Picking up where we left off with our mission adventure…Santa Victoria is an isolated community along the Amazon River. There were NO stores to buy supplies. Say what?? Where was I going to buy my chocolate?? 🙂 Everything we brought for our trips to minister to the children had to be carried in first by plane if it traveled with our team and the supplies bought in Iquitos were added to our cargo and carried with us on the boat. Once we reached Santa Victoria everything was offloaded and then carried by hand up the embankments and into the villages. Toys, candy, written materials, musical equipment, food, you get the picture. No roads, just pathways to the villages. No hand trucks, dollies or carts, just hands carrying the load. There were plenty of people willing to help us get our things to their final destination. It was a beautiful site.

It amazes me that anything the villagers need to buy requires a long, hot and humid walk to “catch a ride” on a boat and then travel 3 hours to the city of Iquitos. Then they have to travel 3 hours back! Guess I never want to run out of anything while cooking since it’s not just a quick ride in the car to the corner grocery store.

Here I am carrying boxes of empanadas (“Flaky dough-like” sandwiches filled with meat, vegetables or cheese). They are really, really, did I mention REALLY good. At the end of the program all the children would be fed a meal. I loved this part! Yeah well I am all about a good meal. Anyway…the musicians that traveled with us had to carry their equipment, guitars, keyboard, amplifiers. Glad I only had to carry empanadas!

You can imagine that by the time we got to the village we were hot and sticky and had really worked up a sweat! And I think it dawned on us finally that everything that was carried in had to be carried back out except the trash which would be burned.

But it was all worth it to be a part of the program. It was WORTH the effort to see the smiles and happiness on their little faces. It was exciting to be able to come into their lives if only for a few brief hours, provide a diversion from their life, bring laughter and the knowledge that they are LOVED.

Grateful to be In His Grip,

Stephanie