Hi Guys -Sorry I had not written anything in the last couple of days. It has been very busy here in Jujuy, Argentina. Even now, I am mildly sick and it is nearly 11 pm (I really need to get some sleep!) but I am trying to get into the rhythm of posting in this on-line journal every day - so - here goes.
I had a hard time getting up this morning. Our beloved Area Directors, Dave & Carol Ellis, are visiting us all the way out in Jujuy for the first time. Not only that, it is their first time ever to make it to this part of Argentina. So we are catching up with them, talking about all of the things we need to take care of in the short-term, sharing dreams and vision for the future, and showing them around. It is great fun and we are thrilled to have them here but it is also a lot of work and takes us out of our normal routine. I thrive in routine so it is double tough in that regard. Thankfully they are great friends and incredibly gracious people. : )
This morning I got up about 7:30 am (way later than I wanted, yet I could hardly get going). I got a little to eat, checked out some things on line as fast as I could, took a shower and prepped the car for the longest, hardest road test yet since it got out of the shop a few days ago. Then at 10 am we went to the hotel to pick up our AD's and show them a little bit of our amazing province.
Jujuy is divided into 4 main geographic areas - the Yungla (very wet, low lying, tropical climate), the valley (little higher, much drier and a little cooler - where we live in San Salvador de Jujyuy, the capital of our province), the Quebrada (climbing mountainous terrain, getting much drier and a cooler still) and the Puna (high mountain desert - and I do mean high!)
They had already seen a little bit of the Yungla & the Valley so now it was time to go for the other 2. We headed north on route 9 and visited many little towns along the Quebrada de Humahuaca, including but not limited to: Volcan, Purmamarca, Tilcara, & Humahuaca. It is a beautiful drive and quickly you go from the valley floor (4,100 ft) to over 8,000 ft in just 1 hour. The landscape changes rapidly and dries out greatly. To us, it is a thing of pure beauty. In Humauaca, Pastor Dave was so excited. It was a place he had often read about in Argentina's history, but had never seen. We drove around quite a bit and he snapped lots of pictures. : )Then we doubled back and went over the mountains on Route 52, winding, and winding, and winding, up, up, up until in 1 more hour we topped out at 13, 700 ft. What an incredible view. The road is extremely steep and I wish the STL SUV had 1 more gear between 1st & 2nd. We ran too high of RPM's in 1st gear, but could not keep our speed up in 2nd gear and had to keep bouncing back and forth between them. The good news - the vehicle ran great under a very heavy strain!
Once you start down the west side you come to a huge salt flat, Salinas Grandes. We drove across a large section of the flats, got out and took pictures, found some harvest pools and stuck our hands in (the water was ice cold even though the temp outside was nice), and licked our fingers afterwards (very salty!). The cool part was that if you wiped your hand on your shirt you could see the salt residue on it after it dried! After a time we reversed our direction and headed for home. We stopped in Purmamarca to look around, let the kids run and play a bit and to buy some local crafts. In the central square of the town, it is completely surrounded by people selling their stuff. It is a huge amount of stuff for such a little place! Beautiful stuff thought. Heather bought 2 Andean blankets & a scarf to use for display when we return to the US. So cool looking.
Finally we returned to San Salvador de Jujuy, everyone trying to get their ears to pop. Our AD's were kind enough to treat us to dinner at Mostaza - a Burger King knock off in our little mall and to pay for the kids to play for a time afterwards in the arcade. They had a blast and are very grateful to them. : )
Finally we dropped them off at their hotel, headed home, and worked on getting the kids to sleep. Tomorrow is another big day.
Love you all
God bless you and give you a great night
If God gives you the chance to climb the high mountains in your life and (literally) get above the clouds - take it! There is nothing like it. : )
Paz, favor, poder en el Espíritu Santo -
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