The Temple

The Winter Quarters Temple was my 43rd temple. This is inside the Visitor's Center

My kids heading into the Winter Quarters Temple

My 43rd Temple, December 2021

It was getting dark when we arrived at the Winter Quarters Temple. We went inside the Visitor's Center to change into our church clothes.

December 2021

My daughter Rebecca at the temple

I have been wanting to go to the Winter Quarters Temple for years! Finally, I decided that I should just plan the road trip and go for it! We went over Christmas Break in 2021 because that's the easiest time for James to miss work. It is a 12 hour direct trip, which we would add detours to, and going in December meant snow and cold! But it was well worth it to attend this beautiful temple! It is located in Omaha, Nebraska at 8283 N. 34th St. It was dedicated in 2001. We arrived at the temple at dusk, and headed into the Visitor's Center to explore and change our clothes before our baptism appointment. Our travelers included me and my husband James, my son James, my daughters Lizzie and Rebecca, and Rebecca's boyfriend Isaac. James, James, and Isaac baptized us for family names. The baptistry is absolutely beautiful! Since it was dark, we didn't get to see the exterior very well, and since we did baptisms we didn't get to see other areas of the interior. We enjoyed the Visitor's Center also. After years of waiting, the trip was worth it!

The Trip

We left on the day after Christmas right after church and drove across Wyoming. I wanted to go to Devil's Tower on the way. The snow was coming down hard, and we had a hard time on the slippery roads in the dark. We made it to Devil's Tower, but we couldn't see it very well through the snow and darkness. We attempted a couple of pictures, but we were all so freezing cold that we quickly retreated to the car and continued on our trip. We stayed that night in Rapid City, South Dakota.

We stayed in Rapid City at the Residence Inn by Marriott, which has a really fun water slide. The next morning the kids had fun playing on the water slide before we headed for Mount Rushmore. I've been to Mount Rushmore a few times, but never when it was that cold! We were all freezing! We walked around a bit and took some photos. The little half-mile trail that would have gotten us closer to the presidents was closed due to winter. After hanging out for a little while at Mount Rushmore, we decided to go find some tunnels that James had found out about from a friend, where we could see Mount Rushmore framed inside them. We drove Iron Mountain Road, but unfortunately we started from the wrong end, so snow stopped us before we reached any of the tunnels. So we drove back to Mount Rushmore and started on the other end of Iron Mountain Road. We saw two tunnels, but the snow stopped us from going any further. We drove up the curly-cue roads (or pigtails), which were fun, and we went through the Doane Robinson Tunnel. We got out of the car to take photos of Mount Rushmore through the tunnel. This tunnel has the best views of Mount Rushmore through it. We also drove through the CC Gideon Tunnel, but we couldn't make it to the Scovel Johnson Tunnel -- we'll have to go back in the summer and drive the whole Iron Mountain Road! Driving through the tunnels and seeing Mount Rushmore through them was more fun for me than being at Mount Rushmore! That was definitely a highlight! When our kids were young, we went to Rapid City and visited Mount Rushmore, walked the little hike there, and even watched the evening program. We also visited Bear Country, Reptile Gardens, Crazy Horse Memorial, and toured Jewel Cave. We couldn't feasibly do any of those activities with it being the middle of winter, so our main source of entertainment was Mount Rushmore, the tunnels we could get to, and the water park at our hotel. That night we played at the water park in our hotel some more.

The next morning we started the trip to Winter Quarters. It was a 7 1/2 hour drive, and when we got there it was nearly dark. We ate dinner and headed to the temple. We stayed at the Hampton Inn & Suites in Omaha. The next day we drove the entire trip home, about 13 hours with the snowy weather. That was a long day! If I were to go back again, I would schedule more daytime hours in Omaha so that I could see more sites there and see more of the Winter Quarter's Mormon Trail Center. Still, the trip was a lot of fun and we made happy memories!