Ziplining & White Water Rafting

Andy and I went on an adventure a week ago last Saturday. We hired a babysitter for our kids and we were gone from 6:30-5:30! In the States, we tried to get away from the kids once every month, so it felt great to have this opportunity here to do the same!

Each month, the student body at ILE comes up with a paseo, which basically means a day or weekend trip. In the past, some have visited La Paz, which is a popular waterfall spot/national park and others have seen volcanoes. For the future, there is a coffee tour planned, a resort trip to Los Lagos, a sloth sanctuary and more.

We met our driver (Ronnie Gonzalez, who's birthday is today:)) at ILE at 6:30 am and piled into his big van.

Ronnie, our driver and tour guide

I was nervous about getting carsick so I asked to sit in the front middle seat so I could see the road. I also took Dramamine and hoped for the best. Once we got into the mountains, it was of course very winding and speed up and slow down. There were two overturned semis, who had gotten too far over on the shoulder and with the dropoff of the shoulder, they overturned and thankfully had space between them and the big dropoff. The view was beautiful along the side of the mountains.

After we had driven about 1.5 hours, we stopped for desayuno at a favorite buffet of Ronnies. It was a good thing too, as I was starting to feel a little nauseated.

We arrived at Pozo Azul and got training on how to zipline. We were able to pair up with another group from another school and a couple from Holland. We went through 9 zipline stations and my favorite one was this last one over the River. It was beautiful!

Baby Viper on the walking trail...thank goodness for guides to show you these things!

After Ziplining and rafting, they served us a delicious lunch and not shown is a guava cheesecake. Andy wasn't really a fan.

Getting instructions on how to zipline and what to look out for ie: bullet ants, vipers etc.

Before Takeoff!

This is Sarah, our friend from North Carolina. She spent the past 14 months in Haiti and we realized we know some of the same people! She had met Isaac and Britney Steiner and Les and Christine Kaeb, some of our missionaries in Haiti. She is super sweet and we do a lot together.

Sarah on the zipline.

This is the beginning of our rafting trip. Approximately 5.3 seconds after this picture, our tour guide doused us repeatedly. I think I bore the brunt of it, sitting directly in front of him, to the right. We never fell out but came close several times. One of the rapids was called the "Washing Machine". Basically we spun around like we were in a washer while simultaneously going down the rapids...eeek! We didn't want to risk losing our phones so we do not have many pictures from the rapids.

Sam shot all of this awesome coverage of the trip and Ethan at the school edited and put it together.

It was a super fun day and I'm so glad we said yes to going.

Our Tour Guides

Andy, Sarah and I were riding in the front of this truck and were talking about monkeys and all of the sudden there was this loud barking noise at my window. I freaked out and lunged towards Sarah and realized it was one of these tour guides playing a trick on me. I thought it was a howler monkey coming in my window!!! They sure know how to keep their customers laughing...

It's getting late here (8:30pm) which doesn't sound super late to my American self, but early to bed early to rise now... So I'll sign off now with this picture from a student here, Kurtis Moss...

Specific Prayer Requests:

1. I feel a little less blind each week we are in school. Pray that this growth in our language learning could continue.

2. Pray for the health of our kids and us. We get emails from the US Embassy while we are here and they are reporting cases of RSV. Thankfully our kids are not newborns, but Aria is still very young. I am trying to wash her hands as often as possible, but I'm not with her at school, which is where most of the germs are. Mary Lou had given us an immune booster oil and Shaklee vitamins but she doesn't always let me put it on her and the kids don't care for the taste of vitamins:(

3. There is a Tico family here who was hosting our Canadian friends. Their third son was recently in the hospital and they could not find out what was wrong with him. Sadly, he passed away early last week. They are having a really hard time with it and our Canadian friends thought it best to move out and let them grieve. Pray for all involved.

4. Our Canadian friends, Kyle and Jenna, are coming to the end of their schooling. They were in a 6 week intensive program and will be heading to Chile next week. Pray for them and their unborn child. We had them for supper Saturday night and she expressed anxiety over giving birth in a different county, in a country that only lets you labor for 6 hours before telling you you need a c-section.

Thanksgiving

1. We continue to learn at school as a family. I was speaking with one of Malaya's teachers the other day and it was a great encouragement to me. Kids seem to be adjusting fairly well but I know they miss their friends back home. If it works for your kids to What's App video chat, please reach out and we will try and find a time to do so.

2. I know God is with us and is for us. We cannot fail. Amen!