Kids at the Beach

My favorite picture of the kids at the beach.

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Our Favorite Picnic Spot

Sometimes we like to go out as a family and explore new areas around where we live. One day on one of our exploring trips, we found this place. It is not too far of a drive past the road where you turn onto to go to the church building. This river is the Ruaha River, which is said to be about 300 miles long. In the less populated areas of the River there are crocodiles and hippos. This particular section didn't have these types of animals, but it did have some interesting birds.

 

The water from this river is often used by many people for their everyday water needs.
While we were on our picnic we saw several people coming to the river to collect water in their buckets. Most of these were kids whose daily chore was to collect the water from the river and bring the Heavy buckets back home. They take the water back to their homes for cooking, bathing, washing clothes, etc.








We have only been here once, but I want to go again soon. It even has a perfect sitting rock that we spread our blanket on.

 

A little back from the river was some really large, and smooth rocks. These were perfect for the kids to climb on. This was almost as good as a McDonald's playground. Okay maybe not, but the kids had a blast.

 This particular picnic day was filled with the warm sun and perfect breeze. It had the sound of running water, kids laughing and playing, and the feeling of family fun.

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Travel To Tanzania

Visiting us in Tanzania.

One of the first things that may come to your mind when you think of Traveling to Tanzania,  is the fact that it is on the other side of the world. So, so, far away. This is true, but it isn't as crazy as it sounds. Most people get discouraged at the thought of even trying to make a trip like that. I have heard," Oh I would have to get a passport or get shots, I couldn't do all that." If you just plan ahead and take it step by step, it really isn't that bad. When we travel back to America our next furlough, (Lord Willing) we will be traveling with 2 adults, and 4 kids. Their ages; 6, 5, 3, and 1. So trust me when I say that if I can do it, anyone can. If you are single or retired, and have the time to spend, then why not spend your time doing something that will change your life forever. There is just something about Tanzania that gets into peoples hearts and stays.

Just think about it. :-)

Bonnie

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Getting To Iringa

I guess I will start off this new adventure with telling you how our getting here went. It was an adventure in itself. We had a large truck come to move our things and several friends/men of the church, came to help us load it up. It was a 28 ft truck. This means that everything we own had to fit in this truck, all furniture, appliances, everything. We didn’t have a lot of room in our Prado, (SUV type vehicle) with the 5 of us already in it, so we had to make a plan on how we were going to get our 2 very large English Mastiffs, and our miniature Schnauzer, with us. We were fortunate enough to have some friends help us out. We borrowed a friends vehicle, and two other friends volunteered to drive the dogs down with us. The vehicle needed a new car battery, so we had to get that car up and running before we could leave. Long story short, we got the truck loaded, very, very tightly, got the dogs loaded up and were on the road before dark. The moving truck was going to drive straight to Iringa so we were trying not to be to far behind it, so it didn’t have to wait too long for us to get there. We knew it was unsafe for us to drive all night and into the next day so we decided to only drive a short ways to Moshi and get a good start on it in the morning. The trouble that we ran into was finding a hotel in Moshi that would allow us to bring in our dogs. We started out going to the nicer places and they all said no. So when it was starting to get late we decided to try the, not so nicer places, but still no luck. At One o’clock in the morning we found ourselves wondering around a bad part of town, and then of course, flat tire. So we are sitting in a bad part of town, way too late at night, after a very long day, with a flat tire. After the flat tire incident we went back to the nicer hotel, someone slept outside in the car with the dogs, while the rest of us got to go sleep in a bed. The hotel didn’t have air conditioning and the weather right now in Moshi (where we stayed) is very hot and humid. We have been in Tanzania long enough to know what to prepare for a little bit, so we brought along our own electrical fan. We were able to sleep with a little bit of a breeze, thanks to the fan.
The dogs had gotten water throughout the night and got to get out and walk around a bit. Thanks to Isreal, the guy who got to sleep in the car with the dogs. (Smiles)
After a fair amount of sleep we had breakfast at the hotel and hit the road. I was feeling a lot better after a good breakfast and a good nights sleep. We had to get the tire patched up before we got on the road. We pulled up to the gas station to get the tire hole plugged when an old man came to fix the tire. Now the day before I would have had a bad attitude and thought, “Oh Great, we get the old guy ! “ But today I was feeling pretty good and just sat in the other car and watched him change the tire. Now this old guy knew what he was doing. He quickly moved from one step to the other and before long he was done repairing the tire. I could tell that he had been repairing tires for years, by the way he worked. I wondered how bad his hands and back hurt at the end of each day. This guy was pretty old, and here he was hammering the rim to get the tire out, bending straight over to do work, and doing a lot of manual labor, tire after tire. After Carey paid the guy and got back in the car, I asked him if he had tipped him a little extra. (Knowing that he usually always gives everyone here a tip) Carey said that he gave the guy a few extra shillings and the guy was so grateful and kept saying, God bless you so much. Carey must have also noticed that he had been repairing tires for a while and asked him how long he had done this kind of work. The guy told Carey that he had been changing and repairing tires since 1964. Wow, that is a long time. I was thankful that this man was put in our path on this journey to help us along the way.
The day was long and tough. We would stop about every 3 hrs. or so for a restroom break, get the dogs some water and let them run around. They were in the other car without air conditioning, but seemed to be doing pretty good. I was watching them close for signs of dehydration, or any complications. Earl the big male Mastiff was panting but drinking lots of water, they were both running around, not acting slugging at all, drinking lots of water, jumping in and out of the back of the vehicle at stops, etc. We drove through Mkumi National Park, and the dogs really woke up and were lively barking at the elephants on the side of the road. We drove about anther 30 min. and stopped at a restaurant for dinner, Carey opened up the back of the car where the dogs were and stated. “Earl is dead.” We were all in shock. We couldn’t believe it. He was doing so good. He didn’t appear to be in distress at all. Did he overheat? Did he have a heart attack? Did he get into some poison when he was walked around on the leash at a rest stop? We couldn’t figure it out. Again we were in disbelief. At his point I just told myself to be calm and take care of the kids. So the kids and I went and sat down to eat some french fries and ice cream at the restaurant while the guys went and put Earl to rest. You have to understand this was our beloved family pet, he was also very important to our security. Aubrie was in tears and very upset, we talked a little about death, and we cried together and then we were on our journey again. We arrived to the house late at night and thankfully the Jensen family had already unloaded the moving truck for us. This was one hurdled that seemed to ease the work that needed to be done. We didn’t have our beds set up yet, so we had made plans to stay the night with them. Carey wanted me to go in the house and at least look at it. I had only seen our new home in pictures and he was excited for me to see it. I knew the house was going to need work and I knew that my positive perspective on things had now turned into a negative one, and I didn’t want to say anything negative about the house, so I almost opted out on seeing it that night. But I told myself to be strong, “buck up” and go in and see it. I was glad that I went in and saw it, just standing in the living room helped me fulfill the sense that... We had finally made it !

Until Next Time,
Bonnie

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