into the jungle

I finished the Amazing Ecuadorian Race on Friday and was just plain exhausted. It was a good experience and hard to sum up in a blog post but I was stretched and challenged beyond what I thought was possible.

Here are some highlights of the Amazing Race:

Day 1:
Mindo Zipline tour - I decided not to do it because I wasn't sure how safe it would be. (For those of you that don't know, I broke my back almost 7 years ago from a zip line.) It turns out we went to the wrong tour, but the one we were supposed to go to was much safer. Maybe I'll try it before the end of the summer.

At the end of the day we had to score a soccer goal against some church members in Bramadora. I really stink at futbol but after a looong time I scored that stinking goal :) Cory, one of my team members, had to catch a chicken after that.

Day 2:
Used a machete to clear land for building a church in El Carmen. Phew, that's some hard work! Then we ate lunch with a family there, que rico! (tasty)

Day 3:
Hiked up this road that took us an hour to get to the church in the mountains. A couple people had some health issues that they couldn't make it up to the 11,000ft altitude. I thought I wasn't going to make it either, but God helped me keep going! We ended up helping gather potatoes. In that area potatoes are the most prominent agriculture product. We had to ride a donkey back to the church. I fell off because the donkey got scared from some dogs fighting and started running up the hill. It was only a 3.5 foot donkey so I was fine.

Day 4:
Back to Quito. We took a bunch of buses and trollies around the city from churches to parks, to schools. We got a little lost, but found our way with a taxi driver, people on the street giving us directions, etc. We had to make our way to the CMA guest house and count every single step. 108. Then we had to get back home to Casa Blanca. Home sweet home. I went from 2nd to 5th place that day. Bummer. I learned a lot more about getting around Ecuador at least.

On Saturday we went to Papallacta to relax after a crazy week. Papallacta is famous for it's hot springs. Soooo goood!

Yesterday we had our own church service. It was pretty cool. We sang some songs and shared Scripture. We had to move out of Casa Blanca for the week because a short term team was moving in. Last night 9 Inca Link interns left for Peru. They have a 28ish hour bus ride. Pray for them! So right now the 4 of us Ecuadorian interns are at Mark & Cheryl's (Inca Link leaders). Today we'll be talking about our strenghts, spiritual gifts, and testimonies.



Tomorrow Lisa is going to live with an Otavaleno family for 10 days. I'm excited for her because the indigenous culture is so fascinating and she'll get to learn more Spanish.

Also tomorrow Cassidy, Marisa and I will be going with Mark to some jungle communities near Lago Agrio until Thursday. We'll be sharing our testimonies and get to know the people there. They want me to play some guitar, which is exciting, but I'm kinda nervous because I've only ever played for my friends.

Please continue to pray for us as we follow God into the jungle!