2016 July Lake Erie/Kirtland Trip Overview

Hello everyone, I’m John and once again I Am writing the report/overview of last month’s camp-out. There is so much to cover I’m not sure how to start other than to jump right into it.

The trip started out with a long nine-hour drive to Lake Erie. You would see I time-lapse video of the whole drive but, the camera stand wouldn’t stay put. Most of the drive was spent ether sleeping or playing Pokémon Go.

After eight hours of driving we finally made it to the ferrie that would take us to South Bass Island (an island in the middle of lake Erie). When you looked at lake Erie you would think it was the ocean unless someone told you that it’s a lake. The ferrie ride was fun. We were able to see our hair blow in the wind as we sailed across the lake. After about twenty minuets we finally made it to the island.

By the time we got there it was dark at our campsite and we were being swarmed by bugs. During the course of our stay I’m sure we all swallowed a few bugs. Anyway we had a pretty good dinner if you don’t count the bugs.

The next day was more eventful, we got up had breakfast and got read for the day. After that we hung out and got ready to go to the beach.

At the beach/lake we had a pretty good time, we swam did some frisbee, and all that other beach stuff. After we got out we began this camp-out’s D&D campaign in which Neil created an over powered character that beat the main villain with one move.

Anyway after that we took a tour of the town. There were golf carts everywhere, there were even golf cart dealerships. The best thing though was Perry’s Victory and International Peace Memorial. It’s a giant granite pillar on South Bass that commemorates The Battle of Lake Erie and the peace between the U.S. and England after the War of 1812.

When we to the elevator up it to a whole minute to get up to the top it’s 352 feet tall, you could see the whole island and the very edge of the Canadian border from up there.

The rest of the town was cool and we even got a picture of Sam sticking his head in a FAKE cannon.

We lounged around the rest of the day and had to deal with more bugs but, thankfully not during dinner, and Josh also swallowed a few while he was DMing D&D.

The next morning we had omelets and packed up camp. After we did our trash sweep we set off for Kirtland.

The first thing we did when we got there was to tour the original town of Kirtland. We saw the house where Joseph Smith lived when he was there and the first “MTC” in the attic of that house. We also saw the sawmill where they cut the wood to make the Kirtland temple.

After we finished we breaked for lunch in the picnic area and then went off to see the temple.

The temple was so amazing, the way everything was set up and the fact that we were in one of the few places that we know Jesus stood and walked.

After we finished our tour of the temple we got back in the cars and headed for our next campsite. During that time we also stopped for dinner at Taco Bell. Anyway once we got to the campsite we set up camp and hit the sack.

The next day was full of driving, sleeping, and Pokémon Go. It only took us six hours to get back this time because our campsite was closer to home.

When we got back to the church there was steam coming of the side walks because the side-walk had been so hot during the day that when it started raining the water evaporated when it hit the side walk. Once we where all there we unpacked everything and then, slowly, one by one we all when home.

Before I end this I would like to thank John Oliver and Gain Foster for driving us all that way.

See you in the next article

-John A.