Martin Cove's Youth Conference Trek July 28-31st

Crossing the Sweetwater

104 degrees in Dan's Cove

With my Young Women's calling I had the opportunity to go to Martin's Cove with the stake for youth conference. I talked Matt into going with and we were a Ma and Pa for a family. I had a lot to do to prepare for the trek and I had a lot of help getting it done. We needed to have pioneer outfits, homemade journals and possible bags, 5 gallon buckets (to pack everything that we could take with us), and everyone needed to know how to square dance. We also had some really neat firesides about the pioneers. My mom was able to take the kids so Matt met her in Heber Monday morning and she kept them all week. I am so glad they have gotten to spend extra time with their grandparents this summer. They have so much fun and they learn to work and have fun doing it. They also get to swim in the river!!

Well the morning finally came when it was time to go. Matt volunteered to take his truck and Glen (1st counselor in the bishopric) and Nora Olson rode with us. Everyone else rode the commercial buses, the ones with not such a great track record. Matt and I soon found out that we were going to have a great time with Glen and Nora we had plenty to talk about and pretty soon we were laughing and joking and the ride went by so fast. We stopped in Rawlings and changed into our pioneer skirts. I had brought some fingernail polish in Matt's truck and it had gotten hot and leaked in his consul. I knew I was in trouble but Matt was nice in front of our company. Nora and I was snickering in the back because she knew what Glen would do to her if she had done that. Luckily I had another bottle of nail polish in my purse because Matt threw that one away. I painted my nails in Taco Jo's and we all had a good laugh.

When we got to Martin's Cove everyone got their cart and we started off. We had been divided into families and each family took a cart. The first day we pulled the carts about three miles to Cherry Creek Camp Ground.

This was a rattlesnake just off the trail on the way to camp. Several others were along the trail. I can't believe we made it through the whole trip with no one getting bit.

Everyone had a name that they were trekking in remembrance of. Matt was going as William Wingnall and I was Grace Wingnall. We had a 3 month old baby named William Wingnall as well. As we started the trek the second day they stopped the company several times as they had couples stop, who were symbolizing the people of the Martin Hand Cart Company, and they would announce that they had lost an infant or a mother and baby had passed away etc. It was quite emotional as they would tell the stories and as we were out in the elements and to even think of loosing a baby or child and having to leave them on the trail.

This is Matt and I's family. We were mainly with our ward and we really got to know the kids and the leaders on a more personal level. They were all such good kids and we really had a good time. We played games and we even had a kid that could play the fiddle. He started playing well after it was time for everyone to go to bed and everyone just gravitated towards him and we listened to him play for quite a while. It was so neat. I think I am going to have to make Jabin learn how to play the fiddle.

These monuments are of the "Utah Boys" just after the Sweetwater Crossing. They are so touching and I wish I would have gotten a better picture. They are of the young boys that carried the whole company across the freezing water. One of the statues has a boy carrying a small boy and if you look closely in his coat you can see an infant baby.

The second day we pulled the carts to a place called Dan's Cove. This is where we were told some more pioneer stories and the stake president gave a special blessing to the company. Then we went on to Martin's Cove. It was 104 degrees and we had a lot of people with us that started to suffer heat stroke and some problems with diabetes and others had knee and ankle problems. After Martin's Cove we went down to the Sweetwater where we were able to cross the river. Matt wanted to carry me across but it was so hot I really wanted to get in. It did feel good and it was quite deep. I can't imagine the pioneers crossing it in the freezing weather and having their skirts freeze and cut their legs as they had to keep walking.

The Women's Pull

This was one of the neatest experiences I had during the Trek. They had all the men leave the hand cart company, which symbolized how a lot of the men died or were called off to fight in the Mormon Battalion. They went up the hill and lined the "rocky ridge." They were instructed not to help no matter how hard it was on us. They pulled the women aside and spoke to us and told us to pretend that the men weren't there. As we started pulling up this hill it was quite difficult and a lot harder then I thought it was going to be. I didn't look up but as soon as we started pulling through the men I felt the warmest feeling and could hear them sniffling and crying. The spirit was really strong and even some of the girls were overcome with tears. When we got our cart to the top I was completely out of breath. I hurried back because we had young girls pulling carts by themselves. As soon as I crabbed onto one of the carts I could tell that Carly was struggling to breathe and I knew she had asthma. Her mom was with me and she crabbed her and helped her as she was having an asthma attack. It was really difficult but I am glad it was so hard because of the impact it had on everyone and especially me.

That night they had the Pony Express deliver mail to everyone. I got a special letter from my mom that meant a lot to me and I got the chance to write a letter for Matt.

Some of the treats that I was excited to share with everyone was my dutch oven popcorn, kick the can ice cream and buttermilk syrup for the pancakes. I make these things all the time and should know the recipe but I need to have it there to look at. I forgot my recipe! The popcorn was great and I even made it Kettle corn. The ice cream and syrup didn't work so great and I promised everyone the recipe so they could make it themselves and I could redeem myself.

We stopped at Independence Rock on the way home. We wore our pioneer outfits the whole time and we were all hot and stinky. It felt so good to change for the ride home and put flip flops on. I put my tennis shoes on for the hike up Independence Rock though. This is a picture of Matt and I and some of the girls from our ward.

The Bishop, Stake President, and I decided to grab all the kids that wanted to climb the rock and do a line stretching down from on top of the rock. We had so much fun climbing all over the rock. The bus driver that drove our ward joined right in with us and even did the hand cart trek with us. He has been going since 1992 when he drives the different wards and stakes. He took us around the back of the rock to the cave where some of the original names were carved in the rock.

Stake President Tim Blackham in the bright shirt. His wife is back by me and these are some of the boys in our ward.

Matt and the Bishop pointing out names in the cave.

On the way home we were coming up the last hill almost to Evanston and our truck just lost all power. We were just talking about times when our cars have broken down so it was really ironic. We pulled over and Glen just mentioned that we may have a dirty fuel filter because it happened to his cousin. Our truck only has 13 thousand miles on it and sure enough the gage said zero life on the fuel filter. It started back up and if our filter would have been dirty we wouldn't have been able to go over 65 mph but since we hit a certain number of miles that was just the trucks warning that we need to change the filter. It worked fine and we did get a laugh about that even. We stopped at a rest stop in Evanston and the bishop ordered pizza. We had so much fun. I laughed so hard at Nora my eye almost swelled shut on the way home. I couldn't believe 6 hours could go by so fast. I felt like I was on a high school cheerleading trip I had so much fun. I will always remember the stuffed beaver at the gas station, the lawn chair incident with the missionaries, and Glen with his one sock and bare foot going in to get four 50 cent cones at Little America. Thanks Olsons' for the great time!!