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Costa Rica (06.03.08): Update #5
Praise the Lord the team is safe and sound back in the United States. Hard to believe the trip is over. Looking back on it, it was well worth all of the time and energy poured into the preparation! Everyone worked extremely hard to get ready for the trip, but the energy, excitement and hard work ON the trip greatly exceeded even that!
It would not be a mission trip without the schedule changing. The schedule naturally changed along the way, but not in as drastic a way as it did over the last weekend. The last update concluded Wednesday night, when the team was saying “Good-bye” to the church family and getting packed and ready for the journey to the Manuel Antonio National Park. To make a long story short, we never made it to Manuel Antonio. We woke up Thursday morning to a torrential downpour. It was incredible how hard it was raining! We found out that there was a tropical storm hovering over the Pacific coast of Costa Rica and that most of the main roads along the Pacific coast were flooded and thus closed. So, Plan B went into action … essentially, we called places all over the country to find a location that was both accessible and available. We ended up in Cahuito, an Atlantic coastal town near Panama. Our trusty bus driver hooked us up with a friend of his who owned bungalows on the coast.
After the 4 ½ hour bus ride we pulled into Cahuito and got set up in our various bungalows. Although it was not Manuel Antonio, it was very close to a National Park. We had dinner and Team Time Thursday evening before heading to bed for the night. It was nice to be able to sleep in a bit, especially after a very long, yet fruitful two weeks in San Jose.
Friday morning a crew of five people got up, walked to the local market and picked up breakfast items fit for a king … French toast, eggs, cereal, fruit … it was great! So the five cooked and then we all ate as a team before heading to the beach for the day. We were thrilled to be out in the sunshine, enjoying God’s beautiful creation. The water was so incredibly warm that it was on the verge of NOT being refreshing. However, it was such a nice way to spend the last day. There was plenty to do that day at the beach, but most people played soccer, swam, went running, tanned, walked through the National Park (that ran along the beach) and watched the monkeys. Oh yeah, and most people burned some part of their body. The sun was very intense!
Friday night was pizza night. We did not think it would take as long to get our dinner that night as it took for Thursday night’s dinner, but we were wrong. It still took about three hours to get our meals. But it did give us time to hang out and talk around the tables. We had our closing Team Time and Debriefing Friday night before heading to bed.
Five people got up at 4:45 am Saturday morning for what turned out to be a beautiful sunrise over the ocean (others were brave in the attempt but slept right through and never made it … good thing we have cameras!). We boarded the bus at 6:15 am and were on our way to airport. We stopped for breakfast but then loaded back up and arrived in San Jose at the airport at 12 noon, right on time! It was a pleasant surprise to find some of our friends from the church there waiting for us. Of course, it meant having to say “Good-bye” again, but I would say we all agreed that it was worth it.
Everyone was pretty beat, so there was much sleeping on both the flight to Miami and the flight to Newark. Of course, the video system on the planes did not function properly, so that was interesting. The layover in Miami was not supposed to be that long, but something happened with the baggage handlers, delaying our departure by an hour. That would not have been as big a deal if it were not already 10:30 pm Saturday night when our flight was leaving. Needless to say, by the time we arrived back in Emmaus, PA and had everyone situated in their homes for the night, it was close to 5 am on Sunday morning.
Sunday afternoon everyone who was still left met at Red Robin for lunch and then split. It is Tuesday afternoon now and most people are back home. And by back home I mean back to the roughly nine states they represented. So people were spread out!
Thanks so much for your faithful prayers! You were an integral part of our team! Please be praying for the following items:
- Team members as they transition back home; that they would make a smooth transition home, yet be able to apply what they learned and experienced.
- The Lord would continue to work in the lives of the team members.
- Local church we partnered with as they do follow-up with the kids and adults.
- Each and every person we had contact with in Costa Rica; that the Holy Spirit would continue to work in their lives.
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