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I was actually thinking about joining the LDS church, and then I found this channel.

I went on trek twice: once at 12 and once at 16. I was a weird kid that really enjoyed survivalist situations, so I had a pretty good time. However, on the second trek, there was a 14-year-old exchange student from Mali staying with a family in our ward who was forced to go. She wasn't Mormon and was given basically zero context. It rained and snowed the whole time, and being from Africa she was not used to the low temperatures and was shivering uncontrollably whole time. With the language barrier it was hard for us to communicate with her, but she basically cried for 4 days straight. I'm sure that was a horrifically traumatizing experience for her, and I felt awful and couldn't believe that her host family had put her through this and that no one thought to send her home. I still feel like crying thinking about her now.

My parents were the stake trek organizers. They made me go even tho i had bronchitis and double ear infections. Got home from it and had walking pneumonia and ended up in the hospital for a week. I also fainted 3 times at the trek and was given an IV of medical grade Gatorade. The paramedics told my parents that i shouldn't have come and that i needed to rest but they still made me go.

I thought about a joke but I'm too high and I forgot , oh yeah Pioneer47

As strange as it sounds, my trek experience wasn't all that bad. My stake in the heart of Utah County had always been really well organized and the health of everyone going on trek was a top priority. Maybe that's why we didn't bury flour babies and drink broth. Luckily we had zero accidents/incidents. I did have some lovely experiences that have stuck with me. We had a hoedown one night and everyone had a lot of fun. I also remember being on top of a small mountain in that had flowers in full bloom, absolutely beautiful. Minus the religious dogma, I think it would've made a nice backpacking trip. The only negative thing I really remember is being stuck in a dust storm one night. That was pretty gross cause we all got super dusty and dirty. I have to say though, this seems really low-key compared to the horrors these treks usually invoke. I'm pretty relieved we never did any of those super intense things.

"larping around as old-timey polygamists" best description ever. I went on trek twice, the first time I was actually in a polygamous offshoot of Mormonism, the second time as an adult LDS member. The first one was the most hardcore and difficult. We went to Martin's cove both times but the second trip we went an extra location (not sure where) after stopping over in Martin's cove for lil walk. The women's pull was utter bullshit both times, I was always confused by the whole "holy spirit" thing because shocker I felt it in non-spiritual contexts so the crying people freaked me out. I didn't think it was difficult, just awkward. Second time around I definitely fake cried because I knew what was expected. I think part of my discomfort with the situation was that it made me feel like they thought women were useless. How fucking condescending?! Also the crossing the river was just odd. It was no more than 10 ft of shallow water. Again everyone was CRYING. I didn't find any of it particularly hard. But, to be fair, I grew up roughing it on the regular. For the most part, I enjoyed it. Although the first time around was the worst sunburn of my life. My skin was CRYING! So maybe it was the mental gymnastic that made me think it was fine? For me really the worst part was the first time around (as a polygamous) I was 14 or so and trek (as well as other youth activities) is basically a hunting ground for 30-40 something-year-old men to find wife #3 or 4. It was really uncomfortable.

I went on a Youth Conference where they re-enacted Lehi's Journey with his family. They lied to us by saying it would be relaxing, but the first night we got "kicked out of camp", our belongings were "stolen", they forced us to walk around and "pitch our tents" for three days pretending we were lost. We re-enacted events such as going back to camp for the plates (the bishop's copy of the Book of Mormon), hunting for our food (shooting a piece of paper with a pic of bacon on it with a bow and arrow; whatever food we shot is what we ate), making a stone alter of thanks to God, using a Liahona to find where to go, and shamed anyone who murmured. I was very upset when later they said they knew exactly where we were (we were literally walking in circles) but wanted us to have an authentic experience of wandering in the wilderness like Lehi and his family.

"Pa said a prayer about the baby going to heaven?" Wait, isn't it part of their doctrine that all babies who die before age 8 go to super awesome VIP heaven?

I’m so glad I grew up in a Spanish speaking Ward. We never had to do the Pioneer trek though we did do a big potluck party at the park whenever we would celebrate Pioneer Day. Latino Mormons are the best.

On my "trek" , I got food poisoning. I vomitied and had diarrhea for about 24 hours until my mom finally picked me up and took me to the hospital lmao

"Our ancestors experienced a mass trauma... Lets recreate that trauma with YOU"

As a non-Mormon kid obsessed with the Oregon Trail, I have always wanted to go on a reenactment. These stories sound so tough.

Trek was one of the WORST experiences I was forced to endure when I was in the church lmao

I loved my hand cart trek 😂😅 however I just found out that those pioneers drank coffee and tea on their trek and I’m very upset I didn’t get to drink it on my re-enactment

Ughhhhh. We had to build our own handcarts. The splinters and the stress were just..the tip of the iceberg.

girl i could tell a FEW stories from girls camp💅💅

I had shared my story with you on Instagram but this video brought back so many other memories from Trek that I repressed 😂😂 I almost completely forgot about the Women’s pull! And on the steepest part of the hike too, ugh! And I definitely had a “this is the place” moment when I saw those buses at the end! It was more of a “this is not the place please hurry and get me home” tho

We didn't even have tents on my trek, we slept in sleeping bags on the ground and got rained on during the night. One of our meals was a single dry biscuit/cracker. I was forced to carry a babydoll in the scorching heat. On the last day, they made us hike a very long and steep hill, which I was really struggling with. So the bishop came over and held my hand to help me up the hill, and he made a weird comment about how he was wearing gloves so the hand-holding "didn't count"?? I was 14.

I went on our stakes pioneer trek, and I got heat stroke, asked to go home or get medical attention. Was told no. Luckily my aunt happened to be dropping something off for one of my cousins and I told her to kidnap me. Which she did, and took me home without asking any of the leadership

We did a Book of Mormon/Lehi's Journey themed one - can confirm, pushed us into "spiritual" experiences in moments of extreme exhaustion, lots of dehydration. I woke up most nights with sharp cramps in my legs, and as a result was also barely sleeping for the week.

Ok so for my trek, I was 14 and my mom forced me to go. I’m from UT county and so it was more intense 🥴 we drove to Martins Cove Wyoming and they FORCED everyone to wear LONG sleeve linen shirts, and the girls had to wear FULL LENGTH, past the ankle skirts (or a dress with long sleeves, full length) and it was HOT AS HELL outside. I remember being dehydrated and needing water the WHOLE TIME. Water was not easily accessible. Mixed with our clothes, the heat, and lack of food and water, sooo many people were passing out and our leaders or “ma’s and pa’s 🤢” would literally use the passed out kids with heatstroke as examples of “this is how it was back then! They had to push the sick in the cart.” It was miserable. I got the worst sunburn I’ve EVER gotten on my face, lips, nose because my bonnet didn’t really shield my face very well. My skin was literally BUBBLING it was terrifying to look at and soo painful. So many people got food poisoning. So many cringey “role playing” activities and “devotionals”. One of the most “molly Mormon” girls in my stake bore her testimony saying she doesn’t know if god is real anymore on the last day of trek. I felt that. Ughh! Thanks for making this video. It’s an F’ed up part of the church.

Before we went we were lectured about “having a good attitude” and not complaining. Nothing about it was spiritual and I just remember it making me feel guilty for not living up to the stories they told of actual pioneers. I tried to act tough and happy even though I had migraines, insomnia, and my period. My skirt got caught in the wheel. I fell twice and the wheel rolled over my foot. One person injured their knee and was not sent home. At one devotional one of the male leaders said in a speech to everyone that the girls in the stake were still good looking after three days of trek. Looking back it was kind of creepy.

I participated in the very first hand cart trek that the church initiated 1976. Yes I’m that old! The carts at that time were really made by the Amish, they gave us two jars of honey ash cakes and beef jerky. A very limited amount for each “family”. Our “parents” were BYU students from their survival course. They treated us like crap. The most traumatizing thing I remember is the last night they released these poor turkeys in a field and had us chase them down and wring their necks and kill them for our dinner. It was horrifying!

I hate when Mormon mom “influencers” talk about how they identify with oppressed people because their ancestors were persecuted and went on the trek.... yet deny polygamy’s role in church history. The trek literally would have never happened if polygamy was legal in the state they were fleeing (I forget). That’s the only reason the church is in Utah.

I did what they call quest. It’s a lot like trek except it’s in Book of Mormon context. They would reenact scenes from the Book of Mormon while we would watch and sometimes have to participate ourselves. I remember one scene where they pulled me from the audience and pretended I was a slave, and made me rub some guys feet. The weirdest scene we did though was Christ visited the americas. We were all sitting in a clearing in the woods, when the leaders blindfolded us and scattered us away from your groups. They then placed sounds like volcanos exploding and tornadoes to make it seem like we were in the darkness when Jesus was killed. We had to find our way back to our groups. When we finally made it, they allowed us to take off our blind folds and the stake president showed up dressed as Jesus and came and hugged us all and we touched the prints in his hands and all that. It was so weird, everyone was taking it so seriously, there were people literally sobbing. It was honestly so messed up.

I'm am so sorry to everyone who's had to go through this. Holy shit. Also the kneecap one got to me because I once had to walk a mile with a dislocated kneecap and torn thigh muscle after I fell on a walk and my phone died. It was AGONY.

When I went to trek we had to sit through devotionals all day and then hike around a mountain, aimlessly wandering in circles all night. We would hike from about 5pm to 3am. It was dark and cold and we were fed only broth and hard biscuits. When we were finally allowed to sleep, most kids just passed out on the side of the trail without any energy to find their blankets in the handcart. The leaders told us that there had been a string of assaults on the mountain by a crazed hermit in the weeks prior and that we needed to watch our backs. I am just now realizing that we were probably only told that so we would fear for our lives. It worked. Everyone was terrified, hungry, cold, and miserable.

This video just made me really glad I didn’t live in Utah when I went on trek.

Several years ago my Mormon cousin told me that she was sending her kids off to "trek". As a total non Mormon, I asked her about it. She said that it was a was for the young people to be able to share the LDS pioneer experience. It sounded totally barbaric to me. I then asked her...... When is Mountain meadows camp?

I lived in Colorado when I was of the age to go on trek. I went twice, once was in Wyoming, like Rocky Ridge area. Luckily, it wasn’t as awful as a lot of these stories. We had water on the handcarts, and were fed a decent amount. The “families” I was in were actually pretty decent. But, it wasn’t great. It was hot and we were all dressed in pioneer clothes. There was one river that when we crossed it they made the boys carry the girls across, which is gross.

I remember I had to sign a release form for my son to go. The leaders said he did good. But, when he got off of the bus he let us all know he hated all of it. He said they practically starved the kids. He gave up one of his meals to share with a teenage girl who was worse off than him. I was upset that they rationed the food out for the kids. While the leaders were getting really good meal portions . Talked to the leaders about it later they all said it was the norm for the trek.

Damn Sam! You make a great cowgirl! Tanner, you are hilarious in your pioneer lederhosen. I am glad I never had to do a trek. Somehow the LDS church manages to take the fun out of most everything. I think I will refer to the LDS church as "The Church of Latter Day Buzzkills".

I’m so glad I held my ground against not going on trek despite my friends and family pushing me to do so. The Mormon church is not afraid to lie to their youth. For our girls camp hike they told us we were hiking 2 or so miles on flat ground. It was 5+ miles all steeply uphill. I was furious. I didn’t care we were hiking but my leaders lying to me bothered me and never trusted them again. Plus, the hike guide rode an atv the whole time. Kids were under prepared. There WAS a flat path a little bit away but they purposely made us take the harder way and lied about it. Because they lied about that I never went on trek.

The cart RAN OVER one of the girls. Her family had to PUSH the cart over her because the wheel got stuck on her body. She was helicoptered out and honestly how she survived is beyond anyone. Please Pull the cart as you see in the paintings. DO NOT PULL FROM IN FRONT OF THE WHEEL. It sounds obvious, but these carts are so heavy you are constantly looking for a more efficient way to get it moving.

I actually enjoyed trek. My ward had several doctors in it, so we didn’t have any health issues. But 2 things. From my trek: They tried to present dinner on the first night like the 17 Miracles thing of just eating flower and water. One of my close friends just about lost her shit. To be fair, she was SUPER hungry. Then they were like “just kidding. It’s tacos!”. & gave us these little hand outs of flour in a little sack to help us think of how difficult that would be. Second, from when my mom and dad were ma’s and pa’s: my dad had to sit on the side of the trail & he told my mom and everyone to go ahead. After a little bit, the bishop was like “hey, I don’t like this.” & checked him out. Bishop was a cardiologist. Turns out my dad was having a heart attack & he was rushed to the hospital. He survived. & my mom has one of those pictures of Jesus in the operating room because of it. Which is kind of funny, because he wasn’t even opened up, he was awake during the whole thing. But whatever:).

The “women’s pull” was the biggest issue for me, and hearing the person in this video say it made them understand that the church views women as weak really resonated for me. We had to sing “as sisters in zion” bc obviously anything women-related means you have to sing that song, and then all the men just watched us by lining up on either side of the trail. It wasn’t even that hard, all it did was make the men ~feel things~. I smiled at my family as I went by because I felt uncomfortable and they mentioned it in their testimonies for MONTHS afterwards.

As someone who is not and has never been a Mormon, and therefore never heard of 'trek', this video was a bizarre and horrifying journey.

Our trek was a little unconventional, there were no pioneer outfits or handcarts, and they only had the youth go (with adult supervision from inside vehicles and at water stations) but we reenacted John Rowe Moyle's walk that he made weekly from his home in Alpine to the Salt Lake Temple. We started at 2 AM from his home in Alpine and walked 30ish miles through the night through the mountains and eventually on roads. I was quite the runner at that point in my life, having done marathons and halfs prior to this, and was appointed to be the leader of the first group who litterally ran ahead and hung lights in the trees for the groups behind to follow so they would know where to go. It started pouring freezing rain on us and I remember running in shoes that were completely soaked through, creating blisters that eventually burst and began bleeding through my socks and shoes (I kept those shoes for a long time afterwards as some kind of sick "faith trophy" because of the blood on them). At one point I remember stopping at the water station and being told that the next leg would be done without any water and that we would have to carry a satchel full of stone working tools as well. It was miserable. On the last stretch a runner in my group collapsed and the leaders encouraged us to carry her the last bit instead of having her seek medical attention. Myself and another teenager carried her in a makeshift double bridal style carry the last few blocks to the temple. Once we made it to the temple I remember laying on the grass near the reflection fountain and crying as my muscles cramped up from a massive lack of electrolytes and sodium while running that distance. As the rest of the ward made it to the temple they told us about so many children who had just absolute nightmares on the trail, injuries, collapsing from exhaustion, vomiting, etc. It was wild.

Wow... I really had no idea it was this bad/almost feel bad listening. My treck was intense...but... it was awesome/the complete opposite of the stories shared here. I think it was somewhere around 20 miles, and we went to Wyoming where all those Willy/Martin people froze to death. Granted... it was the middle of summer, we had HUGE meals every day, regulated water stops every 45 minutes or so, several assigned doctors patrolling, looking for any even remote sign of heat exhaustion, every night was a huge barbeque, and our entire ward motto was literally "PW!!" (Pee white/stay hydrated). I also was really into the outdoors, and they had a huge medical tent where anyone could stay for the day/have a support truck take them back to any time, no questions asked. Like... honestly, it was some of the most fun I had in the church. The only bad part was when a park ranger found a rattlesnake and killed it instead of capturing/relocating it in the middle of testimony meeting. Which, come to think of it now is pretty hilarious (minus the dead snake). I.... yeah, wow. I'm sorry to hear so many people... that that apparently was NOT the case for them.

Fortunately, they don't do trek in the San Jose California area.

"The closer you get to Utah the weirder things get" this is absolutely true. I'm from Ohio and the Mormons I know are genuinely happy and nice people who didn't go through a lot of brainwashing like this channel and Jimmy Snow describe. Many of them are essentially protestants with a few extra rules.

I was 16 when I did my first trek and one of the first things I was told about it is that someone had died in some trek the year prior somewhere. In Australia I think you had to be at least 14 to attend. Trek was done during school holidays, which is the middle of summer. Queensland summers can reach heights of 40°C and 90% humidity where I lived. Because of how intense it is, the leaders were not allowed to withhold food or water from us; I remember being quite well fed. My actual mother was a Ma to one of the families and she got heatstroke a few days in because the ridiculous clothing was heating her up and she wasn’t eating well enough since she was more invested in her kids’ health than her own. She also has arthritis and it was painful for her to walk every day. Here we had medical professionals with a van, and they ferried people along to the next stop if they truly couldn’t make the trek, but no one wanted to take it. I remember that the girls-only push wasn’t so impactful because the girls managed it quite easily without any of the boys. Overall, super weird experience. This was in the middle of a faith crisis and I remember people seeming so spiritually affected while I was asking myself “what the actual fuck” half the time. Thankfully Australia seems to care more about our health and safety than Utah?

OMG! I never experienced Trek. Thank God! I did have a “Tree of Life” experience in YW camp where we held onto a rope blindfolded while our leaders tempted us to let go with promises of dessert 😂 and we also had other leaders cheering us on. At the end, we got to a tree lit up with Christmas lights. The tree was actually really beautiful. This led us into a testimony meeting about how we could never let go! So much crying. So. Much. Crying. Thankfully, my real life object lesson was nowhere near as intense as Trek!

I couldn't wait to get to this episode! I only went on trek once. What always stood out to me was this moment near the end. The women had split off from the men as the men "went to war". Us and another group came upon the last, very steep hill we were supposed to overcome. Apparently, we were supposed to wait for the boys to get back to help us push our wagons up the hill. Only we didn't know that. So the women from the other group joined us, and we pushed our cart up the hill with only the girls. The people at the top seemed surprised to see there was no guys with us. We went back down to help the girls with their cart. All I'm saying was that it was more of a lesson in female empowerment that we could do it on our own.

I went on trek 2 years ago as an exmormon because peer pressure and honestly I just hated the religious stuff. They had this "super powerful" devotional and made people stand up who were planning on going on a mission. I didn't want to be the only one sitting, so I just stood up. All our food was catered (we had ice cream, fries ect) parents gave us candy, and there were porta potties. Just like religious camping but not even as hard as that

One of the families in my stake tied their babies to the wagon wheels.

I wore tampons even though I wasn't on my period to try and make myself sick so I didn't have to finish trek. I was forced to rely on the boys in my ward who constantly made fun of my weight (I have always gained weight easily and because of my depression, my appetite is blown to hell) or for how I was actually following the words that were taught even though it didn't make sense to me. I'm getting triggered thinking about it and it wasn't even that climatic of an event for me in the moment.

I'm sorry, but I can't watch the vid because trek is an especially triggering topic for me. I love y'all and hated trek with a passion! Take care, stay safe and stay healthy you lovely people ❤️ I do have a funny story though, well, two stories. The first one- I fucked up my shoulder so bad I still have chronic pain almost five years later. The medic did nothing at the time other than giving me a lukewarm ice pack. Second story- that same medic is brothers of one of the members of imagine dragons. My "family" began singing radioactive while walking and the medic stopped us and we had a discussion about his family. It was strange but it made my little fangirl heart flutter

When I went to track I almost passed out on the first day and on the second I couldn't play several games because my feet hurt so bad from walking I couldn't stand.

I feel like there was enough medically recorded pain and suffering in these stories ALONE to have a class-action lawsuit against the church. I hate to think of the stories still untold.

I'm pretty sure we had to sign waivers when we went on trek. Funny, I didn't find that strange at the time.

Mine wasn't as intense as most of these, I think because a lot of the mas and pas were actually parents of a kids there(and not fkn crazy abusers.) We changed our plans and went to "zion" a day early because people were getting heat stroke. A few went home early.

so Im pretty sure that the Canadian trek where the person walked through the river and had to pull the carts up the hill, was the same trek I did. I was 14 and the third day we were woken up around 4-5 by the mobs attacking us with gunshots sounds and I was way to tired to be scared (I hadn't eaten enough) and that evening after walking for hours we had to cross the river and it started raining when we got their and everything got soaked. and the adults watched from the bridge (still pissed about that) after we did all that I was walking with my cousin(same family for trek) and we got behind the group, she was not okay and was on the verge of hypothermia. luckily our ma checked in on us and put her in one of the two trucks they had. after another hour of walking, when we got to the campsite I was complexity done and just sat on a bench until an adult put me in a truck with the heat on, since I was apparently suffer from hypothermia as well, I was just to tired to realize it. short version trek sucks and is a way to pass on generational trauma.

“We don’t get it. We’re trying to figure it out, Siri. 😂”

Wow, that wouldn’t pass the “health and safety regulations “ here in New Zealand. Never thought I’d be in favour of those regulations.

My fiancé was raised Mormonism and before I helped him leave, he was super indoctrinated. He reeeeeeally wanted me to do the trek with him as parents and I was like NO. NEVER. He enjoyed the trek but from this video, I know I would have throttled him if I had to join him doing this. P.S. y'all's and Jimmy's videos helped inform me of Mormonism and made me have the facts needed to convince him to leave. Thank you for helping my relationship flourish 💖

I was never Mormon but your mention of the song "God Be With You Till We Meet Again" reminded me of something. My uncle was a convert to the church and when my grandmother died in 2002, he did an impromptu performance of the song at the cemetery as dirt was put onto the casket. He just like busted it out acapella. I also remember he came over to my parent's house and talked about the 3 levels of heaven and how that was the correct biblical teaching like days after my grandmother's death. He was an interesting dude. He was pretty all in for the church. He talked about The Book of Mormon all the time to anyone who would listen.

During testimony meeting I said that the pioneers did this so we didnt have to....and here we are...doing it for no reason. They quickly moved on.

The one who said they had someone with a crushed hand/fingers, someone needed stitches, and someone had an asthma attack feels uncomfortably close to my recollection of my trek in southern Alberta...

I’m an ex-mormon from Austria!! If the church would do it here, officials would immediately arrest them for child abuse!!

I remember they made us push the handcarts up a huge ass hill then back down and some girl got ran over by the cart

A bishop from another stake in my city straight up died on trek. It was traumatizing for the kids I knew that were there. Trek was a horrible experience. I remember feeling discouraged and asking for help and they would say pray for the strength to keep going. I promise you, praying is NOT what you want to do on trek.

Amazing thinking outside the box to address this very inside the box issue of Mormon culture. This was an issue that needed to be covered and shows a very problematic aspect of the church.

Oh and don’t forget that for most people all you could bring had to fit in a bucket (other than sleeping bag stuff) you were going to sit around by the fire.

Ok you guys finally got me. I'm now a patron

i was on my period during trek and cried every day of the experience. I was in excruciating pain and they still made me walk the 7 miles every day. But i did spend a lot of time with my girlfriend at the time which was kinda my way of saying f the church. me holding hands and snugging with my girlfriend during trek

Thank Mormon Jesus I never went on one of these in South Florida. I always had an excuse for not going. These stories are cringy and down right wrong. I hope ppl stop going to these.

I was raised in the Mormon church by parents who are *very* loyal to its teachings, but I question them. Thank you for making this channel.

Trek is actually one of my best memories growing up in the church

I participated in trek and I nearly dogged a bullet but my mom signed me and my sister up. I think the total mile tally was 21ish miles over 4 days. I had several panic attacks. And I left early because I had food poisoning. They also did the baby burial and men go to war thing at my trek.

So. Many. Memories. I went on trek twice. The first one I was barely 14, lost my bonnet on the first day and got massive sunburn BLISTERS all over my face by the end of the three days. However, I was convinced I would be a "spiritual" family member with the people I met for the rest of my life. We even had a "family reunion" the summer after. Second time I was part of the planning committee and I was determined that it would be as authentic as humanly possible. It was intense, and now I'm very conflicted. While I think it's awesome to go electronics free for a weekend and connect with your religions history, I think trek might take it to an unhealthy level, and there is definitely a high level of "group think" and brainwashing that goes into it.

When I went on trek (in Idaho) the only thing I learned was that I liked long hikes! But I really enjoyed my trek . We had no angels, or baby dolls. The weirdest thing (besides the whole concept lmao) was the morning they didn't have breakfast for us, and two miles down the road they gave us beef jerky .

Were the Mormon Mountain massacres of sept 11th done during trek? Did you reenact those?

It fucked me up so bad. They rationed our food. In the first few days my under garments on the "Forced dress" gave out and I started getting chaffing. You only had portable toilets in the morning and at night. One girl had the strap break on one and she fell over and all of it on her. They had to go out in the weeds and hose off. There were rattle snakes. The trail was full of badger holes and with having a handcart you couldn't see them till they were under your foot. I sprained my foot and it was so swollen by the end of the week. I got dehydrated after the women's pull (and had hallucinations of angles) because we ran out of water before we even started pushing up the mountain (yes it was a mountain not a hill) Our clothes are what we had and mine got ripped and full of cacti needles which then brushed against my legs. I got a tick I had to burn off. Both my feet became hosts to hundreds of blisters. I got sunburned on my face and arms. I was starving tired and in so much pain. I don't know I was so indoctrinated that I thought it was so amazing seeing kids get tipped in a portable and taken by an adult women and stripped and washed.

my friend got heat stroke and couldn't walk for 2 days of the trek because the person in charge of the trek said "one more hill" for 6 hours so she didn't fill her water up. we did 15 miles that day.

Me and one other kid were the only dudes in our group and the girls refused to help pull the cart. I literally pulled that thing by myself for like twenty miles in the middle of the mountains (the other kid was twelve and super scrawny). I remember this redhead girl named Megan who did nothing but carry a small bag of rice as a pseudo baby. I told her it was her turn to pull the cart and she just turned to me and said: "Yeah, that's not my thing." And then when we finished walking all I got to eat was a biscuit and cup of broth. When the first councilor of the stake asked me how it was as we were entering our campsite the first night, I looked him straight in the eyes and said: "This sucks some seriously hairy balls." I was 14 and never went again

My trek thankfully wasn't that traumatic. I thought all the "spiritual stuff" was cheesy as hell and I obviously wasn't moved to tears when my abusive parents sent me a letter. My "Pa" got a huge wood tick on his neck and little 14 year old me was the only one in our group who knew how to properly remove one. (For context: my dad's been a scout master my whole life and I'd worked at a scout camp for a year at that point, so I had first aid knowledge out my ass.) Other than that, I had some fun experiences. The oldest boy in my "family" told me about his first gay sex experience and we laughed about how awkward he'd been. He was super openly gay and would clap back at any leaders who tried to criticize him for it. (He honestly was such a huge inspiration for me) Also, during the women's pull, my group and I were all very athletic and had a fairly easy time. I lead my group in singing "Be A Man". We were laughing and giggling the whole time until we got back to the men and leaders and I got a stern talking to about "disrupting the spirit" 😂 Some girl badly sprained her ankle and had to be carried on the wagon by the rest of her group. All the rest of the groups came back crying and praising God and I just remembered feeling so confused because I hadn't felt The Spirit ™️ at all. All in all, it was tiring and weird and not at all spiritually enlightening for me. But I'm glad I met cool people and didn't have to have as traumatic of an experience as others did. Edit: yes, I was 13 when I started working. I still have no idea how that was legal but 🤷‍♀️ Also, I don't remember too much from trek so either it was uneventful or my brain's sheltering me from it hahaha

There was a tornado warning while we were out on trek. It poured rain and our tents flooded. My trek sister got a tick in her shoulder and both of my irl sisters ended up in the medical tent. One had heat stroke, and one had food poisoning. Not as crazy as this girls camp though. Our stake president dressed up as Jesus and was walking around letting people touch his hands. Thinking back on it all, it’s so wild the things we did that are absolutely insane but seemed normal at the time.

I actually went on two treks. I went one one, moved, and went on another. I was freaking proud that I did it twice. Edit: I actually enjoyed them, weirdly enough. But mostly for the scenery and experience. On the first one we lugged chickens under the cart, only to kill and eat them on the last full day. I don't remember being miserable really, but I had abusive parents and a high pain tolerance so take that with a grain of salt.

My stake was one of the ones that did the book of mormon treks, they called it "quest" i believe the whole hike was 11 miles total around a lake in centralish washington. We were divided into tribes instead of families and we were basically confined to that group 24/7. The first night all we were given to eat was a bunch of nuts and dried fruit and then were fed actual food the rest of the week. Luckily didnt have to carry any od our stuff (was packed ip and driven in the morning to the next nights camp. Had to sleep in unconvered sleeping bags and it rained overnight of course. We did a bunch of weird reenactment activities, building the boat, sword fights, retrieving the plates and another i dont remember why exactly we did but we hd to climb and incredibly steep cliff blindfolded with only twine to hold on to and were given a pear at the top. I recall one girl breaking her toe during the boat activity, a ton of people got stung by wasps during the same activity. And the "retrieve the plates from lamen" took a boy from each tribe and had them sprint two miles back to the previous nights camp and sprint to recatch up with their tribe. Testimony night was weird all i remember was being pressured into bearing mine while being in a faith crisis myself and giving the generic answer of "this gave me a testimony if the book of mormon" and the whole thing ended with a hug circle. overall not the worst thing by far but strange to look back on

Y'all should see if you can get enough stories to make a video like this ab people's experiences with the "spiritual activity" at girls camp!!! I'm not sure how other wards outside of TX go about it but I'm sure there have to be some parallels. They were all weird but one in particular was extreme and a bit traumatizing lol. I'd love to hear other perspectives and stories on that topic.

I never got to do trek because it was cancelled. It was cancelled because a different stake was doing trek the week before us and someone DIED on their trek due to heat exhaustion.

I'm so glad that my ward in Texas never did trek lmao, I never would have gone anyway cuz I thought it was stupid but at least no one pressured me

I remember “cheating” with the other girls in my ward because for a YW activity before trek we made cushions attached to the lid of the 5 gallon bucket we had to put all of our stuff in. We couldn’t use pillows so we had our sleeping bags out on the grass with the bucket lid cushion as a makeshift pillow.

Man, I remember trek. Both times I went, I didn't get to be in a group with any of my friends and nobody paid me any attention because I wasn't attractive.

Hi. Kansas here. 30 min from Independence and Liberty Missouri. Every 4 years they do a handcart trek (maybe 15 miles or less in a few days) in place of the segregated camping. I always feel so bad for the kids because it’s like 100 degrees here and 99 percent humidity. Hello misery.

I was never Mormon and i have only met one mormon my entire life. I swear each of your videos is like “wait they do what!?”

And I thought just having the women's pull was bad. The only think keeping me from eating pretty well was my own pickiness, even then I ate rather well

My trek experience was also terrible. My Ma and Pa were extremely obnoxious and during free time my introvert self would go for a walk to get way from my "family" only to come back to them making fun of me for not being a team player even though no one was doing anything except sitting by the fire & singing? The first night the men actually had to do the cooking and they burned it so we got to eat nothing. The only thing we could eat during the day was trail mix from a shared bag in the wagon. It rained every night. One night I woke up and all of our sleeping bags were practically floating in our flooded tent. We were freezing. But of course no one would complain because we wanted to be like the pioneers. I really wanted to love it because I wanted to honor the pioneers. I would lay awake at night crying and praying to Heavenly Father feeling so bad that my pioneer ancestors had to do that without tents and with babies, pregnant, etc...and for months! So surely I could do it for a few days. But the worst part was that I felt extremely self conscious going to the bathroom in front of anyone/in the woods/in a dress. And at night they would only set up one porta potty for everyone (It was a group of about 600 people in our stake in Georgia)....and there was always a line. One time I stood in the line so long but when I got to the out house it was covered in poop and pee - it was so gross I couldn't even go inside. So I literally HELD my pee and poo for 4 days (3 nights). And I got a UTI over it. It was awful and incredibly painful. The mornings were the worst. I still can't believe I actually did that...and thought it was normal.

My church was rich so the leaders were like "fuck this hard shit" so I had an easy(ish) trek

On my trek all the boys slept in tents and the girls got some really heavy duty tents, cots and heaters. It rained so much that all of the boys tents flooded and we all were soaked. It was miserable. All my clothes and my sleeping bag and of course myself were just completely soaked every night. The girls complained that it was too warm in their tents and I was super jealous

I remember sprinting with the cart for the last 1/4 mile...and it broken the axel, we left it in the middle of the road.

I love this video so much

I was coerced into going to the trek. I didn't want to go but the church leaders told my mom that I had told them that I was going so asked her to sign me up and then I was guilted into staying signed up because all the other youth were going. We had to sew all our outfits for the trip, pantaloons, aprons, bonnets, the whole shabang. So every youth activity for the month or two leading up to the trek revolved around sewing. We flew from southern CA to UT, then drove to WY. They were pumping us full of water so we didn't get dehydrated over the next days, but only scheduled one bathroom break for the entire like 8 hour drive. I talked them into doing an unscheduled bathroom break and literally everyone from the three buses were in line to use the bathroom. How they thought 12 year olds were supposed to drink 5x as much water as usual and not need to pee is beyond me. We did something like 35 miles, so about 12 miles a day. It was WY, so one moment it'd be pouring rain, then 15 minutes later, blazing sun, then 15 minutes later, wind storm. When we finished walking for the day, we'd set up camp then eat and have some free time. One of the nights, the wind got so bad, we had to break down camp so our stuff didn't blow away and set it up again when it was time for bed. Over the course of the trip, I basically got 3 marriage proposals, i.e. three different boys told me they'd "wait for me" until they returned from their mission. I was literally 17 with 3 marriage proposals in my lap. I was the oldest in my group so had to hold the baby while pulling the handcart, pretty typical. My mom was one of the cooks so she had extra storage so packed one of those sun showers that you can use when you're camping. Both her and I used it and then we got in trouble for it and had it confiscated. All in all, bizarre AF. I was not very mormon growing up, none of my school friends were mormon, and we'd all just refer to this trip as that weird mormon thing I did.

A friend of my moms shared this story that my mom passed onto me this summer on the morning she sent my little sister to trek. I’ll never forget this spiritual moment while on trek 6 years ago. Our youth built the Nauvoo Temple. We had stained glass windows, an operating tower clock, it was approximately a 12x12x20 foot structure with double doors-looked just like a real temple. The kids worked hard all day long. The next morning at 4:45am a group of Mormon hating men rode into camp, on big loud stomping horses,while everyone was sleeping; shooting their guns and threatening to kill everyone if they didn’t leave. The kids were shocked. They had everything cleaned up, packed and ready to go in 45 minutes. As they were walking away, they all looked back at the temple and watched it being destroyed; totally and completely fallen to the ground. They were devastated. A very spiritual moment of what our pioneers experienced when they were ordered out of Nauvoo. Seems like some serious emotional abuse and brainwashing to me! What a mess!!

not related to trek, but my mom's patriarchal blessing says that she will be here during the "second coming" and it breaks my heart that she will be going through a faith crisis on her death bed 🥺

I want to know more about the person who got pregnant on trek. How do you get it on when it felt like there's no privacy

I said it on the Reddit thread and I'll say it again: This sounds like child abuse with extra steps. By the way Sam and Tanner, have you seen the Mormon Pride and Prejudice on KZfaq? I saw it years ago and it was WILD. Thought it would be a good one to do commentary on.

I went on trek last minute and didn't pack. I wore the same outfit the whole time. I trekked 8miles one day in a thunderstorm. Went to bed in my wet clothes because I was scared that anyone would see me in my tank top. I get it was mostly my fault but not a fun exploring at all lol