WEEK #57 - The Mount Garfield Rescue

This was one of the craziest, most intense weeks of my life...  

Monday: August 17th

CRAZY STORY:

The Mt Garfield Rescue: So to make this concise, basically we saved an Elder from dying today... ya, it was that intense. So one of our Districts decided to hike Mount Garfield which is this INSANELY difficult hike. And I got a call from that District leader who told me that they had ALL run out of water and one Elder was going into severe heat exhaustion! Me and Elder Samojla rushed out of our apartment with a bunch of extra water bottles. We were so fast that I didn't even have time to change out of my white shirt and tie! So we grabbed some more Elders and sped up to the bottom of the Mountain. Me and Elder Samojla sprinted up the steep trail carrying only a few water bottles, but we needed to get to them. Long story short, we found Elder Emery who was suffering from severe heat exhaustion and got him some water. We even used my tie drenched in water to pat his head down. For the next 3 hours we shade hopped down the mountain as I carried Elder Emery with me. At one point he fell unconscious and his eyes rolled into the back of his head... that was the scariest moment of my life. Luckily I slapped him back, and we got him down the rest of the mountain to where we had fresh water waiting. It was the most intense life or death thing I've ever experienced. Here are we, running up an ash covered mountain as half of Colorado is being burned by fires, with this COVID thing still here and everything with it... BUT I still know that Heavenly Father was in every detail!

The Rescue team!

Mt. Garfield Trail

RIP my shoes

Tuesday: August 18th

We got to makeup pday today, and had a very nice dinner with the Olsons. They are an amazing family. It was such a polar opposite day from yesterday!

Now this is how you play chess :)

Wednesday: August 19th

We had exchanges with our district leader! Too bad it was virtual again. We had an in person lesson outside Ashli's house. There was ASH EVERYWHERE! It was literally snowing ash on us, my clothes smelled of smoke and you could see ash all over it. We couldn't even see Mt. Garfield from our apartment AT ALL, whereas beforehand we could... there is so much smoke I look in every direction and it's just a well of smoke surrounding the city of Grand Junction. I never thought this would happen on my mission. 

Thursday: August 20th

AWEsome 20th today! :) Goofs. We had exchanges with our 2nd district leader! It was great to learn from them. Today we got to make evacuation plans for our Zone in case the fires got to close. Last I heard they were only 12 miles away from us! Who would've ever thought a whole ZONE may potentially get evacuated from their apartments because of some crazy wildfires.... dang gina!

The sneak selfie... :)

Friday: August 21st

We had exchanges with our 3rd district leader! It was pretty good despite it was all over phone call, haha. Sometimes I wonder how signal works. I learned lot of good things from them, Elder Oakes is going home in a week. I love how as we focus on becoming a disciple of Jesus Christ it doesn't matter where we are in life, because we WILL receive the guidance we need. I pray that we may continue along the path of Discipleship. A cool though from Elder Bunker (my AWEsome Monticello friend) was that the word "path" indicates that someone has already used it. Someone has walked it before. And that's our Savior. He's walked the path of discipleship, and so we can trust Him as we follow Him!

CRAZY SIDE STORY:

Because of all the wicked crazy fires in Colorado they shutdown highway I-70 and it's so crazy!!! No one can use the highway because of the wildfires... please keep or start praying <3

Fires and smoke!

Saturday: August 22nd

Today was fun! We got to do some more service, we pulled some weeds... as much as I didn't like that job as a kid I now enjoy it. Very stress relieving to watch a yard look cleaner... haha! We finally finally got to talk with Nick. He's been struggling, but we're getting him back to coming to church and will help him continue to live the Gospel!

Sunset clouded by smoke!

Sunday: August 23rd

Today I got a call from President Rees.... he told me to sell my house here in Lands End because I've been here for so long, haha! He then told me I was getting TRANSFERRED to still be a ZL and Facebook Specialist in Black Canyon, which is in Montrose!! This is literally the 2ND time I've ever been transferred and I've been out on my mission for 13months... wow. My third area. Exciting! Today we also had Carol come to in person church for the first time! It was so cool seeing how supportive and loving everyone was towards her as she learns more about the restored Gospel! :)

What a CRAZY week. Such is life, amirite? ;)

Love you all, 

Elder LaRose