Apartment Inspections

We made it through the two inspections in Ft. Smith and the one in Van Buren, but on the way to Prairie Grove, it started raining pretty hard.  The grey skies and the rain provided a different, but still beautiful look at the forests of Northwest Arkansas.

A mural on the wall of an office building in Prairie Grove---have I posted one of this before???

This particular tree is so striking because the red and green are so contrasted--with the red and green leaves right next to each other on the tree. 

These are Sister Fyfe and Sister Phillips who served in Prairie Grove which is actually outside our zone but allows the senior couples to each do 7 apartments each cycle.   

They were so excited to show Elder Hall "their picture hung in a weird place--a sure sign that someone punched a hole in the apartment."  We knew something was up, because they were trying so hard not to laugh.  When Gary asked them to uncover it-----

this is what he found--

a sign that says "hole."  They were so thrilled that they had "gotten" Elder Hall.  We are still laughing about the whole thing.  I shared it with Sister Collins who loved it as well.  Young missionaries are the best!

The fall harvesting of the grasses where the greens contrast with the autumn colors.

Gary took an unexpected turn out of Prairie Grove and we ended up going over into Oklahoma on our way home from Prairie Grove.  He had seen "Zion" on the map and thought we might be able to get a fun picture there.  Afterall, don't we all want to go to Zion!  Well, Zion, Oklahoma, doesn't have much to mark it as a location.  The school was the only big sign marking the spot of this tiny rural township.  Welcome to Zion!

They decided to save some money and ordered the small size for their stop signs.

Driving up and down these hills on a new road, even in the rain, was a delightful break from the busyness of apartment inspections.

The next day while we were heading to the Mena apartment for their inspection, the zone leaders posted a "Get Real" request on our messenger group.  We grabbed this picture of us at the door of the Mena apartment--with their bread!  This is us doing senior missionary stuff!!!

We then headed the Oklahoma way back home from Mena which is about the same distance as the Arkansas way except we took the famous Talihina Scenic byway.  We probably missed the peak colors by 7-10 days but it still was pretty.

The sign at the end--this is a pretty route anytime.  Put it on your list of things to do on a road trip in Arkansas.

On our drive back, Gary had found a cemetery to visit in Poteau that had several requests for photos of grave markers.  However, when we arrived at the address, it was in the middle of a neighborhood and not a sign of grave markers anywhere.  We did see this nice Thanksgiving sign in someone's front yard.

Luckily, Gary had a back up plan and we went to the Hall Cemetery about 10 minutes away.  Jena liked that we went to the Hall cemetery but we didn't actually find any Halls buried there.

This is one of Gary's passion--to help the people who lived in Arkansas be connected to their God and to their families.  Jena and I have loved helping in take photos and to learn a bit about these people.

As a bonus, we stopped at some bridges we discovered on the way out to the Hall Cemetery.  The new road goes between the old car bridge and the old train bridge.  We were able to get out and walk across the old car bridge right at sunset.

These pictures actually go over an actual flowing river--Poteau River.

The red rust is a perfect match to the surrounding fall colors.

Fun to explore the changing of shadows on the bridge at sunset.

This is the train bridge across the roadway,,,,

and the trussells that carry the train tracks above the water banks.

While apartment inspections seem like an "boring" tasks--it is such a blessing to be with the young missionaries and our journeys along the roads and through the cemeteries just brings us such joy. We are so blessed to have the privilege to serve here/