Vacation Day 7-- The Hill Cumorah, the Grandin Building, and the Pageant

The weather had been so hot we decided to get up early again the next morning to hike the short distance up the Hill Cumorah before we roasted. The Hill Cumorah is where an ancient prophet (Moroni) from the Americas buried an ancient record which had been written on golden plates. This record would later be given to Joseph Smith, which the Lord helped him translate into the Book of Mormon, which stands as another witness and testament of Jesus Christ, along with the Bible.

It was a lovely, short hike through the woods and up a hill. What was so enjoyable about this was that the cast for the Hill Cumorah Pagaent, a pagaent all about the Book of Mormon, were practicing that morning. Although we were not allowed to go past a certain point down the other side of the hill, from the top we could see quite well and were very close to some of the actors. I was once again moved by the sacrifices people make to contribute to the building up of the kingdom. These actors are all volunteers who give 3 weeks of their summer to learn the show and perform it for a week. They are families of all shapes and sizes, including little children. This is what they are doing for their summer vacation. Why you ask? It is because they believe in it. They love the Book of Mormon. They want to share it with others so they give of their time and talents. Seeing them there in their normal clothes practicing already that morning was just so moving to me. What a lesson for the children and teenagers in the show; some things are worth sacrificing a lot for. I think I enjoyed this moment on the hill even more than the pagaent itself.

Next we went on to the Grandin building where the Book of Mormon was first published. This was one of our favorite places. Surprisingly we were the only ones in our group on the tour. The Sister Missionary quickly learned all of the kids names and would ask them questions by name. she also geared her remarks toward how the Book of Mormon helps families. She was awesome! She helped us feel the Spirit and once again our hearts swelled with gratitude that we have this book, that we can find answers in this book to life's toughest questions, that we can come to know Jesus Christ better by reading this book, that we can strengthen our families through reading this book. So many miracles happened for it to be published. The Lord wanted this book published!

Then, once again we found ourselves looking for something to do. This time we decided to go bowling. Oh man, it was so fun! I think Anna was the only one who had ever been bowling (she had chosen to do that on of here dates with us) so it was a new experience for the kids. Fortunately for all of us they had gutter blockers so none of us could get a gutter ball. It was so funny to watch the kids different approaches. Jacob was the most enjoyable to watch because he was so little. Adam would put the ball in his hands, then he would just run right up and throw it down the lane. I told Greg he is going to be the kind of kid who just takes life by the horns.

There is nothing like watching a spunky two year old bowl to make you smile. It was so much fun!

Finally we are to the event which caused us to plan this trip at this particular time, The Hill Cumorah Pagaent. I am the only one in the family who had seen the pagaent before so everyone was really anticipating it. We were sad when it had started raining in the afternoon, but it did clear up and even cooled things down a bit (even if it was muddy) by the time the pagaent started. It was also our good fortune to get front row seats. Earlier that morning when we were at the hill we noticed some people had already started saving seats so we thought it was worth a try, so we took our swimming towels out of the car and draped across 7 seats in the front row. They were still there when we arrived so front row seats we had!

We arrived an hour or so before the show started, so the kids had some time to run around and meet some of the actors. They especially liked chatting with the "bad guys". Here's one with the kids and "King Noah".

But they also would talk to some of the good guys - Moroni and Joseph Smith

And, gratefully, they would even talk to each other. Our "twins" Lizzy & Ben. (They are almost exactly the same height now and people often think they're twins).

The show was impressive - especially the special effects. The stage is enormous and complete with large waterfalls, ancient temples, fire, lightning storms (with very realistic lightning and rain), earthquakes, and so on. Many of the significant stories from the Book of Mormon are retold in the pageant through a cast of several hundred actors. The story moves pretty fast - we wondered if it would be confusing for someone if they weren't familiar with the Book of Mormon -but since the stories were familiar to us we were able to follow the action fairly well. The kids really enjoyed it a lot. It was a fun evening and we're grateful to the many people that worked to put that on for us. We did miss the intimacy of the Nauvoo Pagaent. The Hill Cumorah pagaent was much more fast paced and doesn't follow one or two characters throughout (which helps you feel attached to them). It is definitely a big and bold and flashy, which was surprising to me. Things had changed a lot since I had last seen it. We are glad we went though.