you get these glimpses of water through the trees and you can see land on the other side of the water.  It was so pretty and it made me so happy!

We arrived at our campsite and had to spend a few minutes figuring out where to put everyone.  Unlike past High Adventures, this time we have a "couple" within the YM and YW and we definitely wanted to make sure there was a clear boys area and girls area.  But this also gave us a chance to quickly explore the area and see that it was THE nicest campsite I've EVER stayed at!  There was a huge flat field with soft, mown grass for us to pitch our tents.  Right next to the field was a big covered pavilion with picnic tables and kitchen workspace that included a grill and a sink, and it was all super clean.  There were also bathrooms and showers attached to it (with unlimited hot water), also the nicest and cleanest bathrooms of any campsite ever.  In a different part of the grounds, they had a decent three-part zipline and a climbing wall.  And we were right on Lake Seneca!  So that was all a VERY happy surprise-- we really didn't know what to expect going into this!  And when Craig had been trying to make the arrangements back in the spring, we couldn't get anyone to ever answer the phone and we weren't even sure there WAS a campsite.  What a relief!

Getting dinner started

The Girls Tent
(This tent was huge, to the point we weren't sure there would be room to set it up.  Until we arrived and saw our amazing campsite!)

Everyone got their tents set up, the grown ups cooked dinner, everyone ate and played silly games.  We were trying to have a devotional around the campfire while dessert cooked when people began setting off fireworks all around the lake.  That ended the devotional pretty fast!  Everyone went where we could see the fireworks better, and the Gaskins busted out a bunch of glowsticks that they'd brought which were very popular!

The next morning dawned slightly grey and not too hot.  I was so happy!  (I also popped out of my tent to an available shower, so life was good!)  That field was so lovely and perfect for camping in, but it occurred to me that if the sun had been beating down on us, we would have been pretty miserable!  Fortunately that wasn't an issue!

Oh how lovely was the morning indeed!

The kids played a rousing games of spoons (except they were using pencils, which seemed like a really bad idea to me, but no one was injured so I guess it worked out).  Most of the grown ups got to work on breakfast.  And I sat around having Jadyn french braid my hair!

Ben, Madeline, Daniel, Ryder, Kendra, McKinley

Kendra commented that the pancakes were especially good-- light and fluffy-- and I told her she should thank Bishop Morgan.  She said, "That makes sense.  He has good pancake vibes."  I feel like someone should put that on a t-shirt!

And then we headed out to the Smith Farm and the Sacred Grove!  

They divided us into two groups for the tour, so here's the first group (I was kind of bitter that I got separated from Craig (and Megan!)!)

This is probably pretty close to the actual number of people who lived in this home at the time...! 😂

And there's the Palmyra temple, peaking through the trees!

After we'd toured their homes (there are two houses-- the rebuilt log cabin and the original frame house built by their son Alvin) then we got to spend some time in the Sacred Grove, which was lovely, of course.  

These were outside the visitor's center, not in the grove, but Bentley snapped this picture and it's pretty, so I'm including it here!

Amy Gaskin took this picture and I love it!

I wish we would have had more time in the Sacred Grove.  And I wouldn't have minded a little more alone time-- I was constantly seeing youth from our ward wandering by and trying to keep track of everybody.  Which is a great problem to have!  But it made it hard to focus on my own thoughts and feelings.

Before long we had to gather everyone again so we could go to the Hill Cumorah.  I can't remember if I mentioned this on the blog already, but trying to move 35 people anywhere is just really difficult.  Someone was constantly wandering off or getting lost or not ready to leave when everyone else was, so I always felt like we were late (we usually were) and trying to herd everyone in the same direction without getting frustrated was a challenge.  We made it work, but it was probably my least favorite thing about the whole trip.  

Anyway, we got everyone to the Hill Cumorah and got to watch a short movie in the Visitor's Center that portrayed Moroni spending decades wandering the American continents while lugging the gold plates with him the entire time.  (I laughed to myself when I tried to picture the casting call for that-- "Looking for a very tan, very ripped old man!")  I hadn't seen this film before and I thought it was really well done.  The Hill Cumorah is one of Craig's favorite places in the whole world, so he was so happy to be there and probably could have spent hours playing tour guide and telling us all about the pageant.  

The Book of Mormon in a variety of languages!

The Christus inside the Visitor's Center

Climbing the hill (and enjoying the shade!)

Why am I so awkward?

I love that Bentley and Topher are buddies!

We're missing a few people, but that's most of us!

We were all pretty hot and tired and hungry by then, so we climbed the hill, took a picture of as many of us as we could gather around the (glaring white) monument at the top, and then pretty quickly went back downhill so we could go for pizza.  And everyone was very happy to sit and eat in an air conditioned restaurant that actually had room for our entire group!  SUCCESS!!!

Yay for pizza!

They were super excited for a new album that had dropped (I think?) and had sequestered themselves in a corner so they could finally hear it.  But Megan and I were chuckling that it looked like they were on a date 😆

Revived by our pizza, our next stop was the Grandin Print Shop, where the first edition of the Book of Mormon was published!  The last time we came here, I spent most of the time outside letting Colton and Camille run around, so it was nice to do the actual tour!

I like the cheery yellow!  (This, apparently, was how it looked back in the day!)

While we were there, I was rereading my old blog and came across this gem of a picture from seven years ago:

So naturally, we had to recreate it!  (7 years makes a big difference!!!!)

And then we got ice cream!!!

And of course everyone needed a chance to sit in the giant chair!

Amy and Megan

Serious Bentley and Topher crack me up

Marianne, McKinley, Madeline, and Kendra are the OG YW in our ward-- for a while it was just the four of them before all these other awesome families moved in!

That was our last before we headed back to the campgrounds for a little more fun: rock climbing and ziplining!  I, unfortunately, had only packed dresses for this, so I opted out and just took a lot of pictures of everyone.  I'm only going to include my own family here (sorry-- my blog, my rules!), but trust me, I took so many photos!

The zipline was better than I expected!  A three-part course that everyone got to do twice!

That's Craig way up there, making me proud!

Craig is crazy.  We're probably lucky he didn't die...

And once everyone had finished with those activities we walked to the lake to swim and kayak!

On the way, I got this delightful surprise!

Apparently they insisted Craig be a crossing guard.  So this is what we ended up.  Hoo boy!  The funny thing is, he is a crossing guard at his school, so he's actually TRAINED to do this.  But normally he wears a shirt...

That's my man!

I love this shot!  (Also-- see why this reminded me of Bainbridge???)

Kendra and Topher found a canoe to paddle together

Daniel and Cedric got a paddle boat!

We were all getting close for the picture, but you really can't see any of us!

Here's me!

Then it was time for dinner (another fabulous meal, compliments of the Hunsakers!) and campfire, devotional, and sparklers & a few fireworks.  Another lovely evening!

I stayed up chatting with some of the other women around the fire while Craig got all the boys "tucked in" at the end of the night.  It drizzled a little-- not enough to bother anyone, just enough to keep things cool.  When Craig finally came back we stayed up way too late talking about the day.  It's so strange on these trips, because I'm with Craig all day, and yet we hardly ever get to actually talk to each other!  So it was really nice to finally catch up and process everything with him!  Worth the lack of sleep!

We woke up to a gorgeous sunny morning!

This little pavilion was on the boys' side of the campgrounds.  Bentley took this cool shot.

While everyone was packing up their tents and gear, Megan and Nate made breakfast for everyone and (other) Megan and I, along with Bentley & Topher, slapped together basic sandwiches for the whole gang.  It was a busy morning!

Then breakfast, morning devotional, then everyone got into their church clothes, we loaded the cars and headed to the Palmyra temple!

This is mid-song of the devotional!

This group looks so good for having been camping for the last two nights!!!

With the grown ups, too.  I don't know why I'm standing so awkwardly in front of Craig.  That hand rail was messing me up.  

The temple was really wonderful.  Apparently Palmyra is the ONLY temple with a clear window that you can see into on the first floor!  It looks out on the sacred grove, and it has stained glass all throughout of trees, but around that main window, the glass isn't stained so you can see the real green of the trees on the outside.  It's different from most temples and really lovely.  Once we were done (and photographed!) we piled into the cars again and drove back to the sacred grove.

Everyone is so cute and then there's Ryder pulling that face.  Anyone looking really closely will see that we picked up another kid (in the back middle)!  One of our families had friends who met us at the temple and joined for the rest of the trip!

It was quite a sight to see all our youth dressed so nicely marching through the grove!  Craig had reserved the small amphitheater so we could have a testimony meeting inside the Sacred Grove, which is just about the coolest thing ever.  And a perfect ending to our trip.

Olivia and Kendra

So beautiful

And that was pretty much it!  I mean-- we reconvened in the parking lot and passed out sandwiches and snacky lunch foods.  Half the kids changed out of their church clothes.  And eventually we got back on the road and drove home!  It was a long drive with lots of kids sleeping, a nice stop at Chick-fil-A, and a very rowdy game of Tele-strations.  

We got home around 10:30 at night and relieved Tom and Donna of their very intense babysitting.  It was good to be home.  But I couldn't have been happier with how the trip had gone.  It's nice when you put so much work into something and it actually turns out as well as you had hoped it might!  Yay for getting to do really awesome stuff with our amazing youth!