In Cambodia and Ethiopia our team talked about our adventures in Central America. We didn’t do anything really big because we were all saving our money for Central America.
The week after getting back from Masatepe, our first real adventure day we climbed Mombacho, a beautiful and massive volcano. I looked at it everyday from my hammock and it was such a cool reminder that nothing is impossible with Jesus. I saw that because it was the hardest hike of my life! We were hiking up a road but the incline was 90 degrees (I don’t know that for a fact but it sure felt like it!!). It was about a 2-3 hour hike up with that incline all the way up. It was so hard but it was so worth it! While hiking up Mombacho I never once thought of quitting, I stopped a lot but never once did I think, “I’m done, I’m turning around and heading back down this mountain”. No, I took it literally one step at a time and there was pain, sometimes a lot of pain but I knew it was temporary. As soon as I got to the top the pain would stop and I would have hiked a volcano! Hiking that volcano reminded me a lot of what it looks like to follow Jesus. Never once have I decided to undo my decision even during the roughest moments because I know He is the Way the Truth and Light (what scripture is this?). I know that no matter how hard it gets it will be better one day. Faith is not about our emotions, our immediate feelings that either make us happy or sad it’s about the truth, the promise.
Reaching the top of that volcano and literally tears falling down my face at how beautiful the view was. Sometimes it can be hard to see perspective when something bad happens. For example we watched Soul Surfer as a squad a couple of weeks ago and this poor girl gets her arm bitten off by a shark. She’s trying to get perspective on why God would let this happen to her but she was so focused on her immediate pain of feeling like she would never get to serf again that she didn’t see that in the end she got to go on a mission trip to Thailand and help people remember how much they loved to serf even after a huge wave (what’s the word) had killed so many. No one else it was her. That is faith.
Hiking Mombacho was Monday and on Thursday our ministry hosts let us go to the Laguna with the first team that was with us. The Laguna is this beautiful Crator on top of a mountain that is filled with beautiful blue water. Most of our squad went and we had so much fun playing king of the dock (girls won!). It was such a special treat since it was a technical ministry day. That speaks a little more into who Scott is, more about love than the rules. It meant a LOT to non-PVTers because the squad got to go with their parents but we hadn’t been yet so it gave us an opportunity to go too!
That next Monday was the coolest thing I’ve done on the race. Volcano sledding!!! We hiked up a volcano (nothing like Mombacho!!), put on huge, orange jumpsuits, grabbed our boards and went sledding down the side of a volcano.
The next Monday we got up at 4am and took public transportation all the way to the Pacific coast of Nicaragua! God gave me such a bigger appreciation for all these people who had to take the bus this early and this crowded every single day. I got car sick for maybe the third time in life and spent most of my time trying not to puke. Luckily, I didn’t and thank the Lord for that because it was a straight up chicken bus, I could not move so throwing up would have looked a lot like in my lap.
When we got to (what was the name again) the beach was completely empty and this little cove had so many beautiful boats. I thought I was in Greece for a second. It was so beautiful! This was a really special day because it was just our team, team grafted & Luis!
It actually started by talking to some of the guys on my squad because they were raving about their Luis adventures.
For anyone who doesn’t know, Luis is the squad leader to both my team and the guys team. Every month the men on my squad are given money to go on a men’s weekend where they can be by themselves and away from the 42 girls they live with haha! The girls equally love it because we get to have girls night and have a quiet home to relax.
So, being the 7th month of the race, the guys have experienced some SUPER cool adventures with Luis and they were the ones who encouraged us to plan an adventure day with him. That was this day.
It was so much fun!! We were literal fish in the water all day, swimming and playing. I brought a volleyball and we got to play some water ball. Swam out to some boats and did some jumps. It was awesome!!
Got some great food, walked around, chilled. It was such a great, relaxing day with my immediate family. ??
For our last adventure day in Nicaragua I went with a small group to Paradiso which is a hostel on the same Laguna as the first time with the other team. This one was a lot nicer, had floaties and REALLY good WiFi. Not having good WiFi has been hard because I have such a long list of things to do to blogs, to phone calls, to applying to jobs and downloading photos (not having space on your phone is such a World Race regular). It was a much needed WiFi and water day. Just relaxing and hanging out.
I love that we get adventure days. A time to experience the country were in and the fun things it has to offer. A time to have fun and a break from ministry hours. To hang out with teammates and squadmates. A day we can get things done if we need to and separate from our sabbath which is only for the Lord. Nicaragua was a great country and I’m so happy we got to do touristy things and local things while being emersed in the country!
(Downloading photos onto my actual blog is very time consuming and I don’t have enough WiFi access to be able to have all the photos on my blog but check out my Facebook for lots of photos of not only adventure days but the whole race)
Thank you for reading, have a great day!
