Jan 10 2011

Hey there. Had a pretty good week. Things are going good, it was nice to get all the trips finished and the detectors put in. We´ve had an Elder here in the office who is going home that we have been with during the week. Anyways its been ok because me and my companion elder frost know the lord needs us here right now helping him out. Anyways thats been the most part of our week. That sounds like Kyler had a way exciting week with their win again Mt Crest. Good for them. I`m so glad their playing well and that he´s getting to play. I kinda missed out on my senor year. We´re really working on improving living standards here in the mission. President really wants things to be nice for the next mission president that comes in. So I´m doing a lot of work sending repair guys out, assessing apartments, buying supplies, and all of that. I´m praying that next week things can get a little more normal and we can get out and do more missionary work. I´ve been thinking about you coming down and I don´t think you should come without dad. I don´t know if I´d feel right without you both here. So we´ll have to see if it can be done. I need you to start looking into it though because the secretary is getting ready to buy my groups flights, and they need to know what day I`ll be leaving. You´ll have to try and book the same flight and everything so tell me what its looking like. If your really coming I`d say no more than 3 days here in Mendoza. Then we could go to Bahia Blanca for Mike, and then Buenos Aires and Iguazu Falls or something like that. Anyways let me know. My head is peeling because of how bad I got sunburned up at Aconcagua. Sun burns harder at 12000 feet! Love you so much I hope your week goes great!

Jan. 3rd 2011

Helllllo from the highest point in the americas!
Today President suprised me and invited me to go on a trip with the current zone leaders and asistants to celebrate the 1000 baptism goal we made as a mission in 2010. It was such a great day for me I can´t even explain. First off on the way to our destination I got to put in the last CO2 detector, in the final pench I had left to do. We´ve visited and made safe all 64 penches in the mission. It´s definately been one of the biggest accomplishments I´ve been able to get done. Sooo much traveling and so much time spent but the gift to get to go on this trip was the perfect celebration. President rented out two buses, and had me drive the mission car with over 50 missionaries to..... Mt. Aconcagua! It couldn´t have been a better day, there wasn´t a cloud in the sky, and it was absolutely breath taking. 22,841 ft it stands. Think of Mt. Ogden...... it´s like 9500 feet. We went up as a mission and I got to spend some precious time with President Lindahl in the ride up and down. He´s one of the most amazing people I´ve ever met. He´s had such an influence in my life, it´s indescribable. Anyways, I´ll include some pictures. New Years was really fun, we had some other Elders over to eat another Argentine Asado with us and then we played some board games till the midnight madness of fireworks, which we watched from the top floor of our apartment. It unfortunately rained a ton all night long but that somehow didn´t stop them from doing their fire works. (they had to have been lighting them off from their porches!) Anyways, this week was really eventful and good for me. Sunday I got to go with President Lindahl and visit a few little branches out in the country. He´s doing a lot of evaluating of the smaller branches before he leaves to check all the options of being able to help the church better grow here. Having a lot to do with putting some branches together and forming wards and things like that. I think I´ve been handy knowing where everything is in the entire mission having traveled it all the last few months putting in the detectors. I cherish every moment I can with him! Anyways, sounds like it´s a good thing that I missed this sports season, things don´t sound like their going super well haha. I´m way happy to hear about Chase Reynolds, he´s a great kid. Chloe is great for waiting for him, they totally need to get married. We hung out a bit before he left, I´m sure you remember. Keep pressing on and doing the things that are really important. Don´t over work yourself, remember to enjoy everything your doing. Take it all in, we´re supposed to enjoy this life. President said something I have been thinking about alot the last few days. He said, ´´Ya know Elder Campbell, I´m friends with all the big fortune 500 company CEO´s, and ya know what?! They´re all under 10 handicaps on the golf course. That means they know how to balance life, they make time for their passions and hobbies as they do for work, it´s your key to success. 1. Set goals 2. Make em 3. Celebrate. And you´ll live happy.´´ Not many mission presidents think the way he does i assume, but I love him. Anyways I hope your week is great! Love ya
 

The reward trip for the zone leaders for achieving the goal of 1,039 for the 2010 year!

Congratulations Mission Mendoza.

                                     

 Excerpt Taken from Sis. Lindhals blog....thought Carson would like to have record of this when we make it into a book....

"The Inca Bridge is the only land bridge that existed for the Incas the cross the river to go down into Uspallata. The history books say that that is as far as they are recorded going down the canyon. The bridge is the strip of land above the heads of the Elders. The colorful rocks is the result of minerals due to underwater streams that continue to flow out of the rocks and cascade down in to the river below. The windows and bars you see in the background is the remains of a Hotel that use to be cut deep in to the rock, with natural water springs in the rooms. The hotel has been closed for many years."

                                       

Barlow, Carson & Miller

Aconcagua is the tallest peak in the Western Hemisphere and is 22,841 feet high.  

 

 ?, Frischknecht, Campbell

(top left) Elders Fielding, Sandford, Barrus, Campbell, Davis, Hopkin, Robinson, Lucas, Frischknecht, Davis, Eliason (bottom) Elders Harvey, Sorensen. Miller, Galati, Bigelow, Barlow, Fowler, Brown, Redd, Beck

 Elder Beck, Campbell

 Smith, Campbell, Sorenson

 

I received a text message from Elder Campbell saying that he was giving permission to text me and tell me to look at Pres Lindhals blog. Here is the excerpt I have taken from Sister Lindhals wonderful blog about Carson:

Congratulations Elder Campbell. Elder Campbell our valuable office Elder who joined the group to go up the mountain because our farthest apartment in Uspallata is on the way. He installed the very last of 64 carbon monoxide detectors on the wall of every apartment "pension" in the mission. He did it in 3 weeks. He traveled around 1500 miles to accomplish the feat. And yes, he did this and also met all his missionary goals. Hurray for valiant missionaries.

Dec. 27 2010

That was way nice of Liz to do that for me tell her thank you so much! I`ll send her a letter, thanks for the address. You`ll have to tell me when your package gets there that I sent you a while back. It`s not much but what I could afford with our budget. The Skype call was awesome. Totally weird not going to lie but really neat. I´m so greatful that President let us do that. He´s such a cool guy, so good to us. It was way nice of everyone to come over and say hi to me on the camera. That meant a lot! I had no idea Mike told you anything about coming down. We started talking about it in Spanish and I thought he was doing that so that no body knew what we were talking about haha. Anyways, I think it would be great. I would love for you to be able to come down and meet Carmen and all of the great people I´ve met here. Definately wouldn´t want any more than 10 days and really we´d only need 2 or 3 in Mendoza. There isn´t tooo much to do ya know. Tour around, see an amazing winery, and Aconcagua. Going over to Mikes area would be really cool. It is like on the other end of the country but a day in bus would get us there. My only request would be that we go see Iguazu Falls. It´s one of the 7 wonders of the world. And actually during the winter here is the supposedly best time to go see it. Other times of the year it averages 110-120 degrees up there. The only worry Mike was talking about was the weather being a little cold, seeing as how it will be winter when I finish. We definately wouldn´t see the beautiful green Argentina, but that doesn´t mean it wouldn´t be cool. I honestly think if I was to come home and then come back down later it´d never happen. With school and work I just can´t see it happening any time soon. So i´d definately say that we do it while I´m here. Not to mention we´d save my whole trip back down which is no cheap thing. Flights will be expensive but other things such as travel down here and food is relatively cheap if we don´t be super ritzy. It´s 4 pesos to every dollar. Be a lot cheaper than Europe that is for sure. Anyways, the only thing about all of this is that we kinda need to decide soon because in about two weeks the mission sends me a paper so that they can start working on my flight and departure from the mission. One of the questions on that form is if my parents will be coming here to pick me up. Anyways, talk amoungst yourselves and let me know. I´d say it´d probably not be the smartest idea to do this without dad. Even more than that is that I´d really want him to come with you. Pray for it and it will work out. Anyways I love you, thanks for being so amazing and supportive of me. Talk to ya next week. Sorry for this being so late, we had some things come up today! Chau
Carson