Fumaroles and mud pots and geysers, oh my!

Days 9-11--From Tuesday afternoon through Saturday morning, we explored the wildly diverse geological and hydrothermal features of Yellowstone National Park.   

In this post, we will let a few of our photos speak for themselves.

We walked for miles, stopping to see some of Yellowstone's 200 geysers erupt...

Hot springs bubbled from the subterranean heat...

The mud pots gurgled...

We marveled at the colors created by the minerals and bacteria...

As we drove from site to site, we would often see elk or bison...

And what were the sounds of Yellowstone? The whooshing and splashing of geysers; the hiss of steam vents; the gurgling and splatting of paint pots; the roar of the waterfalls; the chatter of hundreds of people speaking in dozens of languages; the click, click of cameras and smartphones; and the dings of videos starting and stopping. 

On Friday we walked both the north and the south rims of the "Grand Canyon of Yellowstone," a 1000-foot canyon carved by the Yellowstone River. The canyon includes two powerful waterfalls.

On Friday night we experienced another serendipity. Bob and Carol Hamlin, our friends from Boise, texted us to say they were in Yellowstone too. After repeated attempts to text each other from the few places in the park that had any cell coverage, we met up for some hugs and an attempt at a four-person selfie in front of their Dutchmen camper.

Serendipities

Before we left on our trip, we contacted a number of people on our route to see if we could stop by to visit them when we passed through their area.

As a result, our schedule for the first two months of our trip is pretty full of planned visits with friends and family. Even so, we knew that a four-month, cross-country trip would also include a number of "serendipities," where we would see God's hand at work in unexpected ways.

One of those serendipities happened last Tuesday in Grand Teton National Park.

We were traveling around the park,looking at the amazing mountains. At one point, we pulled into an area overlooking Jenny Lake. We got out of our van to take some pictures and to stretch our legs. 

When we came back, a woman was looking at our van. She asked Lynn some questions. That's not unusual. We frequently have people ask about our van. We're always happy to talk with them and answer their questions. 

As Lynn was talking with the woman, I began to talk with her husband. I asked where they were coming from. "The Bozeman area," he said. When I was a teenager, I had spent a summer near Bozeman. It turned out that the couple was coming from the area where I had stayed, and we knew some of the same people. One question led to another. I mentioned that our church background was Christian Reformed. So was theirs, the husband replied. I asked him for his name. He replied, "Bel."

I looked carefully at him. And then I knew. He had to be Herm Bel, my old college roommate, whom I had not seen for more than 45 years. I asked him if his name was Herm. He looked puzzled and said, "Yes." Then I told him my name.

We looked at each other in amazement. And then we embraced. 

Lynn and Herm's wife looked at us strangely. They had not heard our conversation. And here were their husbands, whom they thought were two strangers, hugging each other. 

"Lynn," I said, "This is Herm Bel." Lynn knew Herm from our Calvin College days. Now it was her turn to shout, and her turn to hug Herm.

We spent the next hour talking non-stop over tea in the back of our van.  Herm and his wife, Dori, both had recently retired from very fulfilling and significant careers as teachers, and for Herm as a school administrator. They were making a road trip similar to ours, traveling to spend time with friends with whom they had worked and lived, and then stopping to see family on the way back to Chattanooga where they live.

It was wonderful to get caught up, but impossible to describe all that had happened to the four of us over 45 years. All we could do was to acknowledge God's blessings that each of us had experienced over the years. 

When it was finally time to leave, I looked at Herm and said, "God is in this connection we have just made. It cannot be just random. How else could we explain the fact that we wound up talking to each other in a parking lot next to a lake in Grand Teton National Park?"

So we exchanged contact information and went on our way. 

I'm interested in what God will do as a result of this contact with my old college roommate. I'm also eagerly looking forward to the next serendipity that God will bring our way on this journey.

It truly is turning into a great adventure.

Next stop, Yellowstone National Park

The Many Faces of the Grand Tetons

Days 7-8--When we drove into the Grand Teton National Park on Monday afternoon, the clouds hung low in a steely sky, eventually releasing rain. We drove along the spine of the mountain range to our campsite in Coulter Bay. Since it was raining, we decided to rest and read for a while. 

When the rain stopped in the early evening and the clouds lifted, we decided to drive back along the range, to Jackson Lake and Jenny Lake. Just a few of the 12,000-foot peaks were visible.

At dusk, the clouds began to break up, and the sun peeked through. We returned to Jackson Lake and watched as the oranges and reds of the setting sun lit up the clouds and silhouetted the mountain range. It was as if God were showing off. We took these photos with only an iPad. You can imagine what a really good camera and a powerful lens would have captured. 

On a sunny Tuesday morning, we traveled back to see the Tetons against the backdrop of a blue sky and full sunlight. 

Then at Jenny Lake, we experienced a miracle of sorts. Read the next post to discover what it was. 

Reconnecting at Church

Day 6--This past Sunday, we worshiped with Tante Nick and her son, Paul, at the First Christian Reformed Church in Salt Lake, where Tante Nick has been a member for more than 52 years.

My family and I (Bas) were active members of this church, which drew us into a wide range of complex. intimate relationships with a small, vibrant community of Dutch immigrants. We socialized together, worshiped together, and found our way in our adopted country together. Those of us who were children grew up together—physically, socially, spiritually.

The church was located only one block from our house. Next to the church is the Christian school. Both the church and the Christian school were the center of our lives when I was growing up.

The building where I attended church has been torn down and replaced by a newer building. My dad and many of the other immigrant men in the church helped to build both the new church building and the Christian school next to it.

During the coffee time after the church service, I had the special blessing of reconnecting with a variety of people who were in the church with my family when I lived in Salt Lake. Some of these people knew my parents very well. Others were classmates of mine. There were also many new families, including a young family who are the children of one of Lynn's close friends in college.

It was a great encouragement to see this church, which had been so important to my parents and to our family, continue to have an impact in the lives of families more than 50 years later. This was a great testimony to the faithful service and witness of many people as well as God’s blessing on the prayers of my parents and others who worked so hard to build this church in its early years.

Finally, it was time to say goodbye to my relatives. Then, Lynn and I got into our van and headed north into the Rockies, toward the Grand Tetons and Yellowstone national parks, where we will spend the next week.

You may not hear from us for a few days because we will be in remote areas and Internet access may be very limite. We'll post photos and reflections again once we are back in cell-phone range.

Salt Lake City Memories

Day 5--My (Bas') family immigrated to Salt Lake City in 1958, when I was 10 years old. My parents lived there for 20 years. During that time, my dad worked as a carpenter and construction superintendent, supervising the construction of multi-story buildings and structures around the Mountain West. This is one of the buildings that my dad built in Salt Lake City.

I graduated from high school in 1965, when I was 17. Three months later, I was on my way to Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Since then, I have returned to Salt Lake City only for one summer and several brief visits. Lynn, our children, and I were last here more than 30 years ago. Nevertheless, my childhood memories of Salt Lake City are very strong.

On Saturday, Lynn and I drove through the neighborhoods I called home during my time in Salt Lake City. We visited some of the places that shaped my life—schools, homes, churches, parks, mountains.

I’m proud to say that I could drive to almost all of these places without a map or GPS. That’s quite a feat because Salt Lake City has mushroomed in size since I was a child. Entire cities have come into being in the Salt Lake valley since I left. Everywhere I looked, there were new buildings, freeways, stores.

I hardly recognized some places, like downtown Salt Lake City, which has changed dramatically. And then there were places, like the duplex we lived in while I was in Salt Lake, that seemed so familiar that I could almost hear the voices of my family inside when I stood in front of our home.

It’s so interesting to go back to a place where you grew up as a child. Houses, neighborhood, stores, churches, schools seem small compared to their size in your memory. Distances seem much closer while driving in car as an adult rather than walking or riding a bike as a child.

I attended three schools during my time in Salt Lake City. The Christian elementary school is no more, although the building that my father and other church members built still stands and is used as a worship center by several small churches.

The junior high school has moved elsewhere and is now occupied by a private school. The high school from which I graduated has been completely torn down, with a new facility built in its place. Only part of the old façade remains.

While much has changed in the neighborhoods I visited today, the memories remain strong and clear. As I stood in front of the house where we lived, I could picture my mom cooking, my dad coming home from a hot day at a construction site, my brother and me wrestling with my dad on the living room floor, my practice sessions on our upright piano, the desk that my dad built for me as a place to study when I got my own room, the gunfights my brother and I had with our air rifles in the back yard, the old wooden garage where we carefully parked the family car.

I remembered the hymn sings, the family gatherings, the endless rounds of kickball during recess in the playground at the Christian school, the happy voices of families gathered for a church picnic in a canyon near the city.

While there are many changes in Salt Lake City, one thing has not changed. Everywhere you go, you see the Rocky Mountains, towering over the city toward the east. These mountains have not changed. They dominate the landscape. When I looked at the mountains today, it was as if I was looking at them as a child 50 years ago.  

Psalm 90, one of my dad’s favorite psalms, begins with these words, “Lord, through all the generations you have been our home! Before the mountains were born…you are God. (NLT)

As a Christian, I know my true home is not to be found in Salt Lake City, Utah, or in Tigard, Oregon, but in God, who has been our home through all generations, before the mountains that surround Salt Lake City were born.

I treasure the memories of my childhood, although some are bittersweet.  In my memory I hear so many voices of people who have died. I see the faces of many people who shaped my life.

Even more than my childhood memories, I treasure the promise that one day I will hear these voices and see the faces of those who shaped my life when we meet again in heaven.

That will be a glorious day, when we will be with those we love and the God we love for eternity. I thank God for making this possible through the death of His Son, Jesus. My faith in this promise is perhaps the greatest gift and legacy from my life in Salt Lake City. For this, I will be forever grateful.

"How Great Thou Art"

Day 4--When my (Bas') family emigrated to Salt Lake City from Canada, Nick, mom's sister, and her family emigrated as well. Tante Nick still lives in Salt Lake City. She is 87 years old, the only survivor of a family of six siblings, all of whom emigrated from the Netherlands after WWII. 

On Friday we visited Tante Nick in her apartment in a senior citizen’s center. She lives on the third floor, with what she calls a “million dollar view” of the Rocky Mountains to the east. When I listened to her talk, I could hear the voice of my mom, who died a few months ago. The accent was the same. The vocabulary was the same. The perspectives were the same.

Tante Nick is full of life and joy. She walks with a cane but is otherwise able to care for herself. On Mondays, she leads a group of women who get together to play Bunco. On Tuesday, she goes shopping at Walmart with four other ladies. They each use a motorized grocery cart to get around the store. Tante Nick says that the staff at Walmart are always amused to see these four carts in a row going through the aisles. 

On Wednesday, Tante Nick goes to her favorite activity, a rehearsal of the harmonica band to which she has belonged for 10 years. While we were in her apartment, Tante Nick took out her 6-scale harmonica and played some of her favorite tunes for us. 

And, even though it had been 20 years since I had played a harmonica, I joined Tante Nick in playing "How Great Thou Art."

We had a great time with a great lady--a woman who continues to touch many in her building and in her life with her faith, joy, and compassion.

I’m grateful for my Tante Nick, and for her son, Paul, and daughter, Judy and their spouses, with whom we had dinner Friday night. It was wonderful to be able to renew relationships and to experience the love of family. A great and precious blessing.

From the Crossroads of the West

Day 3--When we arrived at our campground in Salt Lake City on Thursday night, we hurried downtown to a 7:30 pm  rehearsal of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, which was practicing for its weekly Sunday broadcast, "Music and the Spoken Word," the longest, continuous-running radio broadcast in the country.

No other choir sounds like the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. More than 360 local musicians volunteer their time to sing in the choir. Each one is a talented singer. Together, their sound is incomparable. Add a huge pipe organ and a full symphony orchestra in the outstanding acoustics of a 20,000-person auditorium, and you have a taste of heaven on earth.

During the two-hour rehearsal, the choir practiced only three songs: Marta Keen's lyrical "Homeward Bound," Cesar Frank's "Praise, Praise the Lord" (from Psalm 150), and John Rutter's "I Will Sing with Spirit." For the two of us, who met in a radio choir and who fell in love on a choir tour, it was a thrill to see and hear the rehearsal.

When the choir finished singing "Homeward Bound," we both had tears in our eyes. The lyrics of this song were particularly meaningful to us because we had come to Salt Lake City to revisit Bas’ boyhood memories of growing up in this city, which was his home for seven years. Click on this YouTube link  or, if you can see it, on the YouTube video below if you’d like to hear this song for yourself.  Click here for the lyrics.

Blessings in Boise

We spent last night in Boise, Idaho, at the home of Bob and Carol Hamlin. Jane Walker joined us for dinner. We know Jane and the Hamlins from the years when Jane and Bob served on the board of directors at what was then Northwest Medical Teams. We've known Jane from our first connection with Northwest Medical Teams; she served on the search committee that eventually selected Bas to be the president of the organization.

Jane, a retired nurse, recently spent a month on a short-term mission trip to Uganda. She commented, "God used some extraordinary circumstances to lead me to Uganda. I felt so comfortable in the villages, sharing my life and faith with the people we met. It is so humbling to realize that even at my age, God can use my life to bless others."

Bob, a retired lawyer, reflected on one of his experiences while serving as a Northwest Medical Teams volunteer in a garbage dump in Mexico City. "One of the vivid memories I have is of the people worshipping. They sang with such passion, their hands lifted up in praise. I'm not a person who normally raises his hand in worship, but I was so moved and inspired by their joy that I couldn't help but join them."

Carol reflected on this phase of her life with their children and their six grandchildren, who live close by. "It's such a joy to be involved in each other's lives. We are so blessed. We share each other's events and struggles. It's a privilege to be able to pray for them every day."

Next stop: Salt Lake City, Utah 

The Overlanders

Day 2--We stopped in at the Oregon Trail Interpretive Center in Baker City today. An amazing museum telling the story of more than 500,000 pioneers who braved a 2,000-mile journey, walking all of the way. 

These pioneers, known as "Overlanders," took with them everything they owned. They left family and friends, knowing they would never see them again. They went to a place they had never seen. They overcame incredible obstacles along the way--heat, hunger, thirst, illness, danger, mountains, uncertainty, rains, sometimes snow.  More than 30,000 died along the way.

Each day was tedious--walking alongside their wagons for 15-20 miles in the dust. They had no emergency road service for breakdowns. No fast-food places to grab a meal. No wi-fi to check on the weather, catch up on the news, or connect with friends. 

Today, we rush past these trails on the freeway. In a week, we could easily cover the same distance that took them 6 months to travel. By plane, we could do it in a day.

The Overlanders traveled in wagons that came to be called Prairie Schooners. We found some of these wagons at the Interpretive Center. They are about 11 feet long and less than 4 feet wide, containing everything the Overlanders had in the world.

In some ways, our van feels to us like is a prairie schooner--a 20-foot vehicle carrying all of life's essentials and taking us on a cross-country journey.

We don't pretend the determination that characterized many of the Overlanders. But as we drive through some of the rugged terrain they traveled, we will think of their courage. 

Roll on, Columbia

Day 1

Just before we left our home today, Alisa and Joe came over for hugs, prayer, and photos. We gave our last bag of garbage to our neighbors, for them to put out tomorrow night, and we took off with a mixture of sadness at leaving our home and friends here, but excitement about the next few months.

Today we traveled through one of our favorite places, the Columbia River Gorge, where the river cuts through mountains in both Oregon and Washington. (Sorry about the pixelated line on the photos. Something was malfunctioning with my camera today.) 

Highway 84 hugs the river, offering views of the river traffic, bridges, and dams, as well as the trains that snake along the river's edge. In a three-hour period we counted nearly a dozen trains, each with more than 100 cars. 

The many Lewis and Clark signs along the highway remind us of their trip down the river 209 years ago. They were bloggers way back then. They might not have had iPhone cameras or blogger apps, but they kept meticulous daily journals. 

As Woodie Guthrie sang, 

     Tom Jefferson's vision would not let him rest, 

     An empire he saw in the Pacific Northwest. 

     Sent Lewis and Clark and they did the rest; 

     Roll on, Columbia, roll on.

By the end of the day we were in Oregon Trail country, the golden grain fields stretching as far as the eye could see. 

We're camping tonight in Baker City, Oregon, in the shadow of the Blue Mountains. 

Tomorrow on to Boise, Idaho.