Our Mission President's seminar for 2011.

Every year, we join with the mission presidents and their wives from the 24 other missions in our area. They come from Colombia, Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela. Our area presidency gave us two full days of wonderful training and on the third day, we had a day of relaxation and entertainment. We were in Parasca, Peru. It was a long day to get to our destination because the plane was four hours late in arriving at the airport, but the event was worth the wait.

Ballestas Islands was our day of diversion.

For our last day, we had a day of entertainment that was enjoyed by all. On the hillside, we see this shaped of maybe a Candelabro, or some think it might be a cactus, but no one knows for sure what the early Parasca civilization of Peru meant this to be. This is not in sand, but rather a hard sedament. Because of the strong winds in the area the shape has never been filled in. There is an arrow at the top that point to the direction that the Nazca lines are located. The shape is 120 meters tall.

The youth from the Parasca stake performed for us.

The youth dancers and the area presidency in the back.

All of these young people are members of the church and performed wonderful dances for us. The first gentleman on the left is the stake president and then we have President Uceda, President Pino, and President Wardell.

The profile of Christ.

Among the many beautiful little islands that we enjoyed, the guide pointed out the silhouette of Christ when you look through the arch.

Needing a nap.

Our days were long and sometimes we wanted to take a nap like this sea lion. He knew how to enjoy the day.

Possibley 100 sea lions are more.

We circled the little islands and saw many sea lions. Here there are four sunning themselves in the sun. These were females, and they were big, but the males are huge. These girls are pregnant most of their lives.

This is a beautiful red sand beach.

Here one can see the beautiful contrast of colors. The sand is red because of iron sediments in the sand. It was a beautiful beach, but the area around it was very barren as you can see on the hillside behind.

The graduating class of 2012.

These are the mission presidents and their wives that we were in the MTC with in Provo, Utah, in 2009. They cover Colombia, Peru, and Venezuela.