A wild kind of week

Yes, it’s sort of been on of those weeks. But then, they’re not too uncommon here.

For one thing, our group of guests wrapped up their final few days here. This meant doing the farewell rounds, packing the campsite up and clearing our veranda of boxes of donated stuff for the time when we’d be gone (for security purposes), then hitting the road for a night each in Gorongosa National Park then Beira.

As we entered Gorongosa, we hoped for some amazing wildlife sightings. And although we all generally hoped to see the same basic thing, the hopes of some our visitors differed somewhat from those of others. Some (ok, one) was excited by the very, very remote possibility that lions or elephants would attack the vehicle. (!) And another one still wanted desperately to see a snake before leaving for home.

I’m happy to say that we were not attacked by lions or elephants. I guess they just weren't in attack mode...

Pretty far from it actually.

They were the highlight. But there was other wildlife as well.

A blurry shot of a porcupine (sorry)

And a variety of buck and birds on the Gorongosa Plain.

Then there was the small stuff...

A nasty biting fly catches a ride on my window

A whole "herd" of ants. I don't know where they were going, but it sure seemed important that they get there all at the same time.

The next stop was Beira which was the team's departure point for their trip home. The flight was slated to leave at 7:30 a.m. Now, usually for international flights you're supposed to arrive at the airport at least 2 hours ahead of time, so we were up REAL early and arrived at the airport just after 5:00 a.m.

It was still dark outside. And very quiet. And...the airport was locked. We weren't about to go back to the hotel, and there were no other places open at that hour to grab a coffee, so we decided to just wait around until someone came and let us inside.

At 6:00 a.m. the man with the keys arrived. Yay!

Group shot of the Prairie team plus Matthew (who works at the mission). Pretty good looking bunch considering the hour!

Dwight and I are back home now and trying to catch up on some things before we head out on our next trip on Monday. I'm excited because on this next trip we'll be picking up the printed health manuals. These will be introduced to pastors and monitors at the upcoming intensive seminar at the end of the month.

And while we're gone, we'll be taking care of other business as well. Business like looking for a new washing machine part for "Old Faithful"--my 10+ year old washing machine which has served us well and washed clothes for many, many people. When Old Faithful started to sound like a Boeing 747 during the spin cycle, we knew something was wrong.

Marc, with the help of his sons, takes on the not-very-fun task of dismantling the machine to see what's ailing. (I am so very grateful for their work. Thanks again guys.)

(A very serious toolkit.)

And last, but certainly not least in terms of noteworthy events this past week, was the day we delivered this young man's crutches which Jeff had resized and newly engineered to actually fit him. It was smiles all around.