Fifty-five students and chaperones lead by choir director Mrs. Owens depart Mansfield in a luxury bus on June 21. After a long drive to Houston they check in at the Air France desk of Houston International Airport. The group boards Air France Flight 33, and several thousand miles and many hours later they land in Paris, France at 8:45 a.m. the next day.

This is the first step of a journey taking the choir across Europe. They will travel to the twin-spired Frauenkirche cathedral of Munich, the castle of Mad King Ludwig, across the Austrian country side, through the rolling mountains and forests of the Alps, past the birthplace of Mozart and down the Autobahn to the historic city of Vienna. In addition to the sight seeing, the choir will perform at several sites during the trip.

“It is a trip for the kids to see something they would not usually get the opportunity to see,” Mrs. Owens said.

The tour of Austria was chosen over a trip to other areas of Europe, such as Ireland or Scotland, partly because of decreased cost, but also because of the historic significance of the areas they will be visiting.

“It has so much musical heritage for us that it was just a good place to take our kids,” Mrs. Owens said.

Choir member Haley Mumaw expressed her excitement over getting to sing for a church on the trip and getting out of Mansfield and seeing famous places and different cultures.

“We get to sing for mass at a church, probably in German.” Mumaw said. “We also get to see the sound of music house. I like that it’s not here and that I get to leave the country. I want to see if the culture is different and if they act differently than here.”

Although the school board and Mr. Wright are on board with the overseas trip (Mr. Wright will even be attending), it was more difficult to secure the legal contract for the trip with our district lawyers.

“We just had to rewrite the contract. Our district lawyers wanted to make sure we were covered as far as all the legalities of it.” Mrs. Owens said. “As far as going through the motions though it was almost rubber stamped, and I understand where the lawyers were coming from.”