we´re in colonia nova!!!!

We made it! We are half way with our big Brazil trip! We took off this morning from Blumenau about 9 am, and flew 3 hours and 45 minutes to Bage. But first we circled around Colonia Nova, about 5 times, and got their attention, then flew to Bage to land. Walter Wall and Helmuth Boschmann picked us up from the airport and drove the half hour to Colonia Nova. We are now all settled in at David and Ingrit Martens and Tante Marichen...

We´d like to thank you all so much for praying for us and sending your messages, they are much appreciated! Today´s flight went very well, very smooth and super clear skies, exactly what we wanted, especially when we were buzzing 300 feet over Colonia Nova...that was fun.

Thanks again, we will stay here for about a week, and then we plan to fly on to Iguacu...

Stay tuned...thanks again, don´t forget to come back!

blumenau update

We`re planning to fly to Bage, Colonia Nova, on Friday morning. We are staying here in Blumenau a little longer than planned because of the weather. The plane got an oil change yesterday because it already had 50 hours on it.

Today, in the meantime, we are going to the beach in Camboriu...where the Walls have 2 chocolate stores...yummmm....

Check back in a few...

only a few of our people and other stuff

our lovely cousin darlene and her son...

tia irene and julia

the penner gerber penner´s and milton...(and another julia) :)

tiny villa velha (sp?)

ponta grossa airport with witmarsum relatives


funny

blumenau

self explanatory

smoke & windsocks

We had a nice send off from Ponta Grossa this morning, from our Witmarsum relatives. We took off this morning at 9:45 am, and flew 55 minutes to Blumenau. It was a very short and easy flight. There are more mountains here, so it was a little different flying so low through the mountains. When we spotted the airport, we flew quite low trying to find out what direction the wind was going, as we couldn´t find the windsock (we found out after we landed that there were two). So since we couldn`t find a windsock, we started looking for smoke, alas, there was none to be found. We chose to land on ´´36´´, and later found out that landing the other way, ´´18´´ is forbidden, good to know. We even started looking which way the cows were grazing, because they always graze into the wind. Some tips we learned from our friend Hans Wiebe. Thanks Hans!

So now we are staying at the Walls here in Blumenau, in their 12th floor apt, which has an amazing view of the city....it`s HOT here.

We can`t get pictures up without using our lap top, no wireless...so it may be awhile until you get to see pictures.

We will stay here 2 days and then fly on to Bage....`til then...

due to popular demand...some pictures from the last week..

We have had a great time visiting all our relatives here in Curitiba and also Witmarsum. It was too short to see some people, but it was great the little time we had here...thank you to all the people that took us in and fed us, and drove us around to show us the sights. We appreciate it so much, even the extra pounds...:)

Tomorrow we will continue flying, on to Bluemenau for a few days, and then on to our final destination of Bage. Keep thinking of us...as we will start flying again after such a long break.

Hope all is well back home...

guaratuba
doris and lori in the condo on the praia
curitiba
churassco
fish pond and bbq area
parrots at our uncle and aunt's "farm"

curitiba time

We had a nice break in Witmarsum and are now with some more relatives in the big city of Curitiba. Quite a different atmosphere than the farms in Witmarsum. We visited lots in Witmarsum with relatives (danke Marly), and ate too much, don´t know if the plane will take off now with all the churascos (bbq)in our stomachs. Tomorrow we are going to the praia (the beach), Guaratuba, and relax at the ocean...it´s a tough life. We are going to stay here in Curitiba until Sunday, and then back to Ponta Grossa where the plane is and then off to Blumenau...

Everything is going great, but we don´t miss the plane....and the guarana is great Joe...

Stay tuned....

witmarsum

We are now in Witmarsum. We had a very good flight from Anapolis to Ponta Grossa. Our total flying time was 48.5 hours. We are planning to stay here for a week to ten days including Curitiba. We don´t want to deal with plane stuff as long as possible then after the break we will continue flying. Next we are going to fly to Blumenau then our final destination of Bage.

Internet access isn´t that accessible these days, so bear with us...

Thanks so much for the prayers and the comments...

we made it to anapolis

Oi, tudo bem? That means hi, everything well? We think. We took off this morning from Araguacema and flew to Palmas to get fuel and then flew to Anapolis. We flew about 3 and a half hours today. We met a Canadian that works at the airport and got a parking spot in a hangar, which is cool. The hangar belongs to MAF, it has a portuguese name. We are going out to dinner soon with the missionaries that we just met. Tomorrow we are planning to fly in the morning to Ponta Grossa, where we are planning to stay a week. We will make a "driving" trip to Curitiba which is only about 45 minutes away from Witmarsum. It'll be good to take a break as its been a little stressful. We still have a ways to go to our final destination which is Bage.

Keep thinking of us, we love the messages and we hope everyone is well....

araguacema

We took off this morning from Belem, with some delays, they wouldn`t let us take off right away, but eventually we were off. We had a 3 and a half hour flight to araguacema, where we are staying with our cousin Frank Penner. We had a nice lunch and then we went on the river araguaia in a small boat and saw the sights. We will stay here for two days and then on Wednesday we will fly to Anapolis. It is good to have a break and not stay in a hotel....stay tuned!!! Thanks for the encouragement and comments, we appreciate them....

hopefully we will get some pictures up soon...

we are in belem, brazil!!!

Success! we will update later, as my time at the internet cafe here in the airport is almost up! \we had a great flight....more to come as soon as we can get to another wifi spot....we will spend the night here in belem and then fly tomorrow to araguacema...another 3 hour flight....but we~re in brazil!!!

guyana anyone?

Hello Everyone!! We woke up in St. Lucia, went to the airport and was guided through the process with relative ease, Thanks Zookie. We flew 1 hour to Grenada to get gas and then customs....again. Which took over 2 hours with us running around the humid airport like chickens. It was something like this, fill this out, go there, oops don't have the right papers, then a long moment of finding out our options, then go file a flight plan, but you can't get into that office unless you go through immigration and get your bags checked, then 2 or 3 times more of that then we were able to go. Then we were off to Georgetown, Guyana, where we arrived 3 hours later. Customs? Was a breeze, very nice people. We even made a friend and swapped addresses. Now we are in a hotel and got settled in minutes before a down pour. We are going to try to enter Brazil tomorrow!!!!

We've flown 31 hours total from home to here, we've gone through 6 countries already, in 1 week and 1 day. Not too bad....

Have a good Easter weekend everybody!! We will miss the Penner family reunion, we'll be there next time.

Bye for now...

ps...we decided today after the chaos of customs to not land in Suriname...as they require a visa to enter the country, and even though we wanted to refuel there, we just didn't want to take the risk. So from here to either Belem or if we don't get that far, we will land in French Guiana, in Cayenne...

pics: top: swimming in st. lucia, second: hotel in st. lucia, third, this morning taking off from st. lucia, with the huge cruise ship in the background, bottom pic: border of Venezuela and Guyana....

we're in st. lucia (halfway to our final destination-southern brazil)

What a day. We left this morning from Provo, Turks and Caicos...and flew 3 and a half hours to St. Thomas, Virgin Islands. We decided to go on from there to Grenada, but not without going through the trials of customs! Yay! Customs! Our favorite! Finally after around 2 hours of waiting and utter confusion, we took off from St. Thomas and only got so far as St. Lucia, the sun was setting faster than we thought and so we changed our plan and landed here. After more chaos and confusion in customs we made it to our cute little hotel...finally something decent, where we may actually feel safe. And they are actually friendly here, so that makes the experience that much better. We will take off tomorrow morning and fly on to Grenada and beyond perhaps to Suriname.

Thanks again for all the comments, we forgot all our troubles and tiring day, when we read them....all the best back home and beyond....keep in touch!

Here are some pics to make you drool....we love St. Lucia...

ps...none of these pictures are of st. lucia, as we arrived here at sunset, so it got dark quite quickly...the top of enroute to St. Thomas, the second pic is the St. Thomas airport, the third picture is taking off from St. Thomas and the bottom is the view from our Turks hotel room...

turks and caicos

Hey...finally found a hotspot, to do some blogging. Updates may not be as frequent as before as we aren't finding wifi connections as easily. We took off yesterday from Jonesboro, Arkansas, and then we flew to West Palm Beach, Florida. It took us about 6 hours, in two legs. We stayed in a crappy motel and then left asap the next morning for the airport. We left this morning around 9:45 and flew into the Bahamas, and now we are all nice and cozy in our island hotel here in Providenciales, Turks & Caicos. We had to buy some minutes to get online, so can't say too much...but we will say IT'S HOOOOOOOOOT! Really beautiful here, the flight was incredible, everything went really well. Hope everything is well at home, we thank you so much for your prayers and thoughts, we can feel them as we fly! Thank you so much!!! Again, updates won't be as frequent...but we will try as often as we can. Tomorrow, we hope to fly to St. Thomas, Virgin Islands and then on to Grenada....stay tuned....

staying put

We're staying put here in Jonesboro, Arkansas. The weather is good here but the weather elsewhere isn't. Nothing is going as planned but that is what we expected. We're staying at a Holiday Inn and we thought it would be better. Our room has no windows to the outside, only windows to the massive hallway. The weather doesn't look so good for tomorrow here either but we hope that it will change.

We'll keep you posted.

update for monday

We are still sitting here in our hotel in Jonesboro, Arkansas half hour north of Memphis Tennessee. We have decided to wait a little while as there are bad thunder storms South of us towards Alabama. So, no go for Florida today, perhaps....but we will try for one leg this afternoon, landing in Tuscaloosa or Montgomery. So we're grounded for now...

here are some pictures from the last couple days

Somewhere on the way from Montana to Wyoming...it was so cold
The Schroeder Farm (Moundridge, Kansas)
Our host Richard Schroeder (on the far left) in Kansas
Us 3 ready to take off from Hutchinson, Kansas

i don't think we're in kansas anymore

After taking the morning off in Hutchinson, Kansas, the weather was so beautiful we decided to fly one more leg closer to Florida. So we took off about 2:00 pm and had a two and a half hour flight to Jonesboro, Arkansas. We flew over Witchita, Kansas, to Tulsa Oaklahoma and then made our way to Jonesboro, where we are spending the night at a hotel. Tomorrow we hope to fly to West Palm Beach, Florida, we should be able to make it in about 5 hours, with one landing in between. We find ourselves asking, "where are we now???"

Thanks for all your messages, they encourage us and we love reading them...keep thinking of us....tune in tomorrow.

storm stayed in kansas

We decided to stay an extra day in Kansas. We are staying at the Schroeder's farm in a town called Moundridge. Our dad met Richard Schroeder when he went to Thailand a few years ago and it worked out perfectly to land and stay here. We appreciate the hospitality. It's actually really beautiful here, and supposed to get quite warm, but there are thunder storms towards our next destination which is Tuscaloosa, Alabama, near Birmingham. It's nice to relax for a bit, and hopefully our next leg won't be as turbulent. We'll be back...