Boat Ride and Tree Top Walk

Tuesday morning right after breakfast, we headed to the port of Puerto Maldonado to board a small motorized canoe for a trip down the river to a research center. Along the way, we saw egrets, turtles, alligators, gold dredges, and lots of butterflies. After about an 1 ½ hours, we stopped at the Ecological Reserve Taricaya. There we got to see several kinds of monkeys, parrots, mawcaws, parakeets, owl, otter, jaguar, and ocelot. We took a jungle walk where our guide explained different plants and trees, and how many were used by the indigenous people. The exciting part was a 42 meters high (137’) by 90 meters long (295’) tree top canopy walkway. It was great to look out over the jungle from the vantage point of a bird. It really gives you a different perspective. After a short lunch at the reserve center, we got back into the boat for the ride home. Along the way, we detoured along a side tributary and stopped to fish for a while. We got some bites, but nobody landed a fish. We did get to see a couple of alligators though. We arrived back to Puerto Maldonado just as the sun set and darkness settled along the river. What a great day.

Festival de Ninos

As some of the first impact work in Puerto Maldonado, we held a “Festival de Ninos”, where we enjoyed parachute games, crafts, snacks, songs, bible verses and puppets. They continued to enjoy the parachute games, crafts, snacks, and most of all the puppets. We had between 60-70 children there on Thursday, Friday and Saturday afternoon. Saturday was the last day and Pastor Freddy gave the salvation message using the salvation bracelet made during craft time. At the end, 33 children asked to receive Christ as their savior. Praise God.

Baby Dedication

You just never know what you will be asked to do when you’re on the mission field. Denise, Dawn and I went to church on Sunday night a few weeks ago. When I got there, a lady was there that wanted her children dedicated. Pastor asked me if I would dedicated these two children. My first reaction was, no way…I have never done it in English, let alone in Spanish. But I was reminded that I was a missionary, and a great honor was being asked of me. So with Dawn as a translator, I thanked them, told them I was humbled and honored for this privilege. Denise read from Luke, chapter 2 about Joseph and Mary taking Jesus to Jerusalem to be presented to the Lord. I then said a few words to the mother and the congregations about raising the children to know and love Christ. Then a short prayed asking God to watch over these children and to use them for his purpose and for his kingdom. You just never know what is going to happen next.

On to Puerto Maldonado

We will soon be working in Puerto Maldonado, a jungle city located on the Rio Madre de Dios, a tributary of the Amazon River. There are about 50,000 in Puerto Maldonado, but it is a small remote city. In some ways, it reminds us of the YK delta in SW Alaska. Dennis spent a week there in late August/early September coordinating the re-start of our building project there. We are building a 2-story missionary house. The first floor will be for the 40/40 Support family, and the second level will be for the eight 40/40 missionaries that will be working on church plants in and around Puerto Maldonado. We have 2 teams coming, one the end of September and one the end of October to work on the building and do community impact to jump start the church planting. Dennis will be leaving soon to live there for 7 weeks until the project is completed. Denise will come to Puerto Maldonado during the 2 work teams, so Dennis will not be alone the entire time. The 40/40's arrive November 3rd, expecting to move in, so there is lots of work to do to get the building liveable.

Rafting the Rio Chili

We decided to do something fun after all the volunteers left. We took a short rafting trip just outside of Arequipa on the Rio Chili. Not big water, but there were some Class II/III rapids, with one Class IV. We had a great time. Denise said it was better than any ride at Disneyland. It was hard to believe that we were in the middle of dry dessert country because everything was so green around the river. If anyone comes down to visit, this will be a must do adventure. We want to go again.

25th Anniversary

On August 18th, Denise and I celebrated our 25th wedding anniversary. The team had a tour day, so we spent the afternoon walking around the Plaza de Armas, showing the group good places to go buy souvenirs, get good eats, or a good cup of coffee. After we loaded them on the bus for the evening, we stopped into a small café and had a great pizza cooked in a wood fired oven. Then a short taxi ride home and fall into bed exhausted. For our anniversary present, there was no silver or jewelry involved. We are both too practical this year….we decided to buy a new mattress for the bed, because the one furnished with the apartment must be 10-15 years old and is killing our backs. Besides, we took each other to Peru this year

Dedication Day

Sunday was a special day for Extreme and the Zamacola church. There were about 500 people in attendance for the dedication of the Larry and Addie Garmin Missionary Training Center, 40/40 housing, and Zamacola Church. About 300 of those were from outside the church, having been invited at one of our impact events during the last week. Each local church was asked to perform a special for the event. Denise and I were part of a dance group from Alto Libertad Church and performed a traditional Peruvian dance. (I was told to not quite my day job). It was a great celebration and there were people hanging out the windows, standing on the sidewalk looking in, and a standing room crowd. What a great way to jump start a church planting movement.