Well, you haven't heard from us for a while because we have been experiencing Hurricane Irene in a big way. We had 18 hours of rain. Then 24 hours without electricity or water. It was 4 days before we had electricity at our shop here at the visitors center. The Visitors Center stayed open, and the grounds stayed beautiful in spite of the storm. As for the people in neighboring areas, some people still don't have electricity

The past few days we have been very busy shoveling mud, tearing down sheetrock, hauling muddy ruined belongings out of houses, piling the back of our car full of the things to be salvaged, which were taken to a friends RV where we unloaded them to be washed later. We spent from about 9:00-4:00 Saturday and then again today (Sunday) from 10:00 t0 3:00. At 7:00 AM today we met at the church where we had an assembly line going to make 200 sack lunches. They made 100 sack lunches yesterday. After making lunches, we loaded them in our car and took them to the school (the command post) then we went home and got on our boots and work clothes and spent the day at Sandy's drive in restaurant and the mobile home behind it. The muddy water came clear up to the eves of the building and left about 6 inches of very sticky black mud that smelled swampy (like the mud at the bottom of the pond). The flood waters were 28 FEET above the normal flow of the river. Very few people had flood insurance. (We took pictures today, but left the camera at home so we will have to add them later. ) The ward provided sack lunches both days, and provided dinner at the school for all of the volunteers and for those they were helping (both days). The ward has a great group of young women and they were super. They pitched right in and were very hard working and cheerful. We were very proud of them. On Thursday all of the young Elders (the missionaries) in our mission are going to come and help out. People have come from towns all around to help. It has been great.


I told some of you about the Stone Bridge. Last week before the storm Mike and six other men spent the day restoring the turnpike bridge. The old wagon road through here was called "The Turnpike" and there was a stream that had to be crossed, so in the 1700's they constructed this bridge. The guys repaired it with the help of a backhoe/front end loader and angels. It was a miracle it came together with no one getting hurt. Some of those stones weighed more than 2,000 pounds, and every one of those guys said they had help from angels. At one point they had the last and probably heaviest stone held up by a strap (like you tow a car with) and it balanced perfectly so they could set it into place. It looked really GREAT. There were still ferns and wild flowers around, and they took the leaf blower and blew pine needles all around so it looked totally undisturbed, just as it might have looked in the 1700's after it was first built. It was shady when I took the picture with my cell phone, so it's not great, but I wanted you to see it anyway. It is amazing that they were able to build it with horse and wagons.
The second picture shows the flood waters. When Elder Charchenko and I got there Monday morning the water had gone down, but debris was causing the water to go over the bridge and was washing it out. He dragged out huge limbs and sent me for Elder McGreggor and the tractor. They were able to get all of the water going under the bridge, but about two-thirds of the road was washed out and has to be replaced. It has been a pretty exciting week. We love you all. Our apartment is high and dry, and we had more rain this evening (Sunday night).

ADDRESS CORRECTION: 273 LDS Lane, South Royalton Vermont 05068

e-mail addrerss: jmchar@gmail.com





In this picture you can see how deep the water was. You can't even see the bridge or the culvert or the road that we drive on. (We don't drive over the stone bridge. We just take people to see it.)