Saturday morning. The chaperones woke us up bright and early. Too early! 6:00 a.m. to be exact. Should have gone to bed when they told us last night. Eat breakfast with my new friends Kristofor and Makayla from Black River Electric Cooperative. In fact, every meal on this trip is provided or paid for (yes, Mike, by Cuivre River Electric Cooperative). After breakfast we packed our suitcases. Counted off. 1... 2... 3... 85! All present and accounted for. We got into our odd and even groups and loaded our bags into two buses and drove to the St. Louis airport. Before we got there, the chaperones asked how many of us had flown before. I was surprised to see that only about a quarter of us had never been on an airplane. As you know, I haven’t, and I didn’t really know what to expect.
We pulled up at Lambert International Airport and the Skycaps literally freaked out. Just as Mike and Lonnie said they would. We unloaded our luggage from the buses. It's amazing at just how many black and red bags we have. Which one is mine? I (Oliver) used a blue suitcase with bright orange tape for quick visual identification. Now it's time to get in line...
Mike gave us our tickets and we got in line for our security screening. Christian had to go through the machine several times before the TSA agents pulled him out of line and searched him. I'm (Jazmin) glad I checked everything! After an hour we made it through security and went to our gate. I met some more delegates as we talked and played cards.
We flew on Southwest Airlines, and the flight was amazing. The flight attendant cracked jokes and sang her welcomes and safety instructions to the tune of the Beverly Hillbillies song. She enlisted three of our delegates to pass out snacks and really made a big deal about the 96 Missouri Youth Tour participants (that’s 85 delegates and 11 chaperones) on the plane.
Like I said, I (Emily) was nervous about flying on an airplane. But with so many fun games, there’s nothing to be afraid of. Why didn’t anyone tell me flying was like this? Wait... We are not in the air yet?
Our plane landed about 3:40 p.m. in Baltimore. Yeah, that bothered me a bit, too. I thought we were going to Washington, D.C. It turns out that our final destination was only a 45-minute bus ride away. We loaded up in two deluxe tour buses and made our way to our hotel. As we arrived, we could see the Washington Monument and the U.S. Capitol rising above the city skyline. It was awesome!
Mr. D. pulled the "Odd Bus" into the Iwo Jima War Memorial parking lot and everyone was shocked at the overall size of the sculpture. It is massive! The sculpture is based on the photograph of the United States Marine Corps raising the American flag on Iwo Jima during World War II. It features a granite base which is huge! It has the phrase "In honor and in memory of the men of the United States Marine Corps who have given their lives to their country since November 10, 1775" engraved on one side and "Uncommon Valor Was a Common Virtue" on the other. The memorial features six soldiers cast in bronze about 30 feet tall raising a flagpole that is over 60 feet tall. I (Oliver) can't imagine what it must have been like for these brave Americans fighting for our freedom at this time in this place.
We stopped at the Jefferson Memorial. At the shore of the Tidal Basin, the memorial featured a 19-foot bronze statue of our third president. What vision the man possessed! It was Jefferson who penned the Declaration of Independence and oversaw the Louisiana Purchase.
He also promoted the importance of democracy, freedom of religion and the separation of church and state. It’s largely due to his vision and leadership that we have such a great nation today. I (Christian) can't wait to visit the National Archives and see the Declaration of Independence. Jefferson also sent Lewis and Clark on their expedition from St. Charles, Missouri to explore the new territory. How cool is that!
On the way back to the hotel, we visited the Franklin D. Roosevelt Memorial. Located on the famous Cherry Tree walk, the memorial took us through a series of four sections, each representing one of FDR’s terms in office. With plenty of statues and cascading waterfalls, the site was perfect for photos.
It is amazing to see these great tributes to such great leaders for our country. It's hard to believe what challenges each of these great leaders had to face during his time as President of the United States of America. Walking through the FDR Memorial and reading about the issues he faced made each of us look at ourselves and what we deal with each day back in Missouri. We just found the electric lineman Lonnie was talking about. There are so many things to see... Glad I am with my friends!
There are about 1,500 other delegates from states all across America at our hotel. From the moment we got off the bus and entered the hotel lobby we met delegates from several states like Florida, Georgia, North Dakota, Ohio, Tennessee, and Texas! We didn't even have time to set our bags down when everybody started introducing themselves and which state they represent. The cool thing about this is each state has a special Youth Tour pin that you can trade or collect! Our Missouri Youth Tour pin looks like our license plate with the letters MO YT. Very clever! This is going to be fun!
