To Kribi: 2020

 

What A God We Serve

A vacation planned by God.

I needed to get away. God knows how much I needed to SEE other places and HEAR other sounds. So, He planned a family getaway.

Needed: a little extra cash to pay for it all – done in November

                a vehicle worthy of the trip -  done  early in December

               someone to care for our dogs in our absence – this was no easy task, since the dogs cannot be together any more, so the caretaker needed to be willing to be at our house for quite a while each time the dogs would need food or to get outside. A young new missionary was willing to help, and stay here some of the nights!
            
                another missionary friend to make the journey with …This is where the story gets interesting. Due to some difficult driving experiences in the past and our relative lack of French, we are far more comfortable driving in caravan with someone when we travel outside of Yaounde. When I found out that some families were going on vacation at the time we could also go I asked if we could tag along for the driving. Funny thing is, they’ve had similar bad experiences like us, but in reverse: our troubles happened while traveling alone, theirs while traveling with a caravan. So, when we asked them about driving together, they all said, “No, we are going to travel independently.”  Now at that point, I thought we were going on the same day and proceeded to make our plans because at least we knew that someone else that we knew would be on the road not too far away if we ran into trouble. But I couldn’t find a place to stay near where I thought they were going to be. Funny thing is, they were staying in a completely different area than where I was looking! In the meantime, another family was thinking of a vacation too. They knew the places down at Kribi far better than we and actually took the last room available at the location near the other friends!  But, funny thing is this couple was  more than happy to do the drive in tandem. They made a suggestion of a hotel not far from the group and we booked a room! (and considering we took the room sight unseen, it wasn't a bad choice) 

                The drive began on Tuesday morning and away we went with God and our friends. Our friends led the way. Though we know how to get there, it is the events along the route that get us all worked up. I know it is not a nice thing to say but THEY got stopped at the speed trap and we drove through. (This "speed trap" is a whole other story so just accept my statement as is and move on!) Then we were together again at the town mid way through the drive where most stop for gas and a little stretch break. We went separate ways to get our different choices for lunch and met them on the outskirts of town to get on the road again for the final part of the trip. Not far out of town we were both stopped by a ‘security’ check. (You never know, really, what the checks are there for. Some are police, some are speed, some are legitimate security – like asking for the emergency road supplies that all vehicles are required by law to carry.) Our friends were done in about 2 seconds but the officials wanted to inquire about us a bit longer. But we were soon free of them and on our way again. One thing that the people at that check were attempting to communicate to people is that the road ahead was dangerous with huge holes. Funny thing is, we are pretty sure one of those holes was the cause of our next God event. Our left front tire blew out. Shredded.

 Yes, we had a spare. But in this unfamiliar car we knew we were gonna be working on that for a WHILE. But God said, “No, remember, I arranged this trip with capable friends.” We called them; they turned around and came to the rescue. They could access their jack immediately; ours was buried. 

 

They have plenty of experience changing tires; us, only a little. The guy under the car is our friend's son.

 

 We stopped right in front of this building that happened to have a pile of cement rubble that was just what we needed to raise the truck so their jack would fit. 

 

We happened to stop right where a couple of young strong men were standing near the road, available to help us. One of them is in the picture above. I think we were back on the road in about 20 minutes and drove slow to the gas station not too far down the road to balance the air in the tires. We also weren’t too far from the outskirts of Kribi, where our hotel was. 

 

 

 

So, we arrived in the middle of the afternoon, settled in and went and found all our friends! 

                  Yes, Muz, that beautiful big dog belongs to one of our friends!