Zimbabwe

Tamie and I spent the last week of June and the first week of July on different continents. I took a group of just graduated high school seniors to Zimbabwe. Tamie went with her handbell choir to Estonia. Very weird to be out of the country at the same time. (Just for the record, the Estonia bunch had five (5) injuries, the Zimbabwe group zero(0), which goes to show you the importance of good leadership!)
The McCarleys drove us to Houston to catch our first flight, Houston to Atlanta. Short layover in Atlanta and it was nonstop to Johannesburg, South Africa. Fifteen (15) hours of endless excitement, NOT. We stayed over night at some IMB guest apartments not far from the airport. We had dinner at The Boma. Great first dinner in Africa, because it was a huge buffet of local food. We had Kudu, Warthog, crocodile, and, not best of all, MOPANI WORMS. Not everyone bit the bullet (worm), but Jake, Ashley McCarley, Alyssa Eskelsen, RaisinMan and I toughed one out. The look on RasinMan's face says it all.
The next day we flew to Bulawayo, Zimbabwe. We were picked up at the airport by Duncan and Tatyiana Pitts, missionaries to Zimbabwe. We were scheduled to stay in a "travelers lodge" called Youngways. Due to some confusion about payment, we ended up staying with the Pitts in their house. The guys took the living room and the girls had the extra bedroom. My position as team leader got me a bed in Duncan's computer repair/third bedroom. As a result, we really got to know the Pitts much better. Tatyiana cooked wonderful meals for us and we did our part by taking care of the dishes, and helping with preparation.
The first morning, we were up at 6:30 a.m. We had our first appearance of the trip at Petra Secondary School at 7:30 a.m. Bryce and Carrie did a great job sharing the idea of True Love Waits. Bryce did a neat demonstration using duct tape. Afterwards, we had tea/coffee with the Headmaster. We came back to the school at 2:00 p.m. for a varsity boys field hockey game against the CBC Falcons, Petra's local rivals. Since none of us had ever seen a field hockey game, it took a bit to figure out the rules, which are similar to soccer. (Only with sticks and a smaller ball.) Unfortunately for our new friends, Petra lost 0-4.













We had a great week in Bulawayo. Some of our activities include visiting the hope of Pastor Mark and his wife, Dorcas. They have adopted nine (9) HIV orphans, with another one likely in the near future. We went with Gloria and Florence to a home where a dozen boys lived who had been rescued from a life on the streets. We heard several of their stories and they were all heart wrenching. I remember one said he was living with his mother and step-dad. His mother went to Mozambique and never came back. He has no idea what happened to her. His step-dad abused him and he ran away. He came for a free meal at Bulawayo Baptist Church and met one of the other boys. As a result, he ended up being invited to stay at the home.
Florence and Gloria also took us to a squatter's town where they feed children every Monday. We helped with the kids and Duncan had the opportunity to share Christ with the group of adults who showed up with the kids. As a result, about 8-10 people came forward. Duncan was already working on plans to continue with their discipleship on the ride home. I spent most of my time with the group working with the kids. That is until two drunk guys showed up. I spent about 30 minutes talking and sharing with them. Their names are Edanna and Stephen. They asked me to pray for them, that they would lose their desire to always drink beer. I'm still praying for them and would appreciate your help in that regard.
Florence and Gloria also took us for a walk through the village. We met some of the people they are trying to help. They showed us the water hole where the community gets its drinking water. It's a small puddle that is filled from a hole in a water line that passes nearby. Periodically, the government patches the hole and then the men come and make a new hole.
One day we worked for the soup kitchen at Bulawayo Baptist. Didn't take an official count, but would estimate they fed about 150 people.
On Sunday we went to both services. The first was an older crowd. They asked the group to sing for them and that went over pretty well. Mostly because I didn't join in! In the second service, the group got up and led a song. Jake had the guitar and Alyssa was on the drums. We picked a song that they already knew and that was a hit, too. That night we came back for the youth service. Lots of fun and more great music. During the activity time, we taught them how to play crab soccer. The kids all took to that game with great enthusiasm! After the service we were invited to watch the USA play Brazil in the Confederate Cup Finals. The game was played in South Africa, which is just to the south of Zim. I video taped some of the cheers, and you can find it at the bottom. They were shocked when we were ahead 2-0 at halftime, but happy when the final score was 3-2 to Brazil.
I would have to write a book to describe everything we saw. Pray for the people of Zimbabwe. They are an amazing people facing incredible hardships. The economy has improved slightly since their currency was abandoned in favor of dollars and rands, but they know it could turn bad again in an instant. Combine all of our heart disease, diabetes and every kind of cancer together and multiply it by 10, it still doesn't come close to the devastation Aids has caused. Parts of Africa have started to show the benefits of the True Love Waits message, pray that it would catch on in Zimbabwe. Gloria said 80% of the people in the squatters' village were HIV positive. She was including the children.

Backpacking in 2009

Well, where should I start? How about at the beginning...

In the beginning there were six Compass staff girls all planning a backpacking trip through the Colorado wilderness. The plan was to leave on Wednesday, July 8, and return four days later. These girls planned ahead, shopped for appropriate necessities (including food, fuel and iodine), and planned a basic route for the trip. The Compass boys had recently completed a backpacking expedition the week before, during which they ran out of fuel, ran out of iodine, and were forced to return a full twenty-four hours earlier than planned. The girls, being more intelligent and generally superior, did not want to repeat the mistakes of the boys, and so decided to equip themselves for success.

The morning of departure, the girls all woke up, gathered their things, packed their bags, and got in the cars to be dropped off. The drop off location was about forty-five minutes back on an old jeep trail to Hotel Draw. The adventure started off seamlessly, as the group started off hiking down the Colorado Trail. The first day started with a climb up to the saddle of Blackhawk Peak. In the spirit of adventure, the brave and fearless women walked up Blackhawk Peak to reach the summit by about 3:00 on the first day. Without even the use of a trail to aid them in their travel to the summit, the girls completely dominated the twelve-thousand-plus foot mountain. Having already exceeded their goals for the day, they hiked down the other side of the saddle to make their first camp in a grove of trees in a picturesque valley. Here they set up camp and enjoyed a delicious meal of macaroni and cheese, followed by an early bedtime at about 8:30.


The next morning, the hardcore women woke up and broke camp in order to depart at about 8:00. Doubtless, the men of Compass Wilderness were still asleep at this time, dreaming of pancakes and other equally manly things. The second day, of course, went just as well as the previous one. The girls had considered another summit, this one to the top of Hermosa Peak, but upon actual inspection of this peak, they realized that it would not be possible, as it would be a dangerous endeavor. Thus, the girls continued down the Colorado Trail to another mountain, named Flat Top Mountain (which the girls discovered to be deceitfully named, as the approach was better characterized by it's rolling structure). After dropping their packs at the base of the lowest sub peak of Flat Top, the girls began an attempt to summit the mountain. An hour and a half later, they had yet to reach the official summit, but decided that they better start back down so that they could continue on to the day's campsite. Before turning to head back to the base of the peaks, however, someone (me) decided that the peak should have more accurately named "Fat Lady's Rolls Mountain". The hardcore mountain women returned tiredly to their packs and continued upon their way. Exhausted, they arrived at that night's campsite in time to pitch the tarps and start on dinner preparations. They quickly discovered though, that the location of the campsite, near Celebration Lake, also meant staying at the home of the world's largest and hungriest mosquito population.


One billion mosquito bites and a couple of insanity checks later, the brave (and now mosquito-bite-covered) women began their third day of exploration by starting off down the Colorado Trail. Knowing that the trail would depart from the main trail on which they started, the girls kept their eyes open for any trail signs off to the side. In this endeavor, however, they discovered that they had utterly failed when they arrived at the dead-end of the jeep trail after three hours of descent. A few of the girls seemed to consider mutiny, desertion, or both, upon discovering that they would have to turn around to face three grueling hours of ascent back up the exact same jeep trail they had just come down. However, they all gathered their spirits back up to start the return journey. They discovered the missed trail marker a mere ten minutes from where the trail had started that morning, meaning that they had hiked about 12 miles total off-trail!!


Not having many options at this point, the girls chose to start off down the correct trail, despite the six hour delay. After a short break to avoid being caught in a lightening storm above tree line, the girls reached the top of the saddle (a point that they most likely would have reached by 10:00 that morning, were it not for the detour). From this point, the exhausted girls continued down the trail, making sure that they did not miss the turn-off to the trail that would provide them with the shortest route home. The wilderness athletes made it down the trail in record time, arriving at the crossing of the hiking trail and the jeep trail in plenty of time to eat a quick dinner. At this point, the women knew that they had a decision to make...either find a flat area to pitch their tarp for the final night of camping, or barrel on through the wilderness to return home a day early. Although some discussion preceded their decision, they knew what must be done. Their determined minds far outweighed the influence of their exhausted bodies, and thus they started the journey home. The evening stretched before them as they hiked toward their final route down Cascade Creek Trail (a welcome and yet depressing end to their journey due to its lack of novelty for the majority of the group). As evening approached and dusk fell upon the travelers, they recalled the unnerving possibility that, as a group, they could appear as a tasty appetizer to the bears that would likely also be frequenting the woods as the skies began to darken. And this is how the singing session began. For the remainder of the evening hike (which was a new experience for the majority of the group), the girls belted out song after song as the hiked down the Cascade Creek Trail toward the inviting arms of their home at Cascade Village. The musical numbers included everything from hymns and praise songs to old classics like "It's Raining Men" and "There's a Hole in My Bucket". Just as the Compass women finished the final verse of the "Hokie Pokie", they rounded the corner to see the glorious water towers that each individual recognized as marking the top of the final descent in the three days of hiking.

Thus, after a traumatizing twelve and half hour hiking day, the six mountaineering women arrived at the condo at 9:30 pm to great applause and boisterous cheering from the Compass men. (Well, maybe it was more like surprise and confusion from the boys) For the six brave women however, their exhausted and tired state led them to a state of complete euphoria upon stepping through the condo door, which led to a fit of giggling and laughter (as it often does with girls).


And this is how the tale of "The Great Backpacking Adventures of the Compass Mountain Women" ended. There are many details and fragments of the story that the world may never fully understand, but one thing is certain...in the summer of two-thousand and nine, the six women of Compass Wilderness dominated and tamed the Southern Colorado Wilderness with nothing but the clothes on their backs and the gear in their packs.

Starting a new Summer!

Well, here I am in Durango once again! This is my third summer to work with Compass Wilderness, and it has been fantastic thus far. It is so nice to escape from the heat and humidity of the Texas summer, although it's always a little sad to leave friends and family behind for a couple months. We just finished up with our second group of campers on Friday, and a new group arrives on Monday afternoon. The last group was a camping group, which was fun even though it's still pretty cool up here at night. We'll be in the condos for this week, and I am glad to escape the mosquito problems that we faced with the camping group last week in Chris Park.

This summer we are trying something new as a staff, which I am still not sure that I like all the time... Lance decided that we would have "optional" staff workouts this summer ('optional' meaning that you don't HAVE to participate, but that you will likely face peer pressure and ridicule if you decide to opt out). It has been fun though to see some improvement already, even though we've only had about two weeks total of workouts. The program that we follow is called CrossFit, and each day there is a new workout posted online called the WOD or Workout of the Day. The program is designed to be an overall cardio workout, which means a lot of timed workouts and a lot of repetitions! Anyways, it is exhausting, but usually rewarding and even kind of fun. This is a picture of Hannah and I hanging in the doorway after a WOD during the first week when we had to do 100 total pull-ups!!!


I don't have a picture yet with all of the staff members this year, but it is a really great group!
The girls include: Hannah (20 yrs old, junior at Missouri St), Samantha/Sam (21 yrs old, senior at Baylor) and Emily (20 yrs old, junior at Abilene Christian).
The boys are: Justin (22 yrs old, just graduated from Baylor), Brian (22 yrs old, graduating from Baylor in December) and Will (21 yrs old).
Of course we always have our fearless leaders as well: Lance and Courtney (and their two boys Nash and Beck).

Anyways, I am really looking forward to the rest of the summer, and I will be sure to write again and tell of all the wonderful ways that God is using our ministry.

God Bless!
--Alyssa