Rosaries By Vivian - Apparition of the Virgin Mary

When I was nine years old, in June of 1968, I went to Turkey Point Wildlife Refuge on a Girl Scout campout for the weekend. At that time, Turkey Point Nuclear Power Plant, located on Biscayne Bay, 24 miles south of Miami, Florida and east of Homestead, was under construction, not yet an operating power plant.

In fact the power-plant-to-be had just received its construction permit in April 1967. Back then Turkey point was known instead for the Wildlife Refuge where there were camps for scouts there, cabins, hiking paths, and not the nuclear plant as it is known today.

For the first twenty-four hours at the scout camp, I had a pretty uneventful, typical time. The girls from my girl scout troop and I were all from the same Catholic school, St. Brendan's, and our troop leaders were also all Catholics. My fellow girl scouts and I swam, got bit by sand fleas, regular boring camping stuff. But that was soon to change through a simple hike with another Girl Scout that late morning.

The troop leaders announced we could go off in pairs to explore the area. So I and this other girl, whose name I do not remember, went down the main dirt road. We understood our exploring perimeters and would stay within them.

It was a typical South Florida late morning, warm, clear skies, but comfortable to me as a 9-year-old child having lived in South Florida since 2 months of age.

After a little bit, my companion and I stumbled upon a small path off to the side in the woods. We decided to explore it, eager for adventure as most 9 year old girl scouts on a hike. Fifty or so feet later this small footpath let out to a circular clearing about hundred feet in diameter.

We were amazed to discover all by itself in this circular clearing, what seemed to us a large impressive tree like a great pine, almost as if planted there for a significant reason. There was a kind of reverent feeling in the air, as if the spot itself, and the stately tree, was a holy area.

We both picked up on this independently, and we followed the feelings by both of us voicing playfully how the tree seemed just the spot for all the animals in the forest to encircle to pray. We were not afraid then, just having fun, and taken by a sense of holy significance of the size and setting of the tree, as if it were a holy spot.

We didn't talk about it very long, just having a brief moment of fun talking about the fantasy scenario of the tree being a place for the forest animals to encircle and pray. Of course we didn't believe this; we were just having fun saying this, inspired by the holy-feeling setting.