More blessings than we can count!

Today has been such a full day with so many events to share that I will only be able to hit the highlights.  We began the day with breakfast and leaving the hotel for our trip to Ambato.  We hated to leave our lovely hotel in Quito, but will be back on Thursday.  Diane's friend, Ruth, joined us on our overnight trip to Ambato, and Mauricio's son Alejandro joined him, so our group was larger than usual.

We traveled the Pan American Highway down what Diane referred to as Volcano Alley, since it has so many volcanoes on both sides of the highway.  As it happens, we have brought our own hair stylist with us.  Baylee managed to do three of the girls with french braids for the day while we traveled.

Early in the morning the sky was blue and clear with only wispy clouds here and there, but as we got closer to Cotopaxi National Park the cloud cover moved in, hiding the gigantic snow-capped peak of the highest active volcano in the world.  As we drove closer and closer and got deeper into the park we were disappointed that we were not able to view the famous volcano.  After driving into the park as far as we were going, the bus stopped and we all got out.  While we were standing there, the clouds moved slightly, exposing part of a glacier on one side of the mountain.  We gathered our group together for a photo.

As we stood there, suddenly the clouds lifted an the magnificent Cotopaxi was in full view.  It was truly an awesome sight to behold.  We were told by our guide and Diane that many people come to Cotopaxi and are never able to see even part of it and we were treated to a complete view of the huge volcano.  What a blessing that was!

Finally we had to almost drag ourselves away from the view, and just as quickly as the clouds had cleared the mountain, they returned and again hid the top of the volcano from our view.  As we drove out of the park and on our way Olen presented some devotional thoughts about mountains in the Bible, and then we sang, "Lord, I Believe" and several other songs appropriate for the occasion while we rode along.

Lunch was at another delightful restaurant Diane had selected for us, and she had a special surprise planned for all of us.  As we ate, an authentic Ecuadorian band came to our area to preform for us.  The number they began with was "Happy Bitrthday", to mark the day for Tim, who is celebrating this special day with his dad on a trip to Ecuador!  How special is that?

We all enjoyed the music and seeing the unusual instruments they were playing.  There was much audience participation in the form of clapping in time with the music, and many, many photos were taken while they played and after it was all over.

Our hotel in Ambato is small and very lovely.  We have the entire hotel just for our group, which makes it special.  It is a historic hotel reflecting the Spanish colonial era.

Late in the afternoon Segundo Toledo and Miguel Quinatoa came to talk with the men and guide us to the place where the church meets. 

We went by bus to the place of worship, which is in a location overlooking the town of Ambato.  Jim preached while Gary translated, and then Gary spoke to the group in Spanish.

While the adults listened to the sermons, several of the ladies took the children for a Bible class.  The children were precious.

After the Bible study time was over, several men spoke and expressed their appreciation for our visit.  Then Vicki and I took the ladies to another room and Vicki showed them some of the special materials we had brough to them to help teach their children the Bible.  They were all eager to learn and were extremely enthusiastic.

While we were talking to the ladies, the teenagers visited in the room below.  From the laughter and giggles, it was not obvious that there was a language barrier at all.  By the time we forced our girls to go to the bus, they had taken photographs of each other, exchanged e-mail addresses and become Facebook Friends.

Shirley, Lucy and Teresa Quinatoa visited for several minutes.

A full day?  Oh my, yes!
A wonderful day?  Definitely!
We had so many blessings today! Our hope is that your day has been full of blessings, also.