Mount Parades:Need I say more?

This is the mountain that we climbed!

Look at all the lush foliage around us. Oh so gorgeous!

Drinking cold sachet water(water from a bag) in the village after our ascend to the mountain. Ahh refreshing!

Dream come true, playing soccer with local kids up on the mountain and its on grass. That hasn't happened since America!

We made it to the top of Mount Gemi, the tallest point in Ghana! This is our hotel from Mt. Gemi. Notice that it isn't commercialized, just it and God's beauty!

Were lost in the jungle! Don't worry we had a path!

Cathy on the porch of Mount Paradies before we went hiking. Doesn't she look ready to go?

This was the first day we got to the Volta region at a small waterfall and swimming hole. We kept dry except for the sweat dripping off of us!

If Cathy was looking for rest on this trip, she came to the wrong place(she knew better though since I was in charge of th planning) because the day after Christmas we found ourselves back out on the road heading to the Volta Region. Ghana is broken up into regions instead of states. I live in the Great Accra Region(Go figure), Auntie Jean lives in the Eastern Region and then the Volta Region is about two hours away. When you are a tour guide in Ghana without a car or clear idea of public transportation and never been to some of the places before, it causes a little bit of stress but Cathy was patient and graious with me as it was just hard to get around. God worked things out so nicely as we were able to get a ride to the Volta with a family from school. They were going with several families and it was so kind to let us tag along. So we sat in a truck for three hours as we headed to a different part of the country. I actually saw more wildlife and plants than cars and people. It was amazing and so refreshing to get out of the city. I didn't even hear any airplanes go over once when I was there. We passed small villages and monkey sanctuaries as we came closer to mountains and God's beauty! The real jungle is better than the metal jungle back in Accra! We stayed at a place called Mount Paradise which left us on a very bumpy road to a secluded place to ourselves. We spent the first day hiking down to a swimming hole(no, not brave enough to get in the fresh water here) using ropes to climb up and down. We then spent the evening having dinner and playing games with the family. It just so happend that there were two volunteers a little young than myself who were also traveling with the families. I know that one of them for sure was not a Christian so it was just an amazing time to build relationship with these girls. You could tell the one had had a rough past and although I wanted to scream out, "know Jesus" I knew it was more important to just love on her. God is so amazing to have paths cross even if it was two days. I pray that a seed was planted and someone soon will come along to water it.

The next day after we arrived, we began our treck up Mount Gemi which is supposedly the highest point in Ghana. Don't get that excited about how awesome we are, because it really wasn't that tall, but tall for Ghana! The path had been overgrown so for the first part we had to push aside leaves and branches to make our treck up. My calves thanked me for the workout several days later! At one point, we were told to look for a path to the left so we would go up instead of down(makes sense since we were climbing up to the top of a mountain!) Anyways, we missed the trail and instead started to descend. For awhile, we were excited for the descend instead of the ascend, a nice break for our bodies, but then a realization came, "we probably shouldn't be going down." Instead of finding ourselves closer to reaching the top, we had taken a nice detour by little streams and farmers plants. Thus, we had to turn around and start the treck up, at least 20 minutes, to get back to the point where we had to turn to the left. As we were trecking back up, this detour reminded of our own spiritual path. Sometimes, we are looking for God's direction, his path, but we don't look close enough for it so we just make our own path which seems pretty great. Life is smooth until we finally realize it was the wrong direction, it wasn't God's path but our own we decided to take which gets us into trouble. Thankfully God is gracious and allows us to turn around and find His path. Yeah, on the way back up, it wasn't fun, we had wasted so much time and some of the younger boys were waiting up at the top for us, but that is like our walk with Christ. We have to admit the mistake and walk towards Christ even when it may be hard and we have let others down. I am so thankful for the new mercies that God graciously gives us each day.

Well, we finally made it to the top to see the gorgeous view of surrounding villages and our own hotel. There are several villages up at the top but there are roads for people to travel up there. It is such an accomplishment to reach a goal and witness God's beauty, especially on a Sunday. We then made our way to water where we quenched for water, who knew you could get so thirsty on the way up. I thought I was seeing a mirage but no in real life, there was a soccer field up at the top with grass on it so I played for a little with the children and I even scored a goal. This was my first time playing on grass since being in Ghana and oh it felt good! Yes, it is the little things in life that get you excited! Going all the way up was worth it as the trip down was like walking through a tropical paradise. The luscious foliage and quiet drips of water greeted us at every turn. We walked through small villages where they were doing there normal routines of washing clothes in the river, cooking, or making something. I struggle with the fact sometimes that I am able to have an enjoyable hike up a mountain, come back to electricity, and eat a filling meal. Most of the people we pass do not have that luxury as they are working to survive. I don't know how to grasp all of this in my mind yet, it just seems wrong but again I do like my life so trying to combine the two is still a work in progress. The next day we went to a waterfall, which long story short ended up taking us out of our way and a little later than we wanted as we were going to trotro back. You might be asking, but you had a free ride there, what did you make them mad and they are making you suffer on a trotro? No, don't worry, it was our choice(are we crazy) because we needed to get back a day sooner to go to Cape Coast. We finally found the trotro station where the first guy we met was looking for two passengers to Accra, we accepted! Cathy sat in the front and I sat two rows back where we immediately saw a lady with a chicken sitting behind Cathy. It was breathing heavy as she tried to wrap it up in a scarve. Finally, the driver made her put the chicken in a box which Cathy was thankful for as she had visions of the chicken pecking her in the head. Her head stayed undented as we traveled for two hours until we reached a checkpoint. Our trotro pulled over and then got out. He motioned for Cathy and then myself to get out. We assumed everyone had to get out of the trotro but as we looked around it was just two obruneis who had to get out. It was hard to know what was going on because English was limited but they told us that we needed to show passports. I told them that we didn't have them with us so they sent us to the head guy. I talked nicely to him and told him we teach in Accra but don't carry our passports with us. He really didn't give us a hard time, just told us to carry our passports with us next time and away we went on the trotro. This little incident was a small glimpse into what missionaries or others deal with on a daily basss in closed countries. We finally made it home close to the mall where the trotro dropped us off so we could catch a taxi. Even though we were only away in the quiet mountains for two days, we weren't ready for the culture shock that awaited us in the craziness of the city. There were so many people, noises, and lights. We couldn't wait to get back to the house but there we heard airplanes and loud music from the hotel nearby. We really had a culture shock! I guess I am not made for city life for too long! Being around the states has showed me how diverse God has created the world and the same is true here. Nothing will replace the simple life up in the mountains! Another successful trip in Ghana with a few heart beating moments but that is what you have to love about here, you always have a story no matter where you are!