Final blog post done by Sam Anderton, tenor and senior:
"Well, our trip has come to an end. It’s quite a bittersweet feeling, being a senior and all. This trip, though long and stressful, has been an amazing experience in my life and the lives of the choir. Over this week, we have become bonded, meshed into one voice — how a choir truly should be. There are only a few days until my very last Spring Concert, and that will be the end of my high school singing career. I am beyond thankful and honored to have been a part of this choir and I thank God for giving me the opportunity and courage to join my sophomore year. Today, we drove from Caldwell, Idaho, back to Bend. It was a pretty uneventful drive for those who couldn’t sleep on the bus, and an even less eventful drive for those who could. We arrived back in time for lunch with our families and unpacked and cleaned the whole bus in pretty good time. Thanks again to Mitch, our awesome driver, and beyond thank you to Mr. Vevia and Mrs. Podwils for putting this amazing experience together. I love every member of this choir, and I know God put us all in it for a reason, even if you couldn’t make it on tour. Now... I’m gonna go take a nap. G’night!"
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Blog from Agata Martin, soprano and international student from Spain "This is the last day of choir tour and I can’t believe it’s over already. We woke up really early and got in the bus for a 5 hour ride. We arrived at Grace Lutheran in Pocatello at noon and we had lunch with them. After practicing for 45 minutes we performed for them. It was our last concert, and in my opinion one of the best. After that, Mrs Krause bought us ice cream and we hit the road again for 4 hours. When we arrived at Grace Lutheran Church in Idaho everyone started playing outside. It was definitely one of the best nights in choir tour, a good way to end it. This tour has been amazing. It has helped me become friends with people I’d never talked to before. As an international student I can say that it’s one of the best experiences I’ve had here in the USA and I’m very sad to see it end. Hopefully we’ll all stay close and we’ll remember everything we learned on this great trip." Blog by Georgia Burwell, senior and soprano: Day 5 of tour and we are still not done! Today, we sang at Parker Lutheran High School (they had over 500 kids in their school!!) We even had some Trinity family and extended family come hear us as well! After the concert we did a choir exchange with the top choral ensemble at their high school. They performed some of their songs they will be singing on their tour, which leaves in a few weeks. It was a very cool experience to see the differences between our choir and their choir. After that, we ate some pizza (which is always a blast) and then got on the bus and headed back to Peace with Christ Lutheran School. At Peace with Christ, we had another great concert and then started our trek back to Wyoming. It was definitely a very long drive, but we did stop for dinner... fast food... again... along the way. After a few long hours in the bus, we finally got to our hotel in Rock Springs, Wyoming. It’s been a long trip but a very fun one! One more concert in Pocatello, ID tomorrow and then we will be on our way home! It has been such a blessing to share the word of God through our music during this tour. Blog by Ben Griffin, junior and tenor: It was a dark and stormy morning... Just kidding, it was a clear and sunny morning, and an early one at that. We had to be ready to leave by 6:30 AM, so of course we were 5 minutes late. Breakfast was provided by the hotel, and most of us helped ourselves to orange juice and “do-it-yourself waffles”. We hopped on the bus and proceeded to run several yellow lights. Once we arrived at Peace with Christ Lutheran Church, we warmed up and performed in both services. It was Palm Sunday and some of our students sang in the worship band at second service. They gave us donuts and coffee, which made us feel both happy and like cops (jk again...). We ate Jimmy Johns for lunch, which was arguably the best part of tour so far. Then we traveled to the Colorado Springs Air Force Base, where Tim found his long lost twin and we toured the base. We explored and sang in the beautiful Cadets Chapel. Next, we dropped by the Garden of the Gods, which we declared the Garden of THE God, cause were all good Christians. The rock monuments were breathtaking, and we even got to see a couple rock climbers in action (#jealous). After we walked for an exhausting fifteen minutes, we went to the visitors center to use the bathroom. We then drove the hour and a half back to the hotel where we crashed for the second night in a row. Somebody had a meaningful devotion, which we’ll all remember for days to come. Thank you. Today was a fun, explore Denver day! We first visited Mile High Stadium, where the Denver Broncos (and other teams) play. We took a behind the scenes tour and it was pretty cool! We got to go into the press box, fancy suites, the visiting team locker room and even out next to the field. Afterwards we went to go see Star Wars: Live in Concert. Basically, instead of the pre-recorded music, the Colorado Symphony played the whole thing LIVE on stage while we were watching the movie!! It was very impressive to watch! After some free time at a mall we head to our hotel night where we are now getting some much needed sleep before our next performance tomorrow morning, followed by a trip down to Colorado Springs where we get to go visit the Air Force Academy. G'night!! After our night in Fort Collins, we head to Denver for our first “real day” of the trip…and we were BUSY! We took a tour of Colorado Christian University, hearing from their admissions team and had lunch in their cafeteria. Afterwards we headed to Bethlehem Lutheran School for our first concert. It was a beautiful sanctuary and the students were a GREAT audience! It was good to finally get our first concert under our belts! After our concert we raced over to Red Rocks Amphitheatre for a behind the scenes tour. We got to go back stage (which was really underneath the stage) and see the dressing rooms, FOH room and see the walls of signatures of all of the famous bands who had played at the venue. Red Rocks has some of the best acoustics of any venue in the world, and it we got the privilege to perform a song on stage! Not many musical groups (let alone HS choirs!) get to claim that…it was awesome! Tonight, we are staying with host families from Bethlehem and getting some rest in beds (and showers)...MUCH needed after two nights of sleeping on the gym floor. Looking forward to a free day tomorrow, doing some sight-seeing around Denver. Favorite Moments of the Day from some of our students: “One of my favorite moments from today was singing for the kids! They were super responsive and attentive throughout the whole concert. It was fun to tell them about our school and answer their questions!” Hailie Bishop, senior “My favorite part of the day was heading to Red Rock Amphitheatre. We got to climb up and go backstage. It was amazing to see the signatures of all the artists who had performed there. We got to sing after the tour and even had a little audience. What a memorable experience.” Alita Ruggles, senior We just finished the first two days of trip and we are finally in Colorado....almost 21 hours on the road! We have an awesome driver named Mitch (he plays the guitar, so of course he is awesome) and so far it has been a fairly uneventful trip. The first night we crashed in the gym at Grace Lutheran in Pocatello, ID. We will sing there on the way back, so there will be more pictures of that place then. On the second day we finished driving through Idaho, all the way through Wyoming, and down to Fort Collins, CO. We had dinner at the famous Beau Joe's Pizza, which is known for their Colorado Style Mountain Pizza (thick, braided crust...it was SUPER good!) We also had a guy stop by our room to give us balloon animals :) After a short walk downtown for ice cream, we headed to Redeemer Lutheran Church, who graciously opened their Life Center for us to crash in. Day 3 will be much more eventful with tours of Colorado Christian University and Red Rocks Amphitheater and, more importantly, our first concert at Bethlehem Lutheran School in Denver!! We are now less than two weeks away from our tour!! We are getting excited and there are a lot of little details being worked out. If you are in Idaho and Colorado, come visit us at one of our concerts!!
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