Heifer Finale

Thursday night, after dinner, all the participants at Heifer Ranch headed down to the pavilion for the Heifer County Fair. Most of us dunked our heads in bobbing for apples and all joined in on dancing to strong blue grass music. Next, we partnered up and all grabbed a water balloon for ‘water balloon toss’. Gabe and Kristian tied for first. The next thing we did was the ‘snail hug’. This mystery activity confused us all but blindly we participated. Little did we know, it was a trick for all the leaders and Heifer Ranch volunteers to attack us with the left over water balloons while we were all coiled up into a snail shape. Soaking, we lined up for the relay race involving the dizzy stick, the sack race, and the three-legged race. We went to bed tired, and wet. Friday morning, we woke up to eat breakfast (disappointed we weren’t served bacon for the final day of the trip at Heifer). Our group and the Ohio group ventured over to the big Heifer ranch sign to take photos with each other and say our goodbyes. It was a sad morning and we hated parting from our new friends. We left Heifer, drove about an hour and reached Petit Jean State Park where we went swimming at a pool and played beach volleyball. We also made friends with the park ranger B.T. Jones. To help share the story of the way petit Jean state park got its name, Kristian and Anna participated in a skit involving costume. It was quite hilarious and other members from the tour begged for an encore. The next stop we made was at Little Rock Central High School and we took pictures in front of the school where the ‘Little Rock Nine’ Crisis occurred. We also visited the museum just a few minutes before closing. We picked up some groceries and headed to Faith Lutheran Church in Little Rock. We made some delicious spaghetti and shortly after played dress up with the church’s stage costumes. Jordan wore a tasteful lace gown, and Mike looked like the King from ‘The King and I,” complete with the crown, as we taped down a Foursquare court and had yet another intense game. We went to bed soundly. Early Saturday morning,  we struggled to find the motivation to do some sight seeing before we left for Kansas City. In the end, we walked cross the ‘Big Dam Bridge’, and visited Heifer Headquarters. We learned the Heifer Building was LEAD certified and was given the highest award for a ‘Reusable building’. 70% of the building was reusable. We learned all sorts of new things and continued on our way towards Kansas City. We headed to the ‘uptown-ish’ area and ate at a local restaurant named ‘In-gre-di-ent’. It was delicious!!! Shot some video for Mike’s sermon and then went to bed early. On our final morning, we woke up and routinely headed to the car like robots. After hours in the car, we are almost home! We cannot wait to see everyone after a wonderful, informative, inspiring, and AWESOME week at Heifer Ranch!