Kelli Climbs Volcano
by Kelli Hedding, Copyright November 15, 2004, all rights reserved. 296 views
I have been so blessed! I had the greatest day on Monday. It is so crazy to think that this little girl from central Illinois was standing were I was standing on Monday. Ok, maybe I am a little dramatic, but it feels almost like a dream now and I will treasure this experience forever.
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| From Misc Images |
Mount Soufriere, St. Vincent, Caribbean
I had been trying to organize a trip to the volcano in St. Vincent. The previous Monday I had been talking to a guy from the Philippines and a guy from Indonesia about volcanoes and I told them how I really wanted to see a volcano. I didn’t know then that there would be one in St. Vincent. I was now in St. Vincent and the base of the volcano was an hour’s drive away. I tried to organize a trip but I couldn’t. I just didn’t know how. So I prayed about it and really left it completely in the Lord’s hands. I kept mentioning my desire every chance I got in hopes of finding someone who was going or could give me some advice on how to get there. I mentioned it one evening and found out that a group was going. I got really excited and asked if I could join them. The guy said no, that the group was already larger than they wanted. I told him that if anyone dropped out to let me know. He didn’t really sound like he wanted me to come so I kind of gave up then and there. (He was a German and sometimes I think he is a little prejudiced against Americans.) The next day, Sunday, I went on a ministry team and when I came back one of the guys from the group going to the volcano told me that there was a possible opening for me. Then I didn’t hear anything more about it for the rest of the day.
I went to bed at 10:00 expecting to get up and go to the beach on the outing organized for the whole ship’s company. I was awakened at 10:30 by my roommate telling me, “6:30”. I was slightly annoyed and asked, “what about 6:30”. “That’s when you’re supposed to meet for the volcano tomorrow.”
Hallelujah! I was so excited, I had trouble sleeping after that. I fell asleep praying God’s blessing on the trip. I woke up at 4:00 excited to go; too excited to sleep anymore. I tried because I knew I would need my rest. It didn’t happen. I had too much adrenaline and that adrenaline carried me through the day.
It was the craziest trip. It was like something you’d see on adventure TV shows to exotic places that normal people will never visit.
The morning started out with Vincent ( Germany) stumbling into the dining room after having thrown up. We have been taking hookworm tablets (some people on board were diagnosed with hookworms so we all had to take tablets in case more of us were infected) and many people are getting sick from them and having trouble sleeping. Vinnie came anyway despite feeling quite sick.
The bus rid was wonderful! (For me anyway) Imagine driving on the roads in the mountains or in Missouri at breakneck speeds in a van crammed full of people with the windows down and the horn honking at every curve to warn oncoming traffic because the road is barely wide enough for two cars to pass. It was as much fun as a rollercoaster. It was a beautiful ride!
Every ridge we drove around provided another gorgeous view of the valley and the village spread out bellow. Many of the houses weren’t much more than shacks. I almost felt like we were driving through tropical Indian villages or frontier towns. It was like a tropical Bisbee, AZ.
We arrived at the beginning of our hike and I learned that not everyone enjoyed the drive as well as me. Everyone was car sick except me. Vinnie threw up again. We set off on our hike. We walked to a little shack that sold drinks and the others bought cokes. I asked for a bathroom. The bathroom was an outhouse behind the shack with a little wooden toilet. As I was inside I heard a snorting and when I came out found a pig scratching his back on a palm tree behind the outhouse.
We walked to a beach of black sand. There were half dressed people running around carrying loads of rocks and carrying machetes and spears in front of tents. I am not making it up. It was the craziest thing. One of the half-dressed men used his spear to get us some passion fruit and golden apples. (Not what we know as apples. These you had to crack open on a rock if they weren’t ripe.) Another man explained how the spears are used in hunting animals. They showed us the trail up the mountain and we set out. The trail was a fairly deep gorge through black rock with tropical greenery spilling over the edge. We climbed out of the gorge and onto a trail eventually. The hike was beautiful. I felt like an early explorer or like one of those guys on Ring of Fire.
We hiked over many ridges. We could not see the top of the volcano. It was blanketed by a large gray cloud.
We stopped several times to rest. Vincent was really not feeling well. I did not feel tired at all. It felt like something was propelling my every step. I felt like I was flying. I WAS having trouble keeping my balance because I was so used to being on the ship and it has really been rocking in our berth (some have gotten seasick).
On the hike, we met several marijuana growers living off in the jungle in little cabins tucked off in clearings off the trail and across the valleys. They asked us if we smoke.
We began to worry about the time. The group was made up of Sonja ( Germany), Elizabeth ( Switzerland), Chung Eun (S. Korea), Anina (S. AFrica), Sam ( Germany) and Vincent ( Germany). The girls wanted to try and be back by 5:00 so they set a time were they were going to turn around. Vinnie and Sam and I wanted to make it. I was willing to do whatever. After all God was the one who had worked it out for me to be there and I knew I had no say in how far he would take me. We eventually decided to split up into a fast group and a slow group. I suppose you can guess what group I ended up in. It was me and the two German guys. Even though Vinnie was feeling horrible he still was determined. I don’t know why he wanted so badly to go back to that crater (he had been there before, just a few months ago) but it seemed really important to him.
I can’t remember the number of times we stopped and considered turning back. The guys were exhausted and we were almost out of water. I was out of water and was very thirsty. (No, Leon and Lucas, I didn’t learn from Gray’s and Torrey’s, but I have learned now) It was very hot. All of us had wet clothing from sweat including me. There was not a dry spot on my shirt anywhere. It all came from sweat. The sun was shining brightly and cheerfully.
Several times the guys wanted to give up but we all had this drive within us. Several times Vinnie threw himself down and said he couldn’t go any further. Sam and I convinced him to keep going.
The sun became blotted out. We were now in the gray cloud that blanketed the mountains. We still didn’t know where the top was and how close we were. Both boys threw themselves down this time and considered giving up. They prayed for wisdom and asked God to provide us with water. We decided to go just a little further. We came over the next ridge and there was the crater.
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| From Misc Images |
Soufriere crater
It was a beautiful sight. A deep bowl blanketed in soft green. The far side rose in green terraces higher than where we stood. In the center of the bowl was a huge mound. There was cloud of steam rising out of one side and small wisps of steam came from various other places. It also was covered lightly in green.
We made our way along the ridge and around the crater. We planned to go down the other (East) side. As we walked around the crater, I saw that through a hole in the clouds the sun was shining into the crater and there was a fragment of a rainbow hanging above the small lake that rests on one side of the crater. It was very peaceful. A very peaceful mountaintop experience. We came around to the other side of the crater and ran into some American tourist and their tour guide. They had some extra water bottles and gave them to us along with some fruit. God even provided for fools who trust in him.
We headed down the mountain at a pretty good clip. All three of us were rejuvenated. Vinnie no longer seemed tired or sick. We hiked down a lava flow. It began to pour down rain on us and rained the entire trip down. That did not matter to us. It didn’t make us much wetter than we already were.
Finally, we made it to the road and the end of the trail. It was much faster coming down and the East side was a shorter hike. We sat in a shelter and talked and rested for a while. My feet were killing me. Soon we headed off down the road toward town. We walked past banana plantations. I asked the guys about their feeling toward Americans because I had been bothered by some of their comments in the past. So we talked a little about politics.
I think they were pleased, though, when they found out how much German I have in me. Vinnie started claiming me as a German. The Germans seem to have this idea that Germans are crude. As we walked along the road, Vinnie let out a good burp. Sam, who was at least trying to have good manners for me, told him to behave. Vinnie said, “That’s all right. We’re all German.”
God was not done blessing us yet. The road came down overlooking the ocean where we got a view of a brilliant sunset over the crashing ocean waves. The waves were especially large that night. I told the guys that I had come to the conclusion that God was going all out to bless us this day. They agreed.
We crossed a roaring river where one man stood near the edge covered in soapsuds. In the dimming sunlight, another gave us instructions on how to catch a van to town. We were a little uncertain whether we would be able to get one but we weren’t worried. God would provide and he did. (We had been concerned all day about how to get back to the ship and even called the ship from the top of the volcano on the tour guide’s cell phone to see if they could send us a van to pick us up. That is a once in a lifetime experience: calling a ship from the top of a volcano.)
So we crammed into a van and rested on the long hour trip back to the ship. My knees were jammed into the seat in front of me; Sam was crammed in next to me and between him and Vinnie another passenger crammed himself in.
Vinnie, who really doesn’t talk much, got excited and asked the man, “You’re a pastor aren’t you?” It turned out that when Vinnie was in St. Vincent a few months earlier he had been on a church team to this guy’s church. It was amazing that Vinnie recognized him. Especially in the dark. It was bizarre.
We arrived back at the ship extremely tired but feeling abundantly blessed and loved by God. We all three had a story to tell about God’s providing for each of us in different ways. It was a sweet trip.
I will send another email about what is going on in my life soon with more information about some of the ministry I have been involved in and more about my job and various adventures. It’s beddy-bye time now.
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