May 28

We were able to lay down a little on the flight. The planes usually aren't too full on Wednesdays so we each grabbed an empty row and were able to curl up and sleep a little.

Arrived in Santiago 7am local (Atlantic time), customs was no problem we declared a stick of Pepperoni which caused some interest but they let it come in.

We waited till 1:00 for our flight and they informed us the flight would probably be cancelled due to fog in Balmaceda. They advised everyone to go home as the airline didn't provide any help for weather caused delays or cancellations. They finally gave folks an option of going as far as Puerto Montt and see if the weather had cleared in Balmaceda. We elect to go on as we have no where to stay in Santiago anyway.

In Puerto Montt we wait around a while and finally they tell us the flight is cancelled.
However they do surprise those of us who tried to make it with the information that they will put us up for the night.

We all load on a nice bus and head for town. We end up at the new Holiday Inn which is attached to the mall. It overlooks the bay and our room has an incredible view. How nice!

We ate in the mall and crashed.

May 27

Wow, what a month!

April 22: Through our Kansas family we received a miracle in our finances. In a few minutes we went from needing another year at least to raise our budget to having it all raised!
We were and still are overwhelmed by this. It also meant quite a shift in gears.

So in a few days we went from scheduling services and itineration mode to get all the stuff we can think of for the next 4 years mode.

The next month was spent in a frenzy of planning, shopping, and packing.

The MasterCard people really like us.

May 21 the container arrived and we started loading it. They picked it up on the 26th and today we head to the airport.
Our flight to Chile leaves at 5:30 pm.

Regal treatment

One neat thing that happened while we were in Florida was when we went by Regal marine to thank them for their help with our previous boat.
Tim Kuck (Co-owner of Regal) was very gracious and offered to let us pick through some of their scratch and dent items. Rhonda and I spend a very happy morning going through several bins full of nice boat supplies. When we got done we were informed that we would receive the hundreds of dollars worth of equipment free of cost! They even shipped all of it to Savannah, GA for us!
We really appreciate the generosity of our friends at Regal.














Tim Kuck and I





Here we are sitting with Rodney Dameron (head of parts) assessing our needs for the new boat.

Busy summer!

One of the things we recently have been able to do is work a little on our boat. Here's a couple pics on what it's like now.

Chaiten

On May 2 a volcano 6 miles from the town of Chaiten started erupting.

We've visited this town a number of times and it's sad to see the destruction.

Here's a number of photos I've gleaned of the internet that might give you an idea of what's happening:

Update

Hi everyone!
Been a while since I've updated this. I'll try to keep up, at least for a while =]
Rhonda and I are doing fine, we're back in the states for a year. We've been back since mid-March and hope to finish deputation by next March.
We have lots of travel ahead of us and we hope to see some of you. Let me know if we meet and you've read this!
Steve

Since the big quake things have been a lot calmer. We are down to just a few small quakes a day.

There has been no success in finding the bodies of the missing. One item of interest: Although they haven't found any of the tsunami missing they did find 2 bodies floating in the fjord. They say they had nothing to do with the quake or tsunami. Hmmm

Some of the tsunami waves reached as far as 500 meters inland.

These photos show some of the huge landslides that occured at the time of the earthquake. They were in part responsible for the tsunami.

Earthquake and tsunami Puerto Aysen

Saturday April 21, 2:00 pm local time we suffered our largest earthquake ever. It registered over 6.2 on the Ricter scale and produced some damage in town, large landslides, a 6 to 15 meter tsunami, and at least 10 deaths.

Rhonda and I are fine as are most of the folks we know. We have power restored but our water is still not potabale.

Everything points to the cause being volcanic as eyewitnesses say they saw large rocks shoot out of the water along with smoke and steam. We also smelled a lot of sulphur after.

I'll try to keep you posted as I can.

Earthquakes

In the last 7 years we have had no tremblors, earthquakes, shaking, nothing. Then, without warning, we began to experience small to moderate earthquakes. Lots of them. In the last month they say we have expierienced over 2000! Most are real small and some have caused some damage.

Now they are saying the cause is due to a new volcano trying to emerge near our town. (possibly some 15 miles away) The depth (epocenter) of the quakes is steadily decreasing and is now about 2 miles deep.

Needless to say everyone is quite concerned and some people are now sending their children to live in Coyhaique some 40 miles away. I'll try to keep you posted and we solicit your prayers for our protection and wisdom as we face this new challenge.

In Puerto Cisnes 80 people attended the closing service!

In January we received a team of young people from the central part of Chile. They came down for several weeks to minister to the churches and towns in Patagonia.

The team consisted of 7 of us in all. We travelled quite a bit in the region visiting a number if towns. 7 people with luggage in a car built for 5 at most was kind of challenging!

To get to Cochrane we had to travel many hours of sometimes beautiful and sometimes dangerous roads.

The town of Cochrane sits near the end of the Austral highway.

For a full week we had colder temperatures in our area then they had in Antartica. Brrrr!

Well, it's August. And on this end of the planet that means winter! The airport (our principal means out of the region) has been closed a lot, roads are slick, and LOTS of firewood is being burned. In other words, things are kinda normal.

We recently found a fishing camp near here. A number of fishermen live in very rustic and hazardous conditions for many days at a time as they try to earn a living for their families.

Latest photo!