WE ARE FINALLY HERE!

We arrived in Trinidad on Sunday, Oct. 12th, after a lo-o-o-ng two days, tired and hungry. Luckily we were met by Elder and Sister Collins, an office couple, who have been here two months and are from Cedar City, Utah. They took us to the apartment of Elder and Sister Coleman (Pima, AZ) where we all ate a wonderful meal that the two sisters had prepared. We had about an hour to relax before we went to the mission home just a few blocks away to attend a fireside which started at 6:00 PM. We had a chance to meet the mission president and his wife (the Robisons from Provo, UT) and another senior couple, Elder and Sister Green. We also met some of the Trinidad Elders and some of their investigators and newly baptized members. This fireside is held every six weeks on the Sunday before Transfer Day. The Elders need to bring investigators or newly baptized members in order to attend and get the refreshments afterwards. There were about 40 people there all together. Then, we were finally driven to our new home to meet the landlady and her real estate agent and to inspect the place. It wasn't until after 10:00 pm that we started to put some of our things away. We couldn't do much more than find our toothbrushes and night clothes and collapse in our beds.

I need to backtrack in our mission story at this point and just give some brief highlights of the last few weeks since we left our home in St. George.

• left St. George Saturday, Oct 4th at 7:30 am in the 1st good rainstorm in the area for many months
• cried all the way to Cedar but had a 2 hour nap and felt better (Carol, not Truman, he was driving)
• got to Salt Lake about 12:30 pm, parked and went to afternoon session of conference with Marilla (our daughter-in-law) who got tickets from Elder Holland's (her uncle) office which were in the center front section on the floor of the conference center - about 12 rows away from the First Presidency and the Twelve
• It was so awesome being in that session and experiencing the Spirit that permeated the entire room.
• had dinner with David and Marilla's family, then drove to Springville to stay at my sister, Marilyn's place
• attended Sunday afternoon session of conference with David - It was such a special experience to be able to attend and be blessed and inspired by such spiritually strong men and women. I wish I could have just a small portion of their strength and wisdom.
• entered the MTC Monday, Oct. 6th for a glorious week of learning and growth. We spent the nights in Springville.
• Wednesday night we stopped by to visit with our grandsons for a couple hours before going to Springville. David has a neighbor who served his mission in the West Indies 15+ years ago. He showed us a slide show of St. Lucia's culture from pictures from his mission days.
• Thursday night Marilla fixed us dinner. Our son-in-law, Darryl, who had been in the area all week on work-related business, also came for dinner. Then, he was kind enough to watch the little boys while we attended a session in the Provo Temple with David and Marilla
• last day at MTC was Friday. I volunteered Truman to sing a solo at the concluding meeting. He sang "How Great Thou Art". It was a perfect ending to a spiritually growing and faith promoting week. Please scroll to the end of the page to see a large picture of the Sr. couples we trained with. Look for us in the middle to the right.
  
• Friday night we enjoyed our "last supper" with our children at the Brick Oven in Provo. Almost everyone was there. Jacquie and her kids missed because it was Parent Night at the high school football game that night. She needed to be there to escort her son, a Sr. football player, onto the field. As you can well imagine, the night ended in many more tears being shed before and after we said our final good-byes.
• After finally getting our luggage repacked for the flight to Trinidad, we made it to bed by 11:30 pm. We woke at 4:00 am to get dressed and to the airport shortly after 5.
  
• checked luggage (no problem); passed through security (always a problem with Carol's titanium knee); ate breakfast (no problem); boarded plane (no problem); flight departing (BIG problem - navigation system); de-boarding (YUK); re-ticketing (HUGE 2 1/2 hour problem)
• finally got a new itinerary: 2:40 pm SLC to Chicago, 7:25 pm Chicago to Miami, next day - Sunday - 10:00 am Miami to 1:40 pm arrival at Port of Spain, Trinidad
• boarded at 2:40; sat at terminal and on runway for 1 hour; had 10 minutes to de-board and change terminals and re-board in Chicago (would have had an hour and 10 minutes); arrived in Miami at 11:30 pm; went to hotel with vouchers to claim our reserved room. HaHaHa - no room; don't know which end messed up but I suspect Miami Hotel just didn't care.
• We found an Amerian Airlines representative who found us a room at a Crowne Plaza Hotel 10 minutes away. Crown Plazas are wonderful! We didn't get to bed until after 1:00 am.
• woke at 7:00 am, dressed; ate breakfast (AA gave us vouchers for that, too); took shuttle to airport; boarded on time (10:00 am); THEN, sat on the runway for nearly an hour. Good Grief, American Airlines, don't any of your planes leave on time?
• We arrived at the Port of Spain airport at 2:15 ish; gathered luggage (MIRACLE! it was all there); went through Customs and finally met the Collins outside the airport. We were on our way to the Coleman's apartment by 3:45 or so.
  

Now, my story has made it back to where I began this blog post. I'm going to add pictures now and tell you about our first few days in the next post.

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Love ya',
Elder and Sister Leishman