Water walkers pass through area

ABOVE: Barb Baker LaRush, left, takes a copper pail of water from Beth Brent as LaRush joins Deon Kirby on a leg of their walk along Route W toward Cape Girardeau on Thursday. BELOW: LaRush and Kirby walk along Route W toward Cape Girardeau with a copper pail of water from the headwaters of the Mississippi River. They are part of the Water Walkers who left Lake Itasca State Park in Minnesota on March 1 after a traditional Ojibwe water ceremony. They are walking each day on a 1,200-mile trip to draw attention to river pollution until they reach the Gulf of Mexico near New Orleans about April 29. "We want the walk to be a prayer," walker Sharon Day said in a news release. "Every step we take we will be praying for and thinking of the water. The water has given us life, and, now, we will support the water," she said. The walk is sponsored by the Indigenous Peoples Task Force.