Mountains, Icicles & Beaches

Hello Everyone!

Last week was another exciting adventure on the roads of NZ. We left Riwaka on Saturday, said our goodbyes to Chris, Liz, and Ruth, and drove down the West Coast.

Norm & Christy took a week break in Auckland, so we had the privilege to have Daniel as our TEAm leader (former TEA participant).

We picked up a hitchhiker from Spain who we saw later in Queenstown J. He made the journey with us to Westport where we stayed overnight. Along the road we went to view a seal colony, a cave (without seals and glow worms ;) ), and the pancake rocks (a funny looking rock formation). The local Anglican church welcomed us warmly on Sunday morning.

The pattern of the next few days was pretty much similar. We stayed every night in a different holiday park, drove 3-4 hours/day and stopped to view or walk in beautiful places. During our study times each one of us were asked to talk about a difficult topic relating to Christianity. For instance: Are there mistakes in the Bible? How could an all-powerful, loving God allow suffering on earth, etc? Those moments were challenging and took us deeper into the Bible.

An hour away from the coast, we arrived at Franz Joseph Glacier where we witnessed a beautiful rainbow. Walking in the ”bed” of the Glacier over stones and rocks to the edge of Franz Joseph was great fun. The majesty of it impressed all of us.

Before taking our quarters in the holiday park, we had a look at Lake Matheson, a jungle like walk to a tranquil lake reflecting the forest and mountains surrounding it.

Haast was our next day´s destination. We made a random stop and happened upon a salmon farm. This inspired our chief cook, Thomas, to prepare a feast for that evening : salmon pasta. That´s where we met a cool friendly guy from France with perfect Australian English!

We took off early the next morning towards Wanaka. We stopped at Fantails Falls and Thunder Creek Falls, a high waterfall in the forest overwhelmed by tourists. For lunch we stopped on a beach of Lake Wanaka which turned out to become one of our best and warmest lunches. The guys built a fire and we baked bread on sticks and topped them with maple syrup – yummo . Daniel played on his fancy guitar and we took some time to praise our Creator and talk about one of the topics. Memorable experience...

We were glad that our shelter for the night had a hot spa pool and a fire stove. As you probably all know, it can get quite cold this time of year on the South Island. We stayed there two nights and met a nice, newlywed Aussie couple who explained to us a lot about the Aborigines of Australia.

The next evening, after a day hiking near Wanaka at the Diamond Lake, we settled into a nice chalet in Queenstown and had a private show by our favourite actor, Phil. He acted out a scene from one of Shakespeare’s plays. Phil temporarily became Launce as he acted out his goodbyes to his parents, represented by shoes...mmh...great theatre!

Saturday morning lying in...breakfast at 8:30, yes! And guess what? We had pancakes, special American recipe by Audra : with strawberries and maple syrup, bacon and eggs. It was also our awaited laundry day! Sara bumped into a friend that she hadn’t seen in 16 years and had gone to primary school with. She was very excited to have a “catch up” coffee with her! In the meantime, the rest of us went up to check out the ski slopes at Coronet Peak. One thing leading to another, the snowballs flew as we made our way back to the van.

Norm and Christy finally joined us after their flight was cancelled due to excessive clouds and having to drive 7 hours from Christchurch...Prayer requests : for safe technology in NZ airports and cloudless skies (this is a joke, mums don´t worry)...

Prayer Requests:

- That we meet more people or find creative ways to go where people are for sharing our faith and having conversations with them about God.

- That we learn more creative ways to serve each other and people we meet.

- Safety during our skiing day this week.

- That we continue to push ourselves and go deeper in God´s Word & ask ourselves the tough questions.

Thanks for your prayers! God bless!

TEA-03/2009