The great temples in Great Britain

Jake and I had a stroke of good fortune

last Christmas and were able to accumulate

a generous amount of Delta dollars (due to

overbooked flights to Orlando after the holidays).

Our second break happened when Delta

started flying nonstop from Miami

to London-Heathrow. They advertised

with some amazing deals.

So what did we do? We booked two flights

to London for the first week of April.

It was a quick trip, but an amazing one.

The first thing we did upon arriving

was rent a car and hit the road:

Ask Jake how he liked driving a

stick shift on the opposite side of the

car and the opposite side of the road:

We drove straight from the airport up to
Preston, England (about a 4 hour drive).
What a beautiful temple:

We had some extra time to enjoy the grounds,
since the clock in our car was an hour slow
(thanks to UK daylight savings time) and we got
to the temple too late to do a session.

But we went back the next morning, and
were able to do some work inside.
Then we explored the grounds a bit more.

And then we were off to explore some
church history in Preston.  First stop was
this corner building:

 Anybody know what it is?

Nobody?

Okay, I'll tell you.  :)

This is the site where the first LDS missionaries

in England stayed, on the corner of 

Wilfrid St. and Fox St.

Next up, this little house is 15 Wadham Road:

 This is where President Gordon B. Hinckley
stayed as a young missionary when he wrote
that famous letter home to his father saying that
he was wasting his time and his dad's money.
His father responded,

"Forget yourself and go to work."

This was a turning point in President Hinckley's life,

who went on to become a prophet in our church.

(Young Gordon B. Hinkley)

Just a short walk away from Wadham Road

was the river Ribble:

This is the site where the first saints in
England were baptized,
including my ancestor, Henry Clegg.
According to family legend, Henry Clegg was in
a footrace with George D. Watt to see
who would be baptized first.  Henry was not
quite as young and spry as George,
and came in second.

We found this lovely park commemorating the
members and missionaries of the Church
of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in England.

We walked around a bit, and then we
were back on the road.

Next stop, the London Temple:

We stayed at the temple accommodations,
and this was the view from our window:

 Jealous?  Permission granted.

We enjoyed going into the London temple

as well to do some work.  

The main reason we went to England was to
see the temples (a long time dream of Jake's),
so these first two days were pretty special.
Mission accomplished.