Colca Canyon Trekking

Very early Monday morning, 4am to be exact, we loaded a bus and headed to Colca Canyon, the second deepest canyon in the world. It is over 10,000 feet deep at the deepest part. We arrived in the little town of Cabanaconde and started hiking around 10am. After a long 4 hour hike down, down, down, 4,000 feet down into the canyon we arrived at a nice little hostel in San Juan. de Chucho. It was a quiet little pueblo where not much has changed in the last 200 years. Small terraced fields are worked by hand, irrigation water delivered in shallow channels, and cooking is done on a wood oven. Electricity arrived about 10 years ago, but is only used for lights (and a TV in the kitchen) J The next day we hiked down the canyon through 2 other small pueblos, and into the town of Sangalle, better known as the “Oasis”. It is a little island of palm trees and hostels fed by a natural warm spring coming out of the canyon wall. Our little hostel had a swimming pool and a nice lawn to relax on. There is no electricity yet, so dinner was by candle light. After a good nights rest, we got up at 4:30 am, so we could be on the trail by 0500 before the sun reached our part of the canyon. This time it was up, up, up, 4,000 feet up. We made it in just over 3 hours. After breakfast, we took a bus to Chivay and enjoyed a dip in the 104 degree hot springs to sooth the sore muscles. Ahhhhh, so nice.

Rock Climbing

Dan, Syndey, and I went rock climbing one afternoon. After about a 10 minute taxi ride and a short 5 minute walk, we arrived at a nice rock face just above the Chile River. The climbing guide set 3 ropes and courses for us. Dan impressed the climbing guide by making it up all 3 routes. They even took one rope down and let Dan lead climb to put it back up. This was new for Dan. Sydney and I didn’t quite make it up to the top, but we had a lot of fun truing. Our hands and shoulders were a little sore the next day.

Life is a Beach!!

Mom and Dad Linnell, Daniel and his girlfriend Sydney, and Dawn all arrived in Arequipa on Monday, December 14th. We took a bus tour around the city on Tuesday. On Wednesday afternoon, we took off for the beach in Mejia. The people that run the language school let us use their beach house, which is just a couple of blocks off the beach. We took walks a couple of times a day, read books, caught up on sleep, played Frisbee, and chased sand crabs. The weather was hot and the water was cold. Everyone got a little sun burn. Came home Saturday afternoon to get ready for the next adventure.

Peruvian Wedding

The Alvarado family, our host family while we were in language school, invited us to the city of Tacna for their son’s wedding the weekend of December 5th. Again, we had the option of bus or plane. We wanted to try the bus since it was only a 6 hour trip each way. We actually enjoyed the ride, with movies, bingo, snacks, and lots of time to read. Denise got to yell BINGO, and won a free bus ride for a future trip. In Tacna, the family reserved space for us in Hotel Holiday Suites. We spent the day Saturday walking around the Tupoc market where you can find clothing and household items. Bargaining didn’t seem to be acceptable, but everything was pretty inexpensive, even by Peruvian standards. We happened to find a few Christmas gifts.

Saturday night we walked to the church for the wedding. Very traditional, catholic wedding...started an hour late. Andres and Karla were lovely. They had a madrino and padrino stand up with them as their sponsors. Then on to the reception. The wedding guests boarded a two story bus for the ride around town and on to the restaurant outside of the city, La Italiana. We arrived about 9:30 pm and had a few housdoerves, a few toasts, and finally a full dinner about midnight. After dinner, the dancing started and the real fun began. Denise and I and another north american couple decided to call it quits about 2am, and we hear the party lasted until 4am. Sunday morning was a little quiet and slow to rise. We sadly said goodbye and headed back to Arequipa after a fun filled weekend.

Happy Thanksgiving

Ahh, a few days off, so we decided to go to Lima and Spend Thanksgiving with Dawn. The choice was bus or plane. A 15 hour ride each way on the bus or 1 ½ hour flight up and back. We choose to fly. The first stop was a grocery – the cupboards were bare! Dawn asked for chicken enchiladas and pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving. Though a little burnt on the bottom (gas ovens are difficult here – just one setting is usually available – full blast) they were delicious. Dawn invited Itamar, the accountant in the office and one of her English students. Also Itamar’s son, Ismael, came to lunch with us. We ate our way through the rest of the visit, stuffed chicken, spaghetti, and a visit to a restaurant for sushi. One outing was to a local park for the magic fountain displays. In the eveing the lazer lights are just beautiful, a must for a visitor to the area. Dawn also had laser eye surgery on Friday and is now recovering nicely. We were also able to visit Dawn’s church which is an hour bus trip across Lima. It was a beautiful service with an amazingly talented group of musicians leading the worship. All too soon, we returned to Arequipa with a 6am flight (who booked that flight so early, anyways?!?) on Monday morning after Thanksgiving.

Puerto Maldonado Team 2

The song “Showers of Blessings” comes to mind as I am writing this update in the middle of a huge thunder and lighting storm here in Puerto Maldonado. The Puerto work project was showered with blessings right from the beginning when 30 people arrived on October 23 in Puerto Maldonado to complete the 40/40 house. These were some hard working folks. We worked non-stop for 10 days, putting in 10, 12, even 16 hours a day to get the building ready for the 40/40 missionaries to move in on November 3.

The house was a little behind schedule when the team arrived. The work site had been without power for 10 days when the team arrived. The stucco work inside was completed 1 day before the group arrived, but the topping floor slab on the second level was not. So we started putting primer on the walls of the first level, tile on the bathroom walls, and plywood ceiling on the trusses of the second level. The floor slab was completed the second day, so we quickly moved upstairs with the primer. A huge blessing was brought in the form of a Graco airless paint sprayer by a church in Idaho. I had not even asked for one, but the pastor there just felt like we could really use it. Boy was he right. Not only did they bring the paint sprayer, but they brought money to buy a generator to run it as well. We were still out of power, so I was able to buy a nice 120V/220V generator to power both the paint sprayer and our power tools. And the store I bought the generator at was owned by a Christian family, who sold me the generator for 33% off since it was for the church. I love it when you can see the hand of God at work.

After I painted the walls and ceilings, we were finally ready to start tiling. We installed tile on all the floors, 3 bathrooms, 2 laundry rooms, and 2 kitchen counter tops. That is a lot of tile cutting, setting, and grouting. A blessing that arrived with the Puerto 1 team was a small tile saw. Boy, did it ever get a work out. In fact, the motor froze up on it after the first floor. One prayer warrior of a lady prayed over it, I laid hands on it, took it all apart, cleaned it out, put it back together, and it worked the rest of the project without any trouble. Blessings come in many forms.

With just a few days to go before the 40/40’s, they completed the stucco on the outside the house. We painted the front of the house, installed to 40/40 sign, leveled and filled the yard, installed windows and front doors. In addition, we completed the block walls for the church, formed and poured the columns and bond beams, built and erected the trusses, and got most of the metal roof on in time for the building dedication. All told, we installed 1000 square feet of ceiling, 500 feet of batten strips, 51 feet of shelving, 16 windows, 2 doors, 2000 square feet of floor tile, 414 square feet of wall tile, 3 toilets, 5 sinks, 4 showers, connected the cistern, water tank, and control systems, 64 feet of metal handrail, 2 ceiling fans, 20 light fixtures, 38 electrical outlets, used 30 gallons of primer, 40 gallons of interior paint, 10 gallons exterior paint,, built 8 metal beds and frames, 1248 concrete blocks, 196 buckets of concrete, 6 trusses, and 200 sheets of metal roofing. There was about 2,970 hours of labor donated during the project, and no major injuries. I was blessed with a great work team.

After a boat trip in the morning and a restful afternoon at a park, the church and house was dedicated on the evening of November 3rd. It was exciting to see over 120 people at the dedication and watch the 40/40’s go explore their new house. I will stay another week completing little things around the place, and will head back to Arequipa on November 15th. I can’t wait to see how God uses this church and the 40/40’s as they begin the church planting process here in Puerto Maldonado.

First Work Team Leaves Puerto Maldonado

After 8 days of hard work, we had completed the second story walls, roof, and 3 sides of the outside security wall. We dug 7 footings for columns, formed 150 feet of foundation wall, tied rebar for 300 feet of beams and 7 columns, carried and installed over 4000 concrete blocks, used 120 bags of cement and hauled an estimated 1,080 buckets of concrete, built 4 roof trusses, installed 120 sheets of metal roofing, and roughed in the main electrical panel and 25 electrical outlets. Many great friendships were formed between both the American team members and the Peruvian team members. Praise God for these men and their willingness to come use their construction skills here in Peru.