Day 7: Nauvoo

I am having trouble uploading pictures from the first day at Nauvoo. I wrote a whole post to go along with them, so I will hold off posting and just post the pictures from our second day at Nauvoo. It was packed.

We started out the morning early, at 6:45. We went to the Nauvoo Temple for the 8:00 session.

The Nauvoo Temple was originally finished in 1846, just before the members of the church left for the Salt Lake Valley. It was eventually destroyed. In 2002, it was rebuilt and rededicated in exactly the same place, almost exactly as it was originally.

Here we are in front of it.

And here's a shot of the temple with a water tower behind it. Just like the one in Lubbock.

After we changed, we headed back to Old Nauvoo, where we walked along the Trail of Hope, which was the street where the church members lined up to begin the journey west, all the while having a pretty good view of everything they were leaving behind. Along the trail are quotes from the people who left, things they wrote in their diaries.

Also along the trail is a spot where you can see oxen.

An ox is not a specific breed of cow. Rather, it is any animal bred to pull cargo. I didn't ask if that mean a chicken could be an ox. But I wondered.

Here I am next to an ox. The pair that were pulling people in a wagon were named Hank and Homer. I am embarrassed to say that my mom and I rode on the wagon in a tiny circle around the yard.

Here is a shot of oxen under a baptismal font. The imagery and symbolism makes a lot more sense to me now.

When we were done there, we had lunch on the main street in Nauvoo. Mom and I loved the place where we ate, which reminded her of Grandpa Hopkin's Cafe in Morgan.

After lunch, we headed to the Nauvoo Cemetery, where I called Grandma Pete to see if we had any relatives who lived in Nauvoo. As it turned out, we did.

Our next stop was the Land and Records Office, where we were able to look up some of Grandma's relatives who actually lived in Nauvoo. They let us burn their records on a CD to take home.

We also made a quick stop at Lucy Mack Smith's house and Brigham Young's house.

Amazingly, we also made it to Warsaw and Carthage Jail before dinner. I have more to say about Carthage, but I will have to save that for a time when I can upload my pictures.

Eventually, we got back to the bus and headed for dinner at a steakhouse. Then we got back on the bus and headed back to Old Nauvoo for the pageant.

During this trip, we will see two pageants: Nauvoo and the Hill Cumorah Pageant. They are vastly different. Nauvoo involves singing and dancing, and the memorization of lots of lines. The Hill Cumorah Pageant is narrated by a recording, and the actors get a week to learn everything they need to know. The Nauvoo pageant is performed on a stage, while the Hill Cumorah Pageant is performed on the hill itself. The Nauvoo pageant is stunning and well-performed, but it is not as big as the Hill Cumorah Pageant, or as widely attended, from what I could tell. But we loved it. The focus of the pageant is life in Nauvoo, and finishes with the completion of the Nauvoo Temple, which was lit up at the end of the play. Beautiful.

Blogger is not letting me upload any new pictures, so this will have to do for now.

By the time we got back to our hotel room that night, it was 11:00. It was a long day, but a great one.