Minga

What is a Minga?  I'm glad you asked, a Minga is a house-moving; Patagonian style.
The need:
A women in Puerto Cisnes had 2 kids, when the oldest was 14 she informed her husband she had fooled him and the eldest wasn't really his.  He went out into the woods and hanged himself.  6 months later she was married to another guy and had another kid.  The first 2 were apparently living in deplorable conditions so the community decided to give the 2 teens (17 & 15) their own house.
The challenge:
The city built a small house for them.  The problem is that it's on the other side of the bay.  Looks like over a mile across.  The house needs to be moved from it's current location, across the bay, and through town to get to it's site.
The solution:  A Minga.
How it's done:
Get a few boats, tie the house to them and float it across the bay.

Then, get a couple strong ropes.

Add a few willing helpers,

Then pull like crazy!

Yes, we helped pull :-]

Check out the video:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jj12OH7QbSM

Boat work

Got engine 2 (starboard) working.  Got the ignition switches figured out and corrected.  Seems some wires were crossed.
Got the radar installed and working.  Pretty cool to see the mountains and bridge on it :-]
Water pump is not working, trying to figure that one out.  Also the fuel pump for the heater won't work. 
We need to get fuel now.  Figured it up and the main tanks will hold around 350 gallons.  That will be around $1400 dollars.  gulp

Boat work

Been working every day (except Sunday) on the boat.  Yesterday we got one engine running, today we hope to get the other.  Found lots of problems to overcome, wiring done wrong among them.  Got the spotlight installed and working and the radar installed.  I have to wire the radar and that looks to be kinda involved.  I have the windlass installed and now need to wire it as well.

Lets all go down to the river...

Today the church in Puerto Aysen had an all day baptism and cook out.  We loaded up in a bus and cars and headed up the canyon some 40 minutes.  Later we had a short service by the river and buried this group of new believers in a water grave!
Here's  a few pictures from it:

8 new believers added to our Fathers kingdom!

Local version of a BBQ.

Puerto Gala

Our church leader called from Cisnes to tell me about something neat.  One of the members there in Cisnes is actually from Puerto Gala and has family there.  The only way to reach Gala is by boat and is one of our target islands for the boat ministry.  Well, seems this guy (Leo) hasn't been idle sharing his faith with his family and now it looks like we have an entire family of new believers waiting for us in Gala!  They have offered us their home to hold meetings in!

Please pray we get the boat fixed up and running asap!

The 13th of Jan a friend (Dennis Gross) and his wife are supposed to arrive and work on getting the boat ready for launching.  Please pray for this couple!

Rainfall

Well, emptied the rain gauge for the last time for 2010.

Total was 119.3 inches for the year.

Heat wave and drought

Driest spell we've ever seen here.  The drought is in it's 10th day.  Ok, so maybe it's not a drought to you but to us that's DRY!  Got clear up to 82 degrees, too.

Christmas eve

We celebrated Christmas in the traditional way here.  We got together with pastor Hector and family and did a BBQ!

This is summer now and the weather was nice.  I put the food on the grill 10 pm, no problem as it was still light out.  Gets dark around 11 pm.  We sat down to eat around 11 and opened presents on Christmas morning.  Got to bed after 1.