Ok, this Ernesto is up and down like a yo-yo 😉

Seems each time I check the tracking sites the projection has changed again! Now Ernesto is expected to make landfall as a Category I hurricane a little more north than my last post indicated. So, looks like just a little north of Chetumal, Mexico, missing Belize altogether, although no doubt we will still get the effects from it…lots of rain and high winds.

I’ll likely be updating this again in a couple of hours the way things have been going 🙂

Maybe you’ve heard about Tropical Storm Ernesto? Well we’ve been keeping a close eye on it because it’s supposed to increase to a hurricane by Wednesday! The first predictions had it heading south of Jamaica, then on toward the Yucatan Peninsula and making landfall just south of Cozumel, but each day I check my hurricane app on my Android phone,  it is projecting a little more south… and now today I looked and it is supposed to make landfall just north of Belize City, which means we will be pretty much right in its path. But, not to worry, at this point they don’t expect Ernesto to progress to more than a Category 1, which only produces a max of 75mph. That’s enough to cause some surging on Caye Caulker though, so we’re still taking precautions… stocking up on water and food, etc.

Hmm… just checked again, and now they are predicting Ernesto to pick up to a Category 2… the latest headline reads “Tropical storm Ernesto rapidly intensifying, tracking towards Belize”… hmmm, well, that’s a little more serious!
The report says “The once-feeble tropical storm Ernesto is now an ominous and rapidly-intensifying storm heading for Honduras and Belize, likely as a hurricane….The storm is forecast to skim the northern coast of Honduras over the next couple of days before it makes landfall on Belize, likely as a hurricane early on Wednesday. NHC projects the storm will have maximum winds of 90 mph at that time.” (that is 145kph)

Well, hopefully it doesn’t decide to increase any more than that!

We’ll keep you posted!

As all true sailors know, you cannot sail directly into the wind. If a sailboat is pointed directly into the wind it’s called ‘in irons’. So the expression ‘sailing into the wind’ is synonymous with ‘making no headway’ and such is the case with our hopes to be able to preach to the outlying islands. Rich has found that it is impossible for him to get the captain’s licence he needs to operate a vessel here unless he is a resident of Belize or a property owner here. And so, it’s a ‘No Go’ like the illustration to the left shows. We’re pretty disappointed (especially Rich) over that, but we’re not going to do like the bottom illustration, turn and run the opposite way (giving up is a ‘don’t go zone’). We’ll keep it before Jehovah and maybe we’ll be able to get on a more favorable tack somehow.

We are having great success on land, with more bible studies and interested ones on Caye Caulker being added weekly! We had 39 in attendance for the public talk this past Sunday.

On another note, I ran out of paint to finish the last 4 feet of wall in our spare bedroom, so by scrounging up bits of colours I had left over in paint cans lying around, I gave us some water frontage 😉

If you look really hard you might see Rich waving from that sailboat out by the reef!

My service partner, Dion, snapped this photo of me on our way back from one of my bible studies out in the ‘New Site’ (a subdivision at the far south end of the island)

H2-O = Water… yep, lots and lots of that stuff falling from the sky lately and when it rains, it pours here!!

The sound it makes is undescribable and just when you think it couldn’t possibly get any louder, it does. The huge 1300 gallon vat (reservoir for collecting rain water) outside our bedroom window gets filled, then overflows for hours.

This happens daily during rainy season and is usually accompanied by high winds, lightning and thunder. If you get caught in these downpours, which both of us have, your clothes are completely drenched through within seconds! And they come up so fast without warning!

The sand streets become lakes of milky white liquid that one must navigate around or, with a little ingenuity, across.

Ren-O = Renovation. We ‘broke on through to the other side’ <- hey that’s an appropriate song since it was by the ‘Doors’! haha because after we cut the hole through the cement wall, we had an instant door 🙂

It’s amazing how instantly, just by creating that 3×7 opening, there was a whole different feeling to our home! It felt palatial!

It took 2 full days to accomplish… sawing through the cement and bashing with a mallet. And what a dusty job! Even though a tarp was put up, a thick layer of cement dust was covering everything!

Hmmm… wonder what was lying here during the reno 😉

C-O = Circuit Overseer

This past week was extra busy and exciting and ended as a very historic one for English-speaking brothers and sisters on Caye Caulker! Since we are not even an official group let alone a congregation, the C.O. could only visit us on one day, so those who had the means, travelled to San Pedro to take in the meetings and service arrangements. (since I had bible studies to go to on Wednesday, Rich and I came back for those then went back again to San Pedro for the rest of the visit). Then, on Saturday, the C.O. and his wife came over to Caye Caulker. We all had a little get-together after service and as we were sitting around eating and talking, he said that instead of his normal ‘concluding comments’, he would be giving a special talk just for Caye Caulker and that he’d be making a couple of announcements! So, at 2pm he gave us his public discourse, ‘Are You Making Jehovah Your Confidence’… so encouraging! Then, after the WT, we were ‘all ears’ and eager to hear what he was going to say to us. We weren’t disappointed! After reading the account at 2 Kings 14 about Elisha instructing King Jehoash to strike the ground with his arrows, he directed a question to the local brothers and sisters: “How bad do you want and English congregation in Caye Caulker?”. Jehoash had shown a lack of zeal by only striking the ground 3 times and then stopping. He applied this to how much support has been shown in the past when there had been an English congregation. He emphasized that though ‘foreigners’ had come to help, the survival of an English congregation would depend on how zealously the local brothers and sisters supported it with service, regular meeting attendance and participation in them. He concluded with the announcement that the papers were all drawn up and he would be taking them to the branch and recommending that Caye Caulker English be reinstated! On asking how we felt about that, very loud, extended applause broke out!

He added that this was the first time ever in Belize that ‘twins’ were being born… 2 groups being recommended at the same time. San Pedro Creole was also being recommended at the same time! If both are accepted by the branch, there will be a total of 16 Creole congregations and 16 English congregations in Belize!

He said he expected that by August 1st we would be an official congregation! <- hmm… an ‘O-C‘ 😉