The 4th Grade Field Trip

Every year at William's school, the 4th grade gets to go on a field trip to Salt Lake City.  The itinerary varies - when Henry went they visited the Utah state capital building, the Natural History museum and the planetarium.  This year William and his classmates were able to visit This Is The Place State Park, Hogle Zoo and the Utah Natural History Museum.

On a trip like this, parent chaperones are needed.  I had always planned to go and help out, but then Jay had his surgery.  He is still unable to drive (hopefully that changes on Monday) and had just gone back to work.  Luckily Jay was able to stay home/work from home that day, so I signed up to go.

It was a loooonnnnggg day.  We had to be at the school by 6:45 am for a 7 am departure.  After a solid two hour bus ride, we arrived at This Is The Place Park:

We visited the school house, where the kids had a lesson as if they were attending school in 1865 in the Utah Territory.

 They took turns pulling and pushing handcarts, like some of the pioneers who settled Utah:

 William and his friend Kyron in front of the big monument:

 Next we went to Hogle Zoo.  It seemed like a lot of the zoo was under construction but it was still fun:

 Finally we went to the Natural History Museum at the University of Utah.  The Sky Terrace was a fun place to visit:

 William loves fossils and dinosaurs, so much so that he wants to be a paleontologist when he grows up (although last week he wanted to be an astronomer):

 This dinosaur footprint cast was pretty impressive:

 Fossils, fossils, fossils!

It was a really fun day!  Thank goodness for my friend Kassey!  She chaperoned the trip as well and it was nice to have a friend to talk to during the long bus ride to and from Cache Valley.  Four hours is a long time to ride on a bus that honestly isn't designed for the comfort of adults.

William was happy to proclaim this activity as the Best Field Trip Ever!