Last night we went to bed early (4:30am) and woke up to be picked up by Vini at 7;00am! Jason, Risa, Jessie, and Christen embarked on a two and a half hour trek to Gramado, an affluent tourist town nestled in the mountains of southern Brazil. The trip there was stunning. Seeing the sun rise over the mountains was such an incredible way to start the day!
We met up with Jonatas Rocha (whose spiritual life was impacted from the 2004 mission team), who lives Nova Petropolis, a town close by to Gramado and had espresso and a late breakfast at a cafe in this quaint German city. Vini took us to his favorite place in Nova Petropolis which was a maze made out of bushes in a park. Unlike Kihei, the weather was cool, crisp, and sunny...perfect weather for our day of exploring!
Next, we headed to the city of Gramado to stroll around the Lago Negroe, a beautiful lake. Jessie and Risa took a Swan boat out on the lake to paddle around while Jason and the others drank expressos.. We took lots of pictures and spent time walking around on a path that circled the lake. We walked around downtown for awhile, soaking up the sights and sounds of a different cultural life.
Our final visit in the Gramado area was to the Parque do Caracol. We were stunned by the enormous waterfall that greeted us when we entered the park. Vini, Jessie, Jonatas, and Risa decided to walk down the 730 degraus (stairs) to the bottom of the waterfall. It was a breeze on the way down, but quite strenuous on the way back up!! We decided that it was "vale a pena" or "worth it" for the view looking up on the 130 meter tall waterfall!!
Once back to Bom Retiro, Jessie and Risa got to teach worship workshop #3 and Christen had English classes. We relied on God´s strength and were able to finish our day strong.
Come and see what God has done, how awesome his works in man's behalf!
--Psalm 66:5
From the Team
Risa, Jessie, Jason
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