Mt. Samat & Mission

A couple weeks ago we drove to Mount Samat National Shrine. This was our first outing with Torah walking and it was fun to watch her happily chase Addy around. It was also nice to not worry about her becoming filthy by scooting around the ground! Here is a little historical background of Mt. Samat from Wikipedia "At the start of World War II in 1942 after suffering heavy losses against the Imperial Japanese Army all over Luzon, the Filipino and American soldiers retreated to Bataan Peninsula to regroup for a last valiant but futile stand. After three days of fighting, the 78,000 exhausted, sick and starving soldiers under Major General Edward P. King surrendered to the Japanese on April 9, 1942 known as the the fall of Bataan. It is the single largest surrender of U.S. soldiers in history and Mount Samat was their last stronghold after which, together with the Philippine soldiers, they were led on to the 80-mile (130 km) march to Capas, Tarlac known as the Bataan Death March. The Mount Samat National Shrine shrine was erected as a fitting memorial to the heroic struggle and sacrifices of those soldiers who fought and died in that historic bastion of freedom."

On the way home we drove through Orani, one of the areas James served on his mission. It was exciting for both of us. Since marrying James I've wanted to see his mission, and for him it was fun to see how the town has changed in the past 13 years. The beautiful chapel that when he was living in Orani was just a modest little building. We were going to stop for a picture but the gates were closed so I just snapped this photo as we drove past. I wanted to see the house James and his companions lived in (James served in this town the longest out of anywhere in his mission. He was there for six and a half months and had 4 different companions during this period) so we went exploring some of the little side streets in an attempt to find it. Unfortunately the roads were so narrow we reached a point we couldn't fit through and had to turn around. We did however find this little courtyard where they would play basketball on their P-days.

Beautiful scenery on our way home.