Mormon Handcart Park

I am really enjoying being in Iowa City. Yes, it is hot and really humid some days, but it is good to be here.

There is a lot of things to do and see. One of these cool things to do is go to the "Mormon Handcart Park." I had heard about this park and went out to find it one Sunday.

A neat fact is that Iowa City was the place to where the saints who would come by handcart outfitted and made their carts for the trek west. The park really isn't a park with a huge patch of grass to sit on, but rather a nice path that on one side of the trail is covered with trees and grasslands and the other side has trees, but it is bordered by some of the U of Iowa practice fields. There are a couple of benches and tables with some patches of grass,

but most a nice walk way. It was very peaceful and wonderful.

This park is where the saints camped and worked before heading west. How cool is that!? It was really neat to walk along this trail and think that saints worked together here for the journey west. I am so grateful for their sacrifice. It was such a hard journey for so many inexperienced saints. They had great faith and they had the fire of the covenant. They were willing to anything to follow the prophet and the will of the Lord. I hope that I can be like them and let the fire of the covenant burn in me like fire unquenchable.

It makes you wonder if this was a clearing where saints camped... Maybe... :-)

I love this picture. It just makes me think of faith in every footstep and enduring to the end.

There was only one downside to this park... the MOSQUITOES!!! Oh my goodness! I got bitten multiple times the two times I went there! It is like mosquito-ville there. They are everywhere around that place, which is sad, because it would be a wonderful place to go sit and think... I did buy some excellent bug repellent... hopefully it will help when I go there again. Wonderful park!