Church Youth Trips

Becky and I went on lots of church youth trips during the seventies. We were a young couple involved in the church and so we got asked often to be part of youth activities. We were even the youth group’s leaders for a few years. We also did youth Sunday school several times. But, the big thing was the trips.

One of the first trips we went on was the youth ski trip to Mt. LaCrosse near La Crosse, Wisconsin. We did know much about leading a group of kids and we knew nothing about skiing but we went anyway. It’s not really a mountain but a big hill.

We started out on the bunny hill and did Ok. They had a rope tow to the top of the big hill so that was the next challenge. It was a long not so steep hill. We went up and came straight down and then up and down again. We could go straight but didn’t know how to turn. After awhile it wasn’t too exciting.

Becky crashed on the hill behind me and was twisted in a painful position. She was unable to move and screamed for my help. Now, the only way I knew to go up hill when skiing was the rope tow but that wasn’t an option. I ended up crawling about 20 yards up the hill to get to her. She had twisted a knee so her skiing was over for the day. Her swollen knee made the long trip home a painful trip.

We took a weeklong trip with the youth group one summer. We took the girls with us on this one. We went to a Presbyterian Camp for a week’s work cleaning and repairing the camp for the camping season. From there we went to Minneapolis we stayed in a church basement. While there we toured an inner city refuge and the group went to a play at the Guthrie Theater. I didn’t get to go because someone needed to stay back at the church and watch Heather.

We made about six trips to Dubuque with church kids. We went there with the confirmation group and visited New Mallory Abby and a Greek Orthodox Church. We stayed all night in the Catholic Seminary and enjoyed having breakfast with the cloistered monks.

Several times while in Dubuque we went skiing at Sundown. It was a better slope than Mt. LaCrosse and offered several routes and challenges. It also had lift chairs that we liked much better than the towropes. We got better and better at it as we continued to go.

Becky perfected several acrobatic moves. More than once after one of the spectacular tumbles I thought surely she was seriously hurt, or worse only to find her giddy with joy. Fortunately, neither us were ever hurt seriously and none of the kids were a problem. We did get a little tired of sleeping on the hard floor of a church.