Iowa Trip Part 1

Let me try this post one more time - I finally got the format page to show up. This first photo was along a pretty high ridge in Wyoming. The wind farm went on for miles. There is also an big area in the middle of Iowa that has hundreds of these things along the tops of the hills. I was really surprised to see so many of these things along the route. It rained alot from Rawlins to Laramie but we finally outran the storm once we got past Laramie. Wyoming is under water - every river was flooded. Every low lying area was filled with water and it was green. I have never seen Wyoming green. Photo doesn't show much green, but it was through the car window (taken by me while I was driving).

Monday was a very hard day. We drove all the way to Lincoln. We arrived at the Flacks about 10:30 that night. The DVD player in the car wouldn't work until we got in the middle of Nebraska and so Ammon was not a very happy camper. But he was like a good little pioneer and toughed it out. He's dreading the ride home. He promised me today that he wouldn't talk about going home until Sunday. (Thank you!)

On Tuesday morning we drove down to our old farm. I wish we hadn't. I didn't have the heart to post the photos. Jim got permission from the manager to drive around it. We were heartbroken. It is the dirtiest junk heap in the state of Nebraska. It used to be so clean. Old junk is lying around everywhere. Barns are in disrepair, and it was awful to realize what it is now. (Dr. Gaufin is still a partner.)

We could hardly recognize the place because it's nearly overrun with huge trees. It was even hard to get my bearings because of them.

You will recognize this - Adam's favorite hang-out place, the pond, still filled with fish.

This is the lane heading down to the mailbox.

Another view of the farm from 134th street. You can't even see the house, abandoned trailer (which is a different one than we lived in) or the barns. You wouldn't even know somebody lived there because the trees are so dense and huge.

We spent a couple of hours at Winter Quarters. I had once taken my seminary class there in December and we had a special meeting sitting out in the snow and cold (16 degrees) trying to understand and appreciate what the pioneers had gone through. There was no temple then and there was no temple when we lived in Nebraska. It's a beautiful building. We took the tour through the visitor's center and enjoyed the quiet break from driving.

More to come..... We are having a great time.