4/28/2012
We had a great time on our first full day in Nairobi. Most everybody got at least a couple of fitful hours of sleep between around 1am and needing to be up by around 5:30 in order to breakfast and be ready to leave for the Nairobi National Park on the outskirts of town early enough to see the nocturnal animals coming in from a night of hunting. We had three matatus (14 passenger vans), with popup tops to take our group out, so everyone got a chance at great pictures with no obstructions. We got a very early surprise when we came around a bend and saw 4 or 5 vehicles all facing us stopped in the middle of the road. There was a pride of lions coming towards us from the other vehicles, including a female, her cubs and the first male lion I have seen outside of a zoo. I am writing this post on an Android tablet and need to take some time tomorrow evening to begin to upload pictures of our experiences. Every minute has been full today and I hope to have a little more time tomorrow after church, setting up the clinic and shopping for our supplies for the week. After the lions, anything else was a bonus. We saw lots of giraffes, water buffalo, gazelles, zebras, baboons, many species of birds and near the end of the day we spotted a large rhino on the side of a big hill. We were the third van to approach the area and as we came down the hill, we noticed that the lead van was stuck up to its front axles in the mud, due to recent heavy rains. Our van was the only four wheel drive vehicle of the bunch, so we drove down to try to rescue our sister van. We also got horribly stuck. We were able to get out of our van and the men pushed and jockied it back away from trouble. Most of us ended up with mud all over us and our shoes completely caked in mud. I knew I had some good material for the blog and Pastor Preece said there were maybe 10 sermons contained in the event as well. We eventually were able to hook two tow straps together and with a lot of mighty pushing from the guys and the towing power our vehicle, we were able to free both vans and drive them to the top of the hill. Both sets of passengers had to hike up the wet and muddy road to get back to our transport. No one was hurt and yes, we did get some good pictures of the rhino!
After the safari, we had a wonderful outdoor lunch at The Veranda Restaurant and many in the group bought nice souvenirs at the gift shops there. We finished the day with a beautiful worship service at our compound for all of the teams, with music being provided by a choir from Springs of Life Lutheran Church, where we will be conducting our vision clinic. Bishop-elect Bakari Kea gave a wonderful sermon on what it means to be missionaries and we concluded with more choir music, prayers and an acapella rendition by the whole Kenya mission team of "Crown Him Lord of All".
It's now 10:30 Nairobi time and I need to hit the sack, since Lupe will be preparing early morning breakfast tacos for all the teams, including those heading out into the mission field very early.He is just finishing with our chefs on the initial preparation and will resume at 4am. Everyone loves it when Lupe comes on a mission trip!
We had a great time on our first full day in Nairobi. Most everybody got at least a couple of fitful hours of sleep between around 1am and needing to be up by around 5:30 in order to breakfast and be ready to leave for the Nairobi National Park on the outskirts of town early enough to see the nocturnal animals coming in from a night of hunting. We had three matatus (14 passenger vans), with popup tops to take our group out, so everyone got a chance at great pictures with no obstructions. We got a very early surprise when we came around a bend and saw 4 or 5 vehicles all facing us stopped in the middle of the road. There was a pride of lions coming towards us from the other vehicles, including a female, her cubs and the first male lion I have seen outside of a zoo. I am writing this post on an Android tablet and need to take some time tomorrow evening to begin to upload pictures of our experiences. Every minute has been full today and I hope to have a little more time tomorrow after church, setting up the clinic and shopping for our supplies for the week. After the lions, anything else was a bonus. We saw lots of giraffes, water buffalo, gazelles, zebras, baboons, many species of birds and near the end of the day we spotted a large rhino on the side of a big hill. We were the third van to approach the area and as we came down the hill, we noticed that the lead van was stuck up to its front axles in the mud, due to recent heavy rains. Our van was the only four wheel drive vehicle of the bunch, so we drove down to try to rescue our sister van. We also got horribly stuck. We were able to get out of our van and the men pushed and jockied it back away from trouble. Most of us ended up with mud all over us and our shoes completely caked in mud. I knew I had some good material for the blog and Pastor Preece said there were maybe 10 sermons contained in the event as well. We eventually were able to hook two tow straps together and with a lot of mighty pushing from the guys and the towing power our vehicle, we were able to free both vans and drive them to the top of the hill. Both sets of passengers had to hike up the wet and muddy road to get back to our transport. No one was hurt and yes, we did get some good pictures of the rhino!
After the safari, we had a wonderful outdoor lunch at The Veranda Restaurant and many in the group bought nice souvenirs at the gift shops there. We finished the day with a beautiful worship service at our compound for all of the teams, with music being provided by a choir from Springs of Life Lutheran Church, where we will be conducting our vision clinic. Bishop-elect Bakari Kea gave a wonderful sermon on what it means to be missionaries and we concluded with more choir music, prayers and an acapella rendition by the whole Kenya mission team of "Crown Him Lord of All".
It's now 10:30 Nairobi time and I need to hit the sack, since Lupe will be preparing early morning breakfast tacos for all the teams, including those heading out into the mission field very early.He is just finishing with our chefs on the initial preparation and will resume at 4am. Everyone loves it when Lupe comes on a mission trip!
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