Amapala

Today our church went to Amapala. Amapala is a small island on the Pacific Ocean that is a couple hours south of here with several small beaches. Small beaches are good. Makes it easier to keep up with a bunch of kids.

We get moving pretty early at Casa de Esperanza, but on beach day, we start a lot earlier. We were to leave at 5;30, but everyone was ready to go by 5:00. Karen has worked and organized all week. The housekeeping staff cooked all day yesterday so there would be plenty of food for the children. Can you imagine what we looked like with 18 children, two coolers and several beach bags full of towels, blankets, clean clothes and beach toys. And that was just us. The rest of the people from the church looked similar, maybe not quite as much.

After riding the bus for a couple of hours, we had to take a water taxi over to Amapala. It was beautiful and fun and thanks to a breeze blowing all day, not near as hot as the beach day last year.

After we had worship and communion, the kids laughed and played and rolled in the sand and ate and had fun all day. The tide was coming in most of the time we were there. There was just no where to go after it got so high. I did not like that, but it didn't seem to bother the kids. They just kept swimming and laughing.

Getting back to the mainland was a series of mishaps that were more Honduran experiences. One of those included burying Maryuri. She was in the floor and we pile bags and wet towels on her and then sat Katy on top of those. Maryuri was not hurt, but she was scared to death.

We got home and began to shower kids. Everyone rushed through showers and got in bed. They were exhausted. And to be perfectly honest, Karen and I both agreed we were spent, absolutely spent. We both said we got little enjoyment out of the day. But we both know we did it for the kids, not ourselves.

Terri