Nauvoo Trip 2024: Day 7 - Nauvoo Temple, More Nauvoo Explorations & Shows

I really wanted a family picture in front of the temple where the sun wasn't in our faces, so we got a picture first thing before the sun was in front of the temple.

We then went to see the Joseph Smith Historical Sites, an area of Nauvoo that was previously owned by the Community of Christ.

We first went and had a tour of the Smith Family Homestead and the Mansion House.  These were both houses that Joseph lived in with his family.  After that we walked around the cemetery where Emma, Joseph, Hyrum, and were all buried along with other people in the Smith family.  I believe that the cemetery is still owned by the Community of Christ.

After we had a tour of the Red Brick Store.  This was way cooler than I had even known.  They showed us the main store area, but then we got to go upstairs where the Relief Society was started and where they stared giving some of the saints their temple endowments so that when the temple was all done, they could start the work right away.  Such a cool thing to be in the same place that had such significant things from history happen.

After that we got some lunch back at the hamburger place.  After we were done eating, we walked down and saw the tomb house where they think the early saints made a tomb for Joseph, but because they were worried about grave robbers, they moved his body a few different times.  

After that we went to ride on the wagon pulled by the oxen.  They were super sweet, and the kids loved petting them.  You just have to hold their horns while you pet them, so they don't move as much.  We found out that Ox are just well-trained cows that learn how to be yoked.  They moved pretty slow, but it was neat to see how they worked together.

After the ox ride, we went to the visitor center where we saw another performance from the missionaries and the band.  This was the second to last one that we still hadn't seen.  It was very good and patriotic.  We were running late from the ox ride, so the visitor center missionary took us upstairs and we got to enter through the stairs at the top of the theater seats.  

After the show we drove into the town that was North of Nauvoo about 20 minutes to have dinner.  After we ate, we picked up some ice cream and then drove back to Nauvoo.  We had to wait on the bridge for a barge to cross so the draw bridge was up.  That was neat to see too.

We got back into Nauvoo in time to see the big show again.  The kids like it so much, they wanted to see it again. We even saw our friends, the Watkins at the show.  We then chatted with them for a little while before going over for the Sundown performances down the Trail of Hope.  It was the final performance that we hadn't yet seen.  We saw the missionaries depict different saints as they were leaving Nauvoo towards the west.  It ends at the river where we then looked for fireflies.  We saw a bunch but couldn't catch one.  It was the perfect way to end our last night in Nauvoo.  We then drove back to our hotel.