St Martin Zone Conference - March 24

We had one last zone conference in St Martin (we think).

Generally the St Martin elders fly to Guadeloupe or St Lucia for conference. But, because there are four 'displaced' elders from Guadeloupe temporarily serving in St Martin, we flew there for a conference. It was fun to have a largish gathering there.

Here's the group



and here they are - companionship by companionship


Elders Larson and Neff


Elders Catherine and Julian


Elders Gray (who finishes his mission on April 1st!) and Maihota


Elders Anihia and Vogel

We can't forget the couples!

The Collings (left) were with us, stopping for a few days in St Martin on their way from Guyana to return to Guadeloupe; and the Olivers (right) are serving in St Martin


We have been traveling with Dr Millet (area doctor) and Sister Millet. They are a wonderful couple called to serve in the Dominican Republic for 18 months. Dr Millet will tour the mission once per year to check on missionary health. He says they are remarkably healthy young men!


The conference was wonderful!

President told some 'legendary' missionary stories from church history. Elder Julian helped him out by reading a particularly fun part spoken with a Welsh accent



Elders Neff, Gray and Catherine, accompanied by very accomplished Sister Oliver, sang one of my favorite hymns (in French) - "Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing"



After the conference we all dug into a yummy taco salad lunch (organized by the Olivers)


And then the elders shared some of their pictures with me. That's how I get such wonderful images for the slideshows. I have an amazing collection!

in St Martin

I have been away from internet for a few days.

Travel plans had to change (again) due to a terrible strike in Guadeloupe. The country is basically shut down - no gas, no food, no travel. The missionaries are all fine and we check on them daily, but President Robison is sending all missionaries who are legal to leave and later return to Guadeloupe out of the island for a month or so, since it is difficult to work there right now. They will serve on other islands or down in Guyana. We could not go in for a zone conference so we ended up here in St Martin where we held a mini zone conference.

This same thing happened last tour - I wonder what is happening in Guadeloupe?!

Here are a few pictures of our St Martin conference




The Olivers are the new St Martin missionary couple - they are great!


Elders West and Gray


Hurrah for Elders Marshall and Larson!


There are two branches in St Martin - one English speaking and one French speaking. We attended both on Sunday.

These are the identical twins of the Mayakos (sp???).


We just had to borrow them since our twins back home were being blessed that day



We took a 20 minute ferry ride to Anguilla to visit a few people


Check out this view that greeted us as we pulled into the harbor


This is really the color of the water - no photo editing!


Can you believe the gorgeous colors?



NO - that is NOT us in the water - I was standing on the beach dressed in skirt and heals :(

and - NO - we do NOT need a missionary couple there just yet

But we do need LOTS OF COUPLES here


The water may not be blue but the people are sweet in Guyana!

If it's Friday....

...it must be St Martin

and the end of our tour!

Normally the St Martin elders fly to Guadeloupe for zone conference but we canceled the flights because of the Guadeloupe gas strike that shut down the roads. But it worked out just fine because we usually end our tour in St Martin to catch a good, reasonably direct flght, back to Trinidad from the French islands. So we had another nice little zone conference with the Platts and Elders Pahio, Lines, Larson, and Nielsen


We drove to the French side of the island to check out a building that might work to rent for the French branch.

We had a little hitch-hiker


This beautiful beach is right across the street from the building. Wouldn't it make a nice baptismal font?


The Platts leave in a few weeks. We will miss them!


Isn't this the life?

Omar and St Martin

Hurricane Omar passed over St Martin early Thursday morning, Oct 16th. Poor Elder Larson was transferred there on Wednesday. He got there just in time for the adventure. We kept in touch with the Platts - the missionary couple and all the missionaries stayed inside and were safe. Here is the latest report from the Platts:

Dear Family and Friends,

It is 4 am on October 18th and the power just came on. The hurricane came through here just after midnight on October 16th and left about 4am which means we have been exactly 48 hours without power so far. We had a brief 10 minutes of power the early morning of the 16th when I sent a quick message saying we were fine. The paper says we will be without power for 7 days except briefly as they try each area out so I will send this now.

It was a category 3 hurricane but the center was 90 miles from us. The damage sustained was from winds and strong waves. We are grateful that damage was mostly minor such as fallen trees, lots of debris, minor leaks and such. There was a curfew even after the storm so the crews could clean the roads of sand, huge rocks and fallen trees. They did a great job. Everyone spent the 17th cleaning up. The salt water that was carried inland causes the plants to turn brown so people were hauling debris to the curbs, garbage trucks spent the day yesterday constantly on the move picking up debris. People were washing plants, vehicles, houses etc. to get the salt off.

Our area has underground electricity so we hope to have full power soon. Much of the island has overhead power and they must repair all the poles before they will get power.

But we were very fortunate not to get a direct hit so food supplies and such are not badly affected. Planes began flying late yesterday afternoon. Wharf repairs should be complete in a couple of days.

It is amazing to see the force of nature. The Elders on the French side just got a little water in their apartment from a leak. All French power is underground so they have been fine.

The Elders in Philipsburg have had no power so far. Their landline is out and they can't charge their cell phone so we try to check with them when they are in their apartment but they are far from the sea and had no damage. Until they went out they didn't think it was bad!!!

Enjoy your snow!!!

Here are some pictures and comments they sent:

All the beaches are covered in seaweed and the water is much higher than normal


The royal palms are standing but were shorn of their outside leaves


Many signs were knocked down. Flooding occurred.

The boardwalk in Philipsburg was covered in sand and they had to sweep up big piles and carry it away. Huge trees were uprooted. But most homes stood.

We have photos of several cars hit by falling trees. The airport was closed from 4pm the 15th until Oct. 17th at 4pm

Close to the beaches, snack bars were battered, ripped apart and large rocks thrown up on the ground.

Here are the chairs, stoves and other furnishings of another beach restaurant.