Traveling to Eldorado

Elder Trevor has begun his 22 months in Argentina. Here is the story of his travels.

Trevor, along with his district, left the MTC on Monday, December 31st and flew to LAX. He had a five hour layover before his next flight. Fortunately, our entire family was flying from Costa Rica to LAX on the same day and arrived in the American Airlines terminal while Trevor somewhere in the airport. Leland, Dallas and I left the family to gather all the luggage, surfboards and golf clubs while we ran to find Trevor. Our only clue as to where Trevor's whereabouts was his email that said he was flying Delta Airlines to LAX and then flying to Santiago, Chile at 2:30 pm.

We ran to the Delta counter and proceeded to buy tickets to Atlanta and then to Santiago with the intent of going to the gate to see Trevor and then returnng the tickets. While waiting for our tickets to be issued, Leland's cell phone rang, it was Trevor and he said he was at the Lan Chile terminal. Thank heavens we hadn't finalized our ticket purchases.

So...we ran to the International Terminal at LAX and with 1/2 hour to spare we stood in two lines at the Lan Chile counter and were finally able to purchase three refundable tickets to Santiago, Chile for a cost of $20,600.00. Leland very hesitantly made the purchase and asked three times for confirmation that the tickets were refundable. He wasn't sure it was worth $20,000.00 to see Trevor. With tickets in hand, we ran to security (thankfuly we weren't delayed because Leland was smart enough to purchase round-trip tickets) and then had to run for five minutes to Trevor's gate. Talk about an Amazing Race experience. I was peeing my pants because I was running so fast with backpack in hand.

Below is a picture of Trevor just before he boarded the plane for Santiago. We were able to visit with him for 10-15 minutes. I think we were more stoked to see him because he was so focused on his journey and excited to finally be heading to Argentina. I was trying so hard not to cry at Trevor's insistence and I just smelled him over and over with each hug. It was so great to see him and be reassured that he was happy and healthy. Seeing him made it ok to give him away.



Upon boarding the plane, Trevor and his companions had a 12 hour flight to Santiago. Then they had to book it to their next gate and next flight to Buenos Aires, Argentina.

I'm not sure yet how he got to Resistencia. I'm hoping they got to fly. Buenos Aires is in the south of Argentina and Resistencia is at the extreme north. But in an email from Trevor on Thursday, January 3rd he said after three days he had made it to Resistencia.



We got an email from Trevor on Wednesday. Here is an excerpt (excuse the grammer because I don't think he has time for proofreading and I'm sure the keyboard is different down there):

Yay i´m finally at my first area! its called Eldorado and its in the
province Misiones, and it was soooo hot and humid! but i´m loving it.
i just sent you a letter that says a lot about the place and my comp so
you should be expecting that in a few weeks.

But yeah and i´m glad you got to meet Nielson too, he is seriously one
of my best friends. But yeah i´ll see him sooner or later. so my area is really
cool, and really poor. my apartment is about the size of our pantry.
and its only like 10 degrees cooler inside there so last night was a
little rough cuz it was like 110. so the apartment was cookin!!!

My comps name is Elder Vincent and he's from Sandy and he´s actually in
aunt traci´s stake, so you might want to call her and see if she
knows the fam. The dad owns like a lot of tanning salons so you could maybe
mention that i duno. but everything is going good, we´re teacing a lot
and the langauge is coming along. ¨c´mon gift of tongues!! dont fail
me now! hahahaha.. its been a little roush understanding the people
but its gotten a lot better than when i first got here.

well mom, know that i´m doing good and the lord is watching over me
and i know if serve him and work hard he will protect you guys also. so
dont worry, i wont slack off for your sakE! haha jk jk

but yeah everything is going great a love my comp, i love the people
already and i love the work. the weather i like not love, i got a little
burned yesterday so i bought a sombrero today haha

well i love you and i hope all is well!

Chao,

Elder Bruce

Trevor's area is the pink area of this map of Argentina. He is virtually surrounded by Paraguay and Brazil.



Trevor's area is in the city of Eldorado and the province of Misiones. The world famous Iguazu Falls are in his area. Hopefully he will get to visit them while he is in this part of Argentina. This is a picture of the falls.



We're excited about Trevor being in Argentina. And believe it or not, the time is going faster than I ever anticipated. It's already the middle of January and time to buy Valentines. I'll keep you posted with more on the mission of Elder Bruce.