Hey all April here,
Here is just a short note to let you all know that I am home in Canada. I left New Zealand on Feb 20th and as well arrived in Saskatoon on the 20th. I have been in contact with Denver sho was my school leader back in New Zealand, and everyone who is associated with YWAM is safe and has been contacted by the base. Please keep Christchurch and all the people in New Zealand in your prayers.
God Bless
April
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Sunday, January 16, 2011
April survived, but Camera did not….
Hey All,
Well here I am writing again, so that obviously means I survived the Abel Tasman… barely. The Abel Tasman was filled with beautiful jungle and beaches, awesome campsites each with toilets, and amazing views that can only be taken in by ones own eyes… and yes we always learn lessons through these experiences… mine was… April likes hiking, for a few hours…. but not for 4 freaking days! But I survived, it was a journey and a great growing experience, I learned that for four days i could have survived with only 2 t-shirts and a pair of shorts and I would have been set; I learned that there is no need for extra clothing because if you'll most likely be sweating enough while your hiking that there isn't going to be a chance to actually wear a sweater; and I also learned not to take advice from people you pass by because they'll only get your hopes up because they have no idea what they are talking about…. "Oh you're going to Watering Cove? Well its flat then down hill from there…" 20 minutes later… April "They freaking lied!!! Oh all down hill eh?! Well now I'm climbing a freaking mountain! I feel like going back and telling them that they are terrible people and ask them if they know where liars go!" However Katie was there to save the day and reminded me that I'd only have to climb the steep hill again… So I let it go… This time. On day three Katie and I took a water taxi from Bark Bay to Awaroa Beach. We had to take the taxi because my ankle wasn't holding up to well and had become more swollen that it already was to begin with. The water taxi was great fun! We went really fast over big ocean waves, and then they took us quietly to Tonga Island which was in the middle of the marine reserve and we got to see a colony of seals and baby seal pups!!! They were adorable! The last of the four days was an easy 2 hour hike, but we decided half way to stay at a beach and go for a swim. When we did finish the plan was to hitch hike back in groups to Takaka… Well there we were walking up a mountain getting passed by vehicle after vehicle… I was always told that hitch hiking in New Zealand was so easy, well not so much for me. I made up for the loss of Kms from the third day when Katie and I took the water taxi by that hitch hiking experience. I think we walked for over 3 hours. Not too sure though. We were very tired and you can probably guess what kind of mood I was in. On the bright side we did eventually get picked up and made it back to Takaka in time for some dinner, and I can say I finished the Abel Tasman.
Side Story.
The Life of my Canon Camera.
My Camera has lived a good long life of 7 years, living through many events some tragic some not so much. He has survived being dropped many of times on the pavement of Forest Grove Community Church parking lot while taking pictures during the days of Youth Group. He has seen many Christmas's and Birthdays, as well as many family vacations. He has gone to Nicaragua on a Missions Trip, held in the hand of many orphan children, and fallen on to, only to have his lends bent 45 degrees downward, then snapped back the opposite way to be put back in place. And still he lived on. He's been flung, and tossed, from one accident to another and yet he chose to keep pressing on. When his life came to an end he did it in a heroic way. I was climbing a bolder that was on the shore of a beautiful ocean of Water Cove, when he jumped out from the pocket of my shorts landing on the bolder then plunging into the ocean. In great remorse I leaped into the ocean after him, picked him up with caring gentle hands and knew the day had finally come. I opened him up and took out his memory card, which was all that could be saved. Here ends the days of my Amazing Cannon Camera, who will never be forgotten.
Back on track…
We are not at Hang Dog campsite where all the hippies and climbers come from all over the world. It is a very chill and friendly atmosphere, right by some of the greatest spots in all of New Zealand for climbing, and by a riving with spots to jump from and a rope to swing off of. Joanna and Nate (friends from base) came up here for a few days to hang out and visit us! It was so awesome to see some familiar faces and talk with again. We've done quite a bit of climbing, I've learned how to belay for lead climbing, and how to lead climb!!It was really awesome!! The weather while being here has been the same as the Abel which has been absolutely beautiful, sunny skies and lots of heat! (Yes mom i have been wearing my sunscreen) There are lots of friendly people here, and we are excited to see what God has in store for us, especially in this new age atmosphere.
Side Story 2.
Many of you know that recently I've taken a big interest in a activity called slacklining. If you don't know what it is, look it up on youtube, it'll take too long to explain. Anyways, since I first heard about Hang Dog, there was one thing that I greatly look forward to and that was Slacklining over water! Yup let me describe this scene for you, two cliffs with a slack line between at about 6 to 8ft above the deep river flowing underneath, concluded with a hot sun blazing down making it feel like 25C. When we first got here (Hang Dog) the slackline wasn't up, and i was greatly disappointed thinking my dreams would never come true, but here on our 4th day the did. Now some of you may think that since I am able to walk back and forth on a slackline above ground no problem that it'd be the same as over top of the river, well not so much. Over water it's like learning the sport all over again… so there I was trying again and again just to be able to leave the edge and take a few steps. Unfortunately I learn to fall over and over again, and I soon learned that falling sometimes includes some pain… and in my case… a good dose of pain. I had decided that since I am able to stand up from a kneeling position over ground that I should be able to do that to get up on to the line. Well I succeeded getting up, however my feet were still wet from the fall before and my feet slipped from underneath me… Unfortunately I fell on to the line with it going in between my legs; then scared of doing a face plant onto it, i grabbed the line and braced it against my chest so that my face was protected (very fortunate), then my feet and legs flipped over my head; and then finally I let go. So today I face massive bruises all along the inside of my legs, which are quite tender when wearing a harness for rock climbing. Ohwell, no pain no game right?
The count down to Fiji has already begun… with less than a week left in New Zealand, we are getting super amped about beginning ministry in Fiji! Oh, by the way, I have do have a tan, and I am starting to tan on my legs! Boo Yeah! And all y'all thought it'd never happen, but it has!!! So going to Fiji is only going to add to my beautiful skin colour hahaha! We are going to spend our First week in Suva doing traditional ministry, how that is going to look, we are not sure yet, but I'll let you know as soon as I know. The next week, we will be traveling through the Yasawa Islands, jumping from island to island as most backpackers do in Fiji. The last week in Fiji will be geared towards backpackers in Pacific Harbour/ doing debrief at Mango Bay. Then after that we will be flying back to New Zealand for one last week with the entire family for school debrief.
Outreach is only half over, but it feels like everything is coming close to an end, please be praying for us as we head out on a new part of our journey, and as well for prepairing our hearts as it all comes to an end. See you all soon!!
Much Love and Blessings,
April
ps. Mom Ill call you before i leave for Fiji (22nd)
Thursday, January 6, 2011
Golden Rays at Golden Bay
Hey All, April here.
Right now I am slightly irritated because the internet that I am currently using keeps on failing... so I'm actually typing this on a word document and then gunna copy and paste it to the blog when the connection works. Unfortunately I was talking to my good friend Wyatt at the same time and now I abruptly left because of this internet. Oh the life of Outreach and expensive crappy internet.
Alrighty, well we are in Takaka (Super sunny!!) which is at the top of the south island, and this area (Golden Bay) will be be our home for the next few weeks. On the 8th we are starting our 4 day track across the Abel Tasman, which is one of the Great Walks in New Zealand. Apparently it's one of the most popular, and it has a marine wildlife reserve on it so it is possible I'll be able to see Penguins in New Zealand... there should be dolphins and seals there as well. The Track is a easy walk mostly along the coast. Unfortunately for myself doing the track might not be possible. I can't remember if I mentioned this in my previous blogs but I pulled a ligament in my ankle just over a month ago, well the ankle is still swollen and to make things worse I stepped on it wrong 4 days ago and it is quite sore again. Unfortunate! So we will see how it goes when we get there; I will do the best I can, and when my ankle has had enough I'll most likely hop a ride with a water taxi to the next campsite. On the bright side however, I am super excited to get going on the track! I can't wait to see what God has in store!! I did the bookings for campsites for on the track and most of them are quite full which equals lots of people!!! Yi Yeah!! or in Kristoffer's words “Yee Haw!” Bring on the opportunity! Should be great!
Some of you may want to ask me “April how are you doing?” and I would answer “Oh, _(insert your name here)__, I'm doing splendid.” Outreach isn't at all what I expected it to be... Well it is and it isn't. I called my mom last week when I was having a rough time and she told me to let go of all of my expectations because that's what is holding me back. I had this unfortunate out of proportion view of what Outreach was going to be for myself, and it has been a struggle to get my mind around it. God has been growing me and stretching me so much through this season, and as much as I think I can't handle any more there is always something new. It has been hard... really hard, but at the same time it has been fantastic! I got asked the other day what I was thankful for, and really the only answer I had was that I was thankful for the struggles. Whaaa??? Yeah that's right I'm thankful for the struggles, I'm thankful for the weakness, I'm thankful that I have to be dependent on God in order to survive. It's through the struggles and weakness that we are stretched and grown, which deepens our relationship with him. Oh my lanta! This is so freaking awesome! We should rejoice through times of trial and hardship! Soooooooo yeah... this is how I am doing. Outreach is hard.... it's so freaking hard, it's a roller coaster of emotions, it's exhausting and draining, and sometimes I feel like just going home.... BUT all these things are normal... it's whether or not we dwell on them, or fight through them. Well all y'all know me so I'll let you answer that question on your own.
I have a month and a half pretty much until the time will come for me to return home, as much as some of you may be looking forward (or dreading) this time it will happen, and fortunately unfortunately I am looking forward but mostly dreading this time as well. I'm at the point where I'm use to missing you guys at home (as bad as it sounds), and am really missing my friends that are on their own outreaches.... it's hard. You become so tight with people in such an intense environment and time then you are separated.... then eventually will be brought back together then separated again and then you probably won't see most of them ever again. AHHHHH! So if any of you don't want to see an April that has lost complete control of her emotions then I advise you to not come to the Airport when I come home and to not see me for about the first... week... month... year... who knows... as long as it takes really. Anyways I've had enough of rambling on for one blog sesh so I'll catch ya on the flip flop and see you when this journey is coming to an end.
Oh and if you could keep me in your prayers that'd be super! Especially for my team, and for my ankle to heal. Awesome.
Much Love
April
Thursday, December 30, 2010
Hostel Hopping.
What'd Up!!!
So I'm in Wanaka right now, and its a much quieter town compared to Queenstown... in a sense. Its not as busy and loud as Queenstown but the youth in this town are quite loud. Apparently here in New Zealand Kiwi youth have been getting slightly outta hand and there have been a lot of problems and police ending up in hospitals... Unfortunately some hostels won't even accept people if the are younger Kiwis. Good thing we aren't Kiwis in this time of year... but still unfortunate because all hostels are full and we aren't overly sure where we'll be staying these next two nights.. We might just end up camping out somewhere which is always fun.
Tonight is New Years so we're going to see what New Years is like here in Wanaka, and then tomorrow we are most likely going to hike up a mountain and stay in a hut or a tent. We will be back in Wanaka for a few more days after that, and then we will be heading up the west coast.
It's crazy how fast time flies by. It's already day 15 of outreach and we are a quarter of the way done... it's crazy that we are already in Wanaka because it feels just that yesterday we were at base planning on where we would be heading and Wanaka seemed so far away. It's crazy that my mom sent me a package in the mail 2 weeks before i left for outreach and its still not here hahaha! It's crazy How I haven't seen my fam or my friends from home in 3 months, and that I haven't seen my friends that are in India, Thailand, and Australia in 2 weeks. Everything is going by so fast. I hate thinking that "April before you know it your gunna be hitting up the books... dang..." That's how life is though... Weird thing though, lately through this holiday season I've actually have been missing you all back at home. I find myself wondering what everyone is up to and such... and of course being like "dude, I really miss my dog."
Well there you go folks, a few random thoughts from me. I'll be posting up a team blog update in a few days so make sure you hit that up. Miss you all greatly and look forward to seeing you all in the new year!
Happy New Years!!
April
So I'm in Wanaka right now, and its a much quieter town compared to Queenstown... in a sense. Its not as busy and loud as Queenstown but the youth in this town are quite loud. Apparently here in New Zealand Kiwi youth have been getting slightly outta hand and there have been a lot of problems and police ending up in hospitals... Unfortunately some hostels won't even accept people if the are younger Kiwis. Good thing we aren't Kiwis in this time of year... but still unfortunate because all hostels are full and we aren't overly sure where we'll be staying these next two nights.. We might just end up camping out somewhere which is always fun.
Tonight is New Years so we're going to see what New Years is like here in Wanaka, and then tomorrow we are most likely going to hike up a mountain and stay in a hut or a tent. We will be back in Wanaka for a few more days after that, and then we will be heading up the west coast.
It's crazy how fast time flies by. It's already day 15 of outreach and we are a quarter of the way done... it's crazy that we are already in Wanaka because it feels just that yesterday we were at base planning on where we would be heading and Wanaka seemed so far away. It's crazy that my mom sent me a package in the mail 2 weeks before i left for outreach and its still not here hahaha! It's crazy How I haven't seen my fam or my friends from home in 3 months, and that I haven't seen my friends that are in India, Thailand, and Australia in 2 weeks. Everything is going by so fast. I hate thinking that "April before you know it your gunna be hitting up the books... dang..." That's how life is though... Weird thing though, lately through this holiday season I've actually have been missing you all back at home. I find myself wondering what everyone is up to and such... and of course being like "dude, I really miss my dog."
Well there you go folks, a few random thoughts from me. I'll be posting up a team blog update in a few days so make sure you hit that up. Miss you all greatly and look forward to seeing you all in the new year!
Happy New Years!!
April
Thursday, December 23, 2010
Quick 10 minute blog... starting...
NOW! Ok so i only have 10 minutes maybe less to fill you in on what's going down. We are currently in Queenstown... quiet town.. not!! This place is known as the party capital in NZ and possibly one of the party capitals in the world, and I'll tell you what it definitely lies up to its name. For the past week we were camping at Te Anau and one night at Milford Sound. Te Anau was quite quiet and didn't have very many people so ministry opportunities we're slightly limited. We are all doing pretty good, as we learn about each other we've definietly had some struggles, but when does that not happen in a family? Tomorrow is Christmas and we are all missing home and our families but we are all excited to experience Christmas in a New Zealand type way. Christmas is Christmas, and it doesn't matter where you are in the world it always means the same thing.
Marry Christmas All,
To Dad, Mom, Adam, and Danielle: I miss you all very much and am thinking of you guys in this Christmas season. Much love, hugs and kisses!
April
Marry Christmas All,
To Dad, Mom, Adam, and Danielle: I miss you all very much and am thinking of you guys in this Christmas season. Much love, hugs and kisses!
April
Friday, December 17, 2010
Lecture Faze atta End.
Hey All!First off I'm going to apologize for the long amounts of time in between my blogs, I know it's been over a month which is kinda ridiculous, however within the last month life got super crazy and much has happened!
Speakers.
So Week Five we had Gordon, who spoke on the Father Heart of God. Gordon talked a lot about information that I’ve already known, however apart from the lecture there was a lot of realizations that I did come to. I realized that there is pain and hurt that I haven’t dealt with, or thought that I didn’t need to because it was unnecessary. Unfortunately for myself I was wrong about that. Listening to Gordon talk really helped me think deep into those hurts and be able to let them go.
Week 6 We Had Sam who spoke on Spiritual Warfare. Hmm where to begin... Well I’m just going to be honest; I wasn’t a huge fan of Sam’s. It might have been because of the fact that he was really built up to me before he got here and then just didn’t meet the expectations that I had, or he just didn’t click for me. The information was key, and was very important, but other than that Sam didn’t impact me as much as other speakers. This week has been really awesome, having the snowboarders come back and welcoming them into our family was awesome!! I loved getting to know them, playing soccer with them, and serving them. It was really sad to see them leave, and as well as hard to say goodbye to the ones I got to be close to.
Week 7 was Aaron who didn't have a topic so it was a Spirit lead week. Aaron’s week was a very interesting week, hard to process just because there wasn’t a particular aim that he was teaching on... he was just teaching where he felt the Holy Spirit was leading him. Aaron made us think, and think hard about stuff that we already knew from before but on a deeper level. What really impacted me about this week was how practical and hands on Aaron was. Not only did he teach us about praying, and prophesying but he got us to do it as well. At the beginning of the week I thought that only certain people had the gift of prophesying, but through Aaron’s teaching he made it a lot clearer that everyone can prophisize by inviting the Holy Spirit to enter in. It was sooooooo cool when it actually happened though. I was in awe of how the Holy Spirit can move! The only down part about Aaron was that he didn’t have time to spend with us students, as soon as lecture was over he usually headed out quickly. It was just a tad disappointing because I would have liked to pick his mind a bit on some subjects. But all in all I thought Aaron was great and really easy to listen to.
Week 8 was Mark Parker who spoke on Lordship! This past week has been a very interesting week, I didn’t like Mark Parker at the start, and I think it was due to his “in your face” personality. I wasn’t so keen on him that’s for sure. But what he spoke about each day was really great. I especially enjoyed his talk on relationships, it reaffirmed my view on relationships, as well as I personally think it’s a subject that is not talked enough about and needs to be talked about more. It was great hearing it come from him because he is a dad. I really enjoyed what Mark set up for us on Friday. It was kind of like doing surgery to our souls and hearts, and it was incredibly moving. The most impactful part for me was when we had to take a burnt and sin offering to God, letting go of some things was really hard to do, but once it was done it was completely freeing.
Week 9 was Matt Dawson who's topic was relationships... FAVORITE SPEAKER SO FAR! Matt reminded me sooo much of Marty Mcfly from Back to the Future, mostly because of his personality and his sense of humour. He was really easy to listen to, which made it easy to learn, but hard to take notes. It was really great that Matt can be very direct with whatever he was talking about, there was no beating around the bush about a point that he was trying to get across he was just blunt. Yes bluntness for some people isn’t good, but when it comes to talking about relationships the bluntness was great. Matt talked a lot about stuff that I’ve already learned and have grown from, but it was really great to just have those ideas and thoughts reaffirmed. During this week we also had something called Angels and Mortals week, which was we each were an Angel and had one person who was our Mortal. Throughout the week we had to bless our mortals by doing crazy nice stuff for them, but it all had to be done in secret! My mortal was Erik who is from Sweden, and I had so much fun blessing him; my favorite one was when I got all the girls to serenade him at the beginning of class one day. We sang Ain't No Mountain High Enough, and so what we did was every girl had a line and so when it came to their line the stood up and sang it and then at the chorus we all walked to him singing the song and then said your angel loves you and gave him a group hug. I don't think I've ever seen Erik's face so red, but he did tell me later that it was one of his favorites because of how funny it was. This week was probably one of my most favorite weeks because of how much fun it was to bless our family, to be blessed, and to learn about relationships.
Week10 Chris Donaldson on Missions.
Week 9 was Matt Dawson who's topic was relationships... FAVORITE SPEAKER SO FAR! Matt reminded me sooo much of Marty Mcfly from Back to the Future, mostly because of his personality and his sense of humour. He was really easy to listen to, which made it easy to learn, but hard to take notes. It was really great that Matt can be very direct with whatever he was talking about, there was no beating around the bush about a point that he was trying to get across he was just blunt. Yes bluntness for some people isn’t good, but when it comes to talking about relationships the bluntness was great. Matt talked a lot about stuff that I’ve already learned and have grown from, but it was really great to just have those ideas and thoughts reaffirmed. During this week we also had something called Angels and Mortals week, which was we each were an Angel and had one person who was our Mortal. Throughout the week we had to bless our mortals by doing crazy nice stuff for them, but it all had to be done in secret! My mortal was Erik who is from Sweden, and I had so much fun blessing him; my favorite one was when I got all the girls to serenade him at the beginning of class one day. We sang Ain't No Mountain High Enough, and so what we did was every girl had a line and so when it came to their line the stood up and sang it and then at the chorus we all walked to him singing the song and then said your angel loves you and gave him a group hug. I don't think I've ever seen Erik's face so red, but he did tell me later that it was one of his favorites because of how funny it was. This week was probably one of my most favorite weeks because of how much fun it was to bless our family, to be blessed, and to learn about relationships.
Week10 Chris Donaldson on Missions.
Chris had good lessons to teach us this week, however I don’t feel like I got much from him. It might have to do with the fact that he was talking/teaching us about stuff that we have already learned during the lecture faze. I felt like a lot of the stuff he brought to lecture had already been covered, or I’ve already known. It was really awesome how he got us to do hands on things. I LOVED doing the project of the 10 year plan! So basically we got put into smaller groups, had to pick a place (my team was Israel), and make a 10 year plan for missions in that country. This made me so excited for missions, excited for Israel, excited for the future, and excited to see what else God has in store! It was crazy to see how possible this could actually be. Chris took information we already knew and made us more excited about it.
Week11 Shane Jette OutReach.
Shane and Tara are wonderful people and have amazing kids, just saying. Anyways, it’s hard to have a great opinion of what Shane is like for a speaker just because it’s only half way through the week, but also because of the topic for the week it must be hard to bring new information. What I mean is, Shane is the last speaker and is talking about Outreach prep, therefore lots of the information the he could be talking about has already been said by many other speakers... which does make it somewhat hard to listen to in lecture just because we’ve heard a lot of it before... Not saying that Shane is a bad speaker, it just must be really tough for him is all.
OutReach Team... Team KiwiFiji!
Ok, so for those who don't know I'm on a team of 5, 2 staff, and 3 students. Really exciting news, Matt is actually one of my leaders! Crazy right?! I really didn't think it was possible for us to be on the same team because we were close friends from back home, so I'm really stoked about this! So there is Matt(SK. Canada) and Katie(WY.USA) as our leaders, then Kristoffer (Norway), Derek(NH, USA), and of course ME! Our team is pretty awesome, however it's kinda hard because none of the students I got close to while being here are on my team. One of them is on the Australia Fiji team, so there is a chance that our team will be able to meet up with them but that's it. It's been a hard process because when the teams were picked I saw all my friends with at least someone else that they are close to on their team. Yes, Matt and I are close, but at first I was frustrated thinking "But I can see Matt whenever I want at home, where I won't get to see my other close friends because they are so far away". After thinking about this for awhile I realized how selfish I was being, and didn't actually realize what sort of blessing God had given me. Yes, I'm not with any of my close friends studentwise which is rough, however when I go home and I'm having a rough day and need someone to talk to that has been through the same things as me and was there with me I can call up Matt and be like "Hey, you busy? I'm having a rough day can we hang out? Yes? Great! I'll be there in 15 minutest!" How special is that?! Really April wake up, can't you see that this is a rare occasion and it's a huge blessing to you!! So yeah that really woke me up.
Plans for our team... Well the rough outline for our teams travels go kinda like this... We are first going to travel about 6 hours to go and do the Kepler Track, which is a four day hike. Unfortunately we will not be going on this track because 2 weeks ago I tweaked a ligament in my ankle. So instead we are going to this amazing camping spot though I forget the name of it so I'll keep ya'll updated :) Alrighty! after the awesome camping experience we will head over to Queenstown which is in the southerner part of the South Island... confusing eh? haha! We will spend about a week in Queenstown and will be there over Christmas. We'll be staying in a hostel and will be working at a church! The next week we are going to go to Wanaka which is close to Queenstown and we will spend about a week there as well. After Wanaka we are going to head north up the west coast, possibly stopping at Fox Glacier, but our destination is the Able Tasman. The Able Tasman is a 3 day track that we will be doing! At Able Denver (school leader) will be doing a pastoral visit before we start, and he's going to be bringing the bases kayaks so that we can kayak and hike the Able!! Should be lots of fun! Apparently near the Able there is this bay where lots of penguins, seals, and dolphins go, and you can kayak in there and they'll come right up to you!! Its said to be a haven for them there, and there are so many dolphins that after awhile its like "oh, there goes another pod of dolphins over there..." I really hope we can go see that!! After we are done our 3 day track we will head to a spot called Hang Dog, which is suppose to be every climbers dream... The lifestyle of Hang Dog is camping, climbing, chill.... camping climbing chill... camping, climbing, slacklining, chill... hmmmm :) So we will be hanging and Hang Dog for a week. After hangdog we will head back down south along the east coast to Lyttelton for a day to have debrief for the NZ part of our trip. Then we will meet back at the base drop off the van then fly over to Fiji for 3 weeks yay!!
Highlights of the Last month.
1.We hiked Louis' pass which is a track up a steep mountain and it's suppose to take you 4-5 hours round trip and we made it up the mountain in less than an hour and a half... and then perhaps going down the mountain it was a lot faster due to running because we were soooo cold at the top. I only stayed at the top for about 5 minutes because of how cold it was! After Louis we went to a hut on Daniel's Lake... but little did we know we thought was a close by campground turned into an 8km(one way) track. So in one day we did a hike up a mountain and an 8km track, it was intense! On the way back the next day, near the end of the track there is this bridge... and perhaps a bunch of us might have jumped off of this bridge into the coldest mountain water of life!! It was awesome!!!!
2. Cave Streams!!! So about an hour away from Oxford there is a cave that has a mountain run off going through it. It takes about an hour or so to go through the cave and you're in at least knee deep water the whole time. It was soooo cool!!!! I went twice in one week I loved it so much. Unfortunately the cave streams is where I wrecked my ankle.
3. Last weekend! Alrighty, so on Saturday I got to go on a trail ride through some amazing scenery!! We took our horses into a river and it was so awesome cuz they started playing in the water and we got soaked! Anyways Sunday was killer awesome! After church I went with some of my buddies (Wyatt, Jonathan, Philip, and Nate) who are really awesome, and they took me to this waterfall. Well we didn't go to SEE the water fall we went tracking through the streams and climbing on smaller waterfalls! it was so sick awesome! We got to the big waterfall we couldn't climb it because it was to high up, however we did climb the cliffs around it and jumped into the pool at the bottom of it. The pool was about 20ft deep, and we jumped from about 10-15ft up. It was so awesome! Later that day all us girls had planned a surprise for the guys. We blindfolded them and took them to a river where we had a fire and had a wiener roast. Well Philip and Wyatt, who are always crazy decided it would be awesome to go a floating in the water. The river wasn't deep, but it was pretty fast moving... Normally I would never do anything like this, but they convinced me to go with them, even though we had no towels, change of clothes or anything... so we jumped in with whatever we had on... and it was fantastic!! It was such a great day!
Anyways all that's about it for now. I head out on Outreach tomorrow so if you wanna know what the team is up to our blog is teamkiwifiji.blogspot.com and it should also be connected to this blog. Love you all so much and thank you for the prayers! I'll update you as much as I can during outreach... which at this rate should be better than I have been so far!
Much Love!
April
Plans for our team... Well the rough outline for our teams travels go kinda like this... We are first going to travel about 6 hours to go and do the Kepler Track, which is a four day hike. Unfortunately we will not be going on this track because 2 weeks ago I tweaked a ligament in my ankle. So instead we are going to this amazing camping spot though I forget the name of it so I'll keep ya'll updated :) Alrighty! after the awesome camping experience we will head over to Queenstown which is in the southerner part of the South Island... confusing eh? haha! We will spend about a week in Queenstown and will be there over Christmas. We'll be staying in a hostel and will be working at a church! The next week we are going to go to Wanaka which is close to Queenstown and we will spend about a week there as well. After Wanaka we are going to head north up the west coast, possibly stopping at Fox Glacier, but our destination is the Able Tasman. The Able Tasman is a 3 day track that we will be doing! At Able Denver (school leader) will be doing a pastoral visit before we start, and he's going to be bringing the bases kayaks so that we can kayak and hike the Able!! Should be lots of fun! Apparently near the Able there is this bay where lots of penguins, seals, and dolphins go, and you can kayak in there and they'll come right up to you!! Its said to be a haven for them there, and there are so many dolphins that after awhile its like "oh, there goes another pod of dolphins over there..." I really hope we can go see that!! After we are done our 3 day track we will head to a spot called Hang Dog, which is suppose to be every climbers dream... The lifestyle of Hang Dog is camping, climbing, chill.... camping climbing chill... camping, climbing, slacklining, chill... hmmmm :) So we will be hanging and Hang Dog for a week. After hangdog we will head back down south along the east coast to Lyttelton for a day to have debrief for the NZ part of our trip. Then we will meet back at the base drop off the van then fly over to Fiji for 3 weeks yay!!
Highlights of the Last month.
1.We hiked Louis' pass which is a track up a steep mountain and it's suppose to take you 4-5 hours round trip and we made it up the mountain in less than an hour and a half... and then perhaps going down the mountain it was a lot faster due to running because we were soooo cold at the top. I only stayed at the top for about 5 minutes because of how cold it was! After Louis we went to a hut on Daniel's Lake... but little did we know we thought was a close by campground turned into an 8km(one way) track. So in one day we did a hike up a mountain and an 8km track, it was intense! On the way back the next day, near the end of the track there is this bridge... and perhaps a bunch of us might have jumped off of this bridge into the coldest mountain water of life!! It was awesome!!!!
2. Cave Streams!!! So about an hour away from Oxford there is a cave that has a mountain run off going through it. It takes about an hour or so to go through the cave and you're in at least knee deep water the whole time. It was soooo cool!!!! I went twice in one week I loved it so much. Unfortunately the cave streams is where I wrecked my ankle.
3. Last weekend! Alrighty, so on Saturday I got to go on a trail ride through some amazing scenery!! We took our horses into a river and it was so awesome cuz they started playing in the water and we got soaked! Anyways Sunday was killer awesome! After church I went with some of my buddies (Wyatt, Jonathan, Philip, and Nate) who are really awesome, and they took me to this waterfall. Well we didn't go to SEE the water fall we went tracking through the streams and climbing on smaller waterfalls! it was so sick awesome! We got to the big waterfall we couldn't climb it because it was to high up, however we did climb the cliffs around it and jumped into the pool at the bottom of it. The pool was about 20ft deep, and we jumped from about 10-15ft up. It was so awesome! Later that day all us girls had planned a surprise for the guys. We blindfolded them and took them to a river where we had a fire and had a wiener roast. Well Philip and Wyatt, who are always crazy decided it would be awesome to go a floating in the water. The river wasn't deep, but it was pretty fast moving... Normally I would never do anything like this, but they convinced me to go with them, even though we had no towels, change of clothes or anything... so we jumped in with whatever we had on... and it was fantastic!! It was such a great day!
Anyways all that's about it for now. I head out on Outreach tomorrow so if you wanna know what the team is up to our blog is teamkiwifiji.blogspot.com and it should also be connected to this blog. Love you all so much and thank you for the prayers! I'll update you as much as I can during outreach... which at this rate should be better than I have been so far!
Much Love!
April
Sunday, November 7, 2010
Long time No Blog?? OOPS!
Hey All!
First off I'm REALLY REALLY REALLY sorry I haven't blogged in an Uber long time!! So I guess this one is going to be uber long!!
Ok, 2md week of lectures we had our first speakers Jamie and Kim! Jamie is from Sydney and Kim is from Brisbane, and they came and taught us about the Reaching Backpackers, and oh my goodness I learned so much (ok lets get this right I've been learning a freaking alot everyday). I went from thinking backpacking is just something people do for fun, to knowing that it is a lifestyle that people choose and there are different types of backpackers; and all of them come down to people searching for something. This week was so amazing for me just because my perspective on backpackers as well as the ministry that I'm going into got turned around (for the good), and now I'm super excited! On Wednesday, all our small groups got divided and sent out to two different places; each girl small group was partnered up with a guy small group and we stayed in a hostel! Yup that's right folks, April experienced her very first hostel! We went down to this beautiful peninsula and went to a town called Akaroa! Akaroa was amazing! Sunny and warm, beautiful ocean, and beautiful mountains! When we got to the hostel there wasn't very many people around, so we decided to tour around the town then meet back there for supper (or should i say dinner they don't call it supper here). So that's what we did, when we came back for "dinner" there was a lot more people around which was awesome. we talked to people ate food, and then ended up playing pictionary with some backpackers all night! It was fantastic! The next morning we got up made pancakes, shared them with some of our friends from the night before, then packed our stuff up and headed out from the hostel. We stayed in town we just had to have our stuff out. Our team then met down by the pier to do some recap and prayer time, which ended up being super awesome because instead of praying together we all partnered off and did a prayer walk through town. So Katie and I started out on our adventurous prayer walk! What was a prayer walk through town turned into a prayer walk through town and up a mountain! We got to this bridge and then saw that there was a paved road going up a mountain so we figured it was still apart of town (which it was), but shortly going down this road i saw this narrow walking path so of course me being me was like "dude! we gotta go down this!" So that's what we did, and oh my lanta I'm so glad we did because it was BEAUTIFUL! We ended up hiking to the top and were in awe of God's creation. That day, we ended up just hanging out in Akaroa until about 3 in the afternoon. When we got back everyone was super excited to see each other and share their stories, it was so awesome! Friday was our first actual Friday Night Evangelism, and I'm on a team for the Beach/Park! And we gotta sick team! So basically we hit up the beach or park looking for people. So that Friday we hit up a park that had some people throwing a frisbee around and then there was two other people doing something with a rugby ball i think; so we were like sweet and started throwing a frisbee with eachother right close near by and with in about 5 minutes we had both groups come together and had a game of Ultimate going down. Freaking awesome right?! My fave game ever while evangelizing! It was a great time, and we met some really awesome people. That weekend I was a weekend warrior so I didn't get to go on the weekend trip, but stayed back with a team and cleaned and kept the base going; it was a fantastic time!
Third Week of lectures we had a lady named Mandy come and teach us about the Holy Spirit. This week was super super crazy awesome for me spiritually. I'm not going to share everything that happened because I'd be writing a book. But basically I was stressed about finances, stuff to do with home, and a few other things and everything on my list that I was stressed about God gave me reasons to not be stressed. A lot of healing for me happened through learning about the Holy Spirit. You know it's God when, someone prays for you about something that you've never told anyone about and have been struggling with since a child... When this happened I completely broke down before God, the Holy Spirit and everyone in the room. It was so amazing, and tremendous healing came from it! This didn't just happen to me but to a bunch of other people too. Holy Spirit week was amazing!
That Friday we hit up a different park and put on a sausage sizzler and went and gathered people to come! nothing better than free food right?! well we didn't get as many people as we hoped to but it was still awesome! The next day I did something completely new... I climbed my first mountain! I know i know i said Katie and hiked one in Akaroa, but that was nothing compared to Authors Pass! It was a 3 hour hike up, and about a 2 hour hike down. I don't think my muscles ever hurt so bad hahaha! Katie and I hiked just the two of us up to the hut which took about and 1 and 45 minutes. and we were pretty speedy. Once everyone got to the hut we had lunch then kept going. This time I hiked with some stellar guys named Erik who is from Sweden, and Evan who is from Colorado. It was probably one of the most challenging things I’ve ever done! I wanted to give up so many times, but they guys wouldn’t let me, they were great because they totally could have kept going at their own speedy pace but they stuck with me which was so awesome! When we got to the top of the peek it was soooooo amazing!!!! Such Beauty! Evan soon had this fascination with making a snow ball and rolling it down the peek. It was pretty awesome because it’d get bigger and bigger as it went down... Soon enough all three of us were making snow balls. Once the group was together we were taking pictures, Erik made a snowman named Swen, Even was being crazy, then we all started having a snow fight which was awesome! Then we headed back down the mountain and Erik and I had a blast, he taught me Swedish, I was a hopeless case... I learned how to say skeet shooting, I love you, count to seven and.. “Mata mig jag vill ha oxfilé, klyftpotatis och en stek till” which means “Feed me a steak, some cut potatoes, and another steak” Yup that’s right folks, I am set for when I travel to Sweden.
Fourth Week of Lectures,
For the forth week we had an awesome speaker named Dalton... Well I can’t really say much of about what he talked about because it was so crazy and he went super fast so I’m still processing what he all said.
Friday night we ended up going to the big mall in Christchurch because it was raining. At first I was quite frustrated with myself because I found it really difficult to just go up to a person and start talking to them. So for an hour I was bummed. After an hour I had to go pick something up from a grocery store, no body else needed anything so I just told them I’d be right back, well Mary Loyd followed me in and as soon as we were outta ear shot from the group she was like “ok April what’s up.”... It’s crazy how well a person can know you after only a month! Well I told her what was going on and she was ok lets pray, so we did, and then we set off out on our own. So the first thing we did was go and find the coffee shop that we were going to meet the team at later on, and it was an amazing thing we did. We walked in there and there was no one there except for the girl working, so I swallowed my fear and walked straight up to her and started talking... Well 45 minutes later we were laughing and having a great time. I felt like I should do something nice for her, and since I found out that she doesn’t get to eat anything that they sell I asked her what her favourite thing to eat was and bought it for her. She was speechless, and had no idea what to do. So then she gets her cake thing out that looked amazing, and then she told me that she wanted to show the same kindness to me by giving me a coffee on the house. I was like “No its ok, cuz then it kinda defeats my purpose.” And then i got “no no, its ok, its not coasting me anything cuz its on the house.” Well people I had the most AMAZING coffee I’ve ever tasted! After that Mary Loyd and I met 4 other people and had great conversations with them!
Saturday for the weekend trip we headed out to a place called Kiakoura! When we first got there we went for a hike along the coast looking at the beautiful Turquoise Ocean and seals! On the first hour of the hike Matt and I hiked together and got to have some great catch up time... Life at the base is super crazy and since Matt is staff his schedule is even crazier than mine so we hardly get time together so it was really nice to talk with him! After the hike we headed to our campsite which was pretty much right on the beach! My van team made super that night, and then later on we had a HUGE bon fire on the beach!! The next morning we woke up had breaky, packed up our stuff then hung out at the beach until lunch... Had lunch then headed home! Weekend= Success!
First off I'm REALLY REALLY REALLY sorry I haven't blogged in an Uber long time!! So I guess this one is going to be uber long!!
Ok, 2md week of lectures we had our first speakers Jamie and Kim! Jamie is from Sydney and Kim is from Brisbane, and they came and taught us about the Reaching Backpackers, and oh my goodness I learned so much (ok lets get this right I've been learning a freaking alot everyday). I went from thinking backpacking is just something people do for fun, to knowing that it is a lifestyle that people choose and there are different types of backpackers; and all of them come down to people searching for something. This week was so amazing for me just because my perspective on backpackers as well as the ministry that I'm going into got turned around (for the good), and now I'm super excited! On Wednesday, all our small groups got divided and sent out to two different places; each girl small group was partnered up with a guy small group and we stayed in a hostel! Yup that's right folks, April experienced her very first hostel! We went down to this beautiful peninsula and went to a town called Akaroa! Akaroa was amazing! Sunny and warm, beautiful ocean, and beautiful mountains! When we got to the hostel there wasn't very many people around, so we decided to tour around the town then meet back there for supper (or should i say dinner they don't call it supper here). So that's what we did, when we came back for "dinner" there was a lot more people around which was awesome. we talked to people ate food, and then ended up playing pictionary with some backpackers all night! It was fantastic! The next morning we got up made pancakes, shared them with some of our friends from the night before, then packed our stuff up and headed out from the hostel. We stayed in town we just had to have our stuff out. Our team then met down by the pier to do some recap and prayer time, which ended up being super awesome because instead of praying together we all partnered off and did a prayer walk through town. So Katie and I started out on our adventurous prayer walk! What was a prayer walk through town turned into a prayer walk through town and up a mountain! We got to this bridge and then saw that there was a paved road going up a mountain so we figured it was still apart of town (which it was), but shortly going down this road i saw this narrow walking path so of course me being me was like "dude! we gotta go down this!" So that's what we did, and oh my lanta I'm so glad we did because it was BEAUTIFUL! We ended up hiking to the top and were in awe of God's creation. That day, we ended up just hanging out in Akaroa until about 3 in the afternoon. When we got back everyone was super excited to see each other and share their stories, it was so awesome! Friday was our first actual Friday Night Evangelism, and I'm on a team for the Beach/Park! And we gotta sick team! So basically we hit up the beach or park looking for people. So that Friday we hit up a park that had some people throwing a frisbee around and then there was two other people doing something with a rugby ball i think; so we were like sweet and started throwing a frisbee with eachother right close near by and with in about 5 minutes we had both groups come together and had a game of Ultimate going down. Freaking awesome right?! My fave game ever while evangelizing! It was a great time, and we met some really awesome people. That weekend I was a weekend warrior so I didn't get to go on the weekend trip, but stayed back with a team and cleaned and kept the base going; it was a fantastic time!
Third Week of lectures we had a lady named Mandy come and teach us about the Holy Spirit. This week was super super crazy awesome for me spiritually. I'm not going to share everything that happened because I'd be writing a book. But basically I was stressed about finances, stuff to do with home, and a few other things and everything on my list that I was stressed about God gave me reasons to not be stressed. A lot of healing for me happened through learning about the Holy Spirit. You know it's God when, someone prays for you about something that you've never told anyone about and have been struggling with since a child... When this happened I completely broke down before God, the Holy Spirit and everyone in the room. It was so amazing, and tremendous healing came from it! This didn't just happen to me but to a bunch of other people too. Holy Spirit week was amazing!
That Friday we hit up a different park and put on a sausage sizzler and went and gathered people to come! nothing better than free food right?! well we didn't get as many people as we hoped to but it was still awesome! The next day I did something completely new... I climbed my first mountain! I know i know i said Katie and hiked one in Akaroa, but that was nothing compared to Authors Pass! It was a 3 hour hike up, and about a 2 hour hike down. I don't think my muscles ever hurt so bad hahaha! Katie and I hiked just the two of us up to the hut which took about and 1 and 45 minutes. and we were pretty speedy. Once everyone got to the hut we had lunch then kept going. This time I hiked with some stellar guys named Erik who is from Sweden, and Evan who is from Colorado. It was probably one of the most challenging things I’ve ever done! I wanted to give up so many times, but they guys wouldn’t let me, they were great because they totally could have kept going at their own speedy pace but they stuck with me which was so awesome! When we got to the top of the peek it was soooooo amazing!!!! Such Beauty! Evan soon had this fascination with making a snow ball and rolling it down the peek. It was pretty awesome because it’d get bigger and bigger as it went down... Soon enough all three of us were making snow balls. Once the group was together we were taking pictures, Erik made a snowman named Swen, Even was being crazy, then we all started having a snow fight which was awesome! Then we headed back down the mountain and Erik and I had a blast, he taught me Swedish, I was a hopeless case... I learned how to say skeet shooting, I love you, count to seven and.. “Mata mig jag vill ha oxfilé, klyftpotatis och en stek till” which means “Feed me a steak, some cut potatoes, and another steak” Yup that’s right folks, I am set for when I travel to Sweden.
Fourth Week of Lectures,
For the forth week we had an awesome speaker named Dalton... Well I can’t really say much of about what he talked about because it was so crazy and he went super fast so I’m still processing what he all said.
Friday night we ended up going to the big mall in Christchurch because it was raining. At first I was quite frustrated with myself because I found it really difficult to just go up to a person and start talking to them. So for an hour I was bummed. After an hour I had to go pick something up from a grocery store, no body else needed anything so I just told them I’d be right back, well Mary Loyd followed me in and as soon as we were outta ear shot from the group she was like “ok April what’s up.”... It’s crazy how well a person can know you after only a month! Well I told her what was going on and she was ok lets pray, so we did, and then we set off out on our own. So the first thing we did was go and find the coffee shop that we were going to meet the team at later on, and it was an amazing thing we did. We walked in there and there was no one there except for the girl working, so I swallowed my fear and walked straight up to her and started talking... Well 45 minutes later we were laughing and having a great time. I felt like I should do something nice for her, and since I found out that she doesn’t get to eat anything that they sell I asked her what her favourite thing to eat was and bought it for her. She was speechless, and had no idea what to do. So then she gets her cake thing out that looked amazing, and then she told me that she wanted to show the same kindness to me by giving me a coffee on the house. I was like “No its ok, cuz then it kinda defeats my purpose.” And then i got “no no, its ok, its not coasting me anything cuz its on the house.” Well people I had the most AMAZING coffee I’ve ever tasted! After that Mary Loyd and I met 4 other people and had great conversations with them!
Saturday for the weekend trip we headed out to a place called Kiakoura! When we first got there we went for a hike along the coast looking at the beautiful Turquoise Ocean and seals! On the first hour of the hike Matt and I hiked together and got to have some great catch up time... Life at the base is super crazy and since Matt is staff his schedule is even crazier than mine so we hardly get time together so it was really nice to talk with him! After the hike we headed to our campsite which was pretty much right on the beach! My van team made super that night, and then later on we had a HUGE bon fire on the beach!! The next morning we woke up had breaky, packed up our stuff then hung out at the beach until lunch... Had lunch then headed home! Weekend= Success!
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