Sunset on the Mississippi

Last night we went to the first production of the summer here in Nauvoo. It was called "Sunset on the Mississippi". They have several productions throughout the year in addition to the Pageant in July. I think they put this one on every night during the summer. It is a musical put on by the Site missionaries plus some of the young performance missionaries that come in for just the summer. A lot of these young people are from BYU, but anyone can try out for it, and BOY ARE THEY TALENTED! It was so fun. We went about 45 minutes early so we were on the 3rd row. The weather was perfect, even though it had rained earlier in the afternoon. And the sunset was beautiful. Before the musical started, they had the Ahuna family from Hawaii do a pre program that lasted about an hour!! It was wonderful too. This is a family that has traveled all over the country doing this program about different Polynesian cultures. They are members...four sons and two daughters and their spouses and about 9 grandchildren. They were good! They are only here for 3 days! I was going to take lots of pictures but I could tell my battery was getting low so I only took a few, and then it went completely dead about the time "Sunset" started, so I only got two of it. I even had extra batteries in my camera bag and they didn't work!!

The father and his 4 sons and 2 sons-in-law. The third son to the left of his father just got his mission call to Russia, Siberia! How about that, going from Hawaii to Siberia!

The two daughters and one daughter-in-law doing the traditional hula. They brought a lot of people up on the stage to teach them a hula too which was really fun.

A son in law doing that tradition Maori dance to scare off the enemy...where they stick out their tongues. See the videos at the end of this blog for a couple of the other dances.

Some of the Site missionaries in their opening number of "Sunset" You should see these "old folks" sing and dance....they are pretty good!

At the beginning of the show, they did a fun thing. They called up all the children in the audience to make a hat and get a musical instrument and then along with the young missionaries they had a parade down through the audience and up on the stage, to the music of the Nauvoo Band. This is another group of young people who are called here during the summer just to play in this band. They perform at the productions, but also go up and down the street playing several times a day....even up in the regular town of Nauvoo! I often wonder how these locals feel about these hundreds of Mormons who desend upon their sleepy little town in the summer! They certainly can't deny that WE HAVE RETURNED!.... in spite of being so cruelly driven out by these people of Illinois!

I think you can see some of the young missionaries mixed in here... and the beginning of the sunset...and then my camera died!! Boo Hoo

This was the youngest son, (age 16) doing a Navajo hoop dance. The first video is when he started with just a few hoops...but then he kept adding and the last video shows how many he had at the end.

This was just a short part of the fire dance done by his son who is an attorney. I only got a few seconds before the camera failed, but he eventually did it with two flaming torches! Quite impressive!