Seeing the Pope at the Youth Rally

TJ and Jeanne were privileged enough to obtain tickets to see the Pope yesterday at the Youth Rally at St. Joseph's Seminary down in Yonkers. Despite having to deal with some logistical problems with food and transportation, they thoroughly enjoyed the day as an experience of a lifetime. And the weather couldn't have been more perfect - especially considering that it is still April here in New York.

I found the experience powerful just watching it on TV. I'm sure it was even more so being there in person.

Here's TJ hanging out soon after arrival.



And here is the view from the spot that the group from St. Martin's scouted out.



Unfortunately, the plan for distributing food wasn't working out so well. After waiting on line for almost three hours trying to get something to eat, Jeanne started to become faint and had to be brought to the first aid station.



Soon after, they closed off the outer area where Jeanne was so that she couldn't get back to the rest of the group. The good news was that this enabled her to get a good view of the Pope's arrival in his Popemobile.



They did have a Jumbotron in the area available to watch the ceremony from, but unfortunately, there was no audio.



Jeanne did find a taller girl (from Pleasant Valley) to reach up high and take some photos from their remote location. I'm glad I invested in a good optical zoom when we bought our latest digitial camera.



TJ thankfully was able to watch the ceremonies from the closer location, but since Jeanne had the camera, they didn't get any good pictures from that vantage point.

Jeanne didn't mind too much that she had to watch from so far away. After all, how many other people can say they've hung out with nuns in baseball caps?