One of the many Treetops Safaris with the  St. Mark’s Church Youth in Chingola, Zambia

TREETOPS
Kafue National Park

Kafue National Park covers is two and a half times larger than the size of the South Luangwa National Park in Zambia. The road from Chingola to the road going north into the Park was fairly good. It was tarmac most of the way. We had four to five hours driving on sand. Once you get to the camp at Treetops game viewing can be stunning. It is close to the Busanga Plains where we saw a herd of Cape buffaloes the very first day. The road the last three or four hours  had been graded and driving  was less bumpy but there still were many huge potholes to drive around if there were not too many rocks  The children got out and filled up some of the potholes with stones and tree limbs. Total journey time is about eleven hours. We broke down three times.  The first time we were fortunate as there was an Acacia tree which provided us with some shade. The main vegetation of the Kafue area is called "Miombo".  It has more trees than you can count.

The Park is North and South by the Kafue River which comes out from the Zambezi River. The Kafue is a long old river that changes its moods from slow to swift channels between trees in the little islands and the rapids flow furiously from the Itezhi-Tezhi dam below which flows out in to the Kafue Flats. Once we saw nesting sites for Bee eaters in the sandy banks. Also some of the students saw two otters, a ugly water monitor that is scary, two hippos and several crocodiles that looked sleepy but of course they are not.  One of the boys threw a rock that was not very big but his eyes opened up probably due to the splash.  Farther down the water became tranquil water and was a haven for wildlife watchers. Two of the boys with their dad threw out their lines and caught some bream, and pike.  One of the fellas thought he had a bream but he lost it.  They caught enough for our dinner and enough to share with the local men that worked at the camp.

  

The Northern Section of the park is a slightly rolling, scenic plateau and has two rivers. Treetops camp is on the banks of the Lufupa River. The area is covered by Miombo and Mopani woodlands with occasional open grassy plains. There are many hardwoods, sausage trees and to everyone’s delight the enormous baobab tree was at the center of our camp. The school room at Treetops has a huge Baobab tree beside it that they told us it was hundreds of years old.  We saw many Baobab trees on this trip.  One of the cooks at the camp who only spoke Bemba, and with the help of the Zambian children that were with us that spoke Bemba fluently showed me how to make a delicious drink from the fruit of the baobab tree.  It tasted like lemonade, and all the children loved it.

We identified martial and fish eagles, crowned and wattled cranes, saddle-billed stocks and a wealth of hornbills, kingfishers and babblers with the help of  camp guide. Kafue also has a huge variety of wildlife. The antelopes that we saw were puku, impala, kudu, bushbuck, hartebeest, defassa waterbuck, sable, roan, lechwe, oribi and blue wildebeest. The predators that we saw on the Busanga Plains were lions, leopards, cheetahs, spotted hyenas and packs of wild dogs. We also saw elephants, herds of buffalos, zebras, many hippos and crocodiles basking in the sun on the grass and sandy shores. 

The focus of the trip to Treetops was to educate the children on the wildlife, and the natural resources. I taught not only about the natural resources and the wildlife but began each day with prayer and reading the Psalms in the Bible.

A huge Baobab tree is the central attraction at "Treetops" Camp which is not far from the Busanga Flood Plains. The camp helped the children from the Copperbelt during the dry season for ten days to help educate them about the wildlife in the Park, and to learn more about the book of Psalms. The camp had boys and girl’s dormitory, teachers huts, dining room, open air classroom, toilet facilities with a shower, and a kitchen with two refrigerators. 

My First Royal Caribbean Cruise

My First Royal Caribbean Cruise 2013      

 by Joan S. Hust 

May 2013 I went on a one month cruise with my girlfriend. We use to double date.  I married Bill, and she chose to remain single. I flew on Southwest Airlines from Spokane, Washington to Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. It was 55 degrees when I boarded the plane, and it was 80 degrees with buckets of humidity when I walked off the plane in Ft. Lauderdale. 

We went on the Royal Caribbean Vision of the Seas ship via Ft. Lauderdale, Florida to Ponta Delgada, Portugal, Paris (LeHavre) France, Cork (Cobb) Ireland, Zeebrugge, Belgium, Amsterdam, Holland, Oslo, Norway and Copenhagen, Denmark.

 The ship docked at all of the above cities.  The ship always arrived at the port early in the morning so after a very nice breakfast there were many options when we walked down the plank.  Would we walk into town or would we board a bus, or would we team up with a couple of ladies and hire a taxi to drive us to and from the city?

The weather on this excursion was in our favor daily as the sun was always shining but it was cold.  I wore a lovely white sweater, and a black and white waterproof windbreaker jacket with a hood in Russia that I wore daily everywhere.  I enjoyed meeting people from many countries and I played Trivia every day with a team of seven or eight folks on the ship. It was such fun. There were several teams that would play. The team I was on won a couple of times, and we would get a prize. My favorite prize was a Royal Caribbean hat.

 I really enjoyed going to the movies in the evening as they had the latest movies flown in from NYC.  The library selections of novels and magazines were wonderful. I attended art auctions daily.  I enjoyed the lectures of the history of the paintings. I did not miss an auction so as a prize I received a free print of my choice which was a water color country setting.  It was mailed to me and I  received it in the mail when I returned home.  It is now being framed  at a local store in Coeur d'Alene.

I am always asked where and what was your favorite place.  Well…My favorite in Ponta Delgada, Portugal was the statue of the Archangel Michael; in Cobb, Ireland it was Cork Harbour; in LeHavre, France it was the paintings in the Museum of Fine Arts, in Zeebrugge, Belgium. Village on the coast is quite quaint, in Amsterdam, Holland it was the house of Corrie Ten Boom because having read her book THE HIDING PLACE, stayed one week at a Bed & Breakfast and the owner went out of her way to make me comfortable driving me to see the Keukenhof flowers and not only did I have breakfast but dinner as well.  I was a guest of a lovely couple that raised Icelandic cows in Warnsveld.

 Oslo, Norway it was the architect of the local churches, and of course The Little Mermaid sitting on the rock in the harbor is quite significant in Copenhagen, Denmark.

 It was an occasion I will never forget as during the time I was in Amsterdam when Queen Beatrix who reigned for thirty three years stepped down and inside the Nieuwe Kerk Church and outside the Dam Square she signed the Act of Abdiction, and her son Willem-Alexander became King of the Netherlands with his beautiful wife, Maxima, as Queen and their three daughters.  The new King and Queen of the Netherlands with his mother, Beatrix, greeted the people from on board a ship on the canal. It was a sight to behold. I felt they were personally waving to me.  The new king and queen's eldest daughter, Catharina-Amalia, became Princess of Orange and first in line to the throne. 

Returning home I stayed for a week with JoAnn in her lovely condo in Ft. Lauderdale, met some of her nice, fun friends, attended a ballet performance, and the Sunday morning service at her Southern Baptist Church in Hollywood, Florida.

I feel most fortunate and blessed that I was able to go on a Royal Caribbean cruise, visiting so many countries, and meeting so many lovely people.

Was I happy to return home to Coeur d’Alene, Idaho?  You bet I was and I am blessed to have such a wonderful husband of 49 years to welcome me back.   

China Mission Trips • Joan Hust

I have been to China 3 times.  I really enjoy meeting the people, eating many different kinds of food, learning more about Bless China International, visiting the leprosy villages, speaking at a local secondary school, traveling with a local resident by bus seeing and meeting people in the Grand Canyon of China that was a friend of a family living in Coeur d’Alene where I live with my family, visiting an orphanage in Beijing where I now send boxes of children and adult books, visiting the hospitals in the country and in the cities, teaching English in a secondary school in Jing Hong, walking the streets in the city and country, staying in a local hotel in the city and also in the country, staying in places where there are no tourists, shopping and having a local tailor make me a dress and 3 piece suit, eating a variety of delicious food prepared by the local people in the country and cities,  and providing children care so teachers could attend educational and inspiring classes. I was fortunate to make many new friends that influenced my walk with the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. 

CANADA • Joan Hust

I have always liked Canada.  I first started visiting Canada when I was a young child with my parents.  We lived mostly in Dearborn, Detroit, and Cleveland then and it was easy to cross the border and travel around Canada in our one seat Chevrolet or Ford.  My dad traded in his car every year as you could do that than for only one hundred dollars I was told by my mother.  So we always had a new or practically new car.  I knew we were in Canada when I saw the big red leaf. My mother would always say that we were now entering the world’s second largest country.  When she said that my dad and I would automatically holler WHOOOPY.  My very favorite place to go was Niagara Falls.  We would stay all day till it got dark just so we could see the colorful lights get turned on and it was such an unbelievable beautiful sight with every ray imaginable of color.

Going to Mackinac Island

My last trip to Canada was to visit Miriam and Dennis Brubacher.  We met the Brubacher’s in Chingola, Zambia as they were Brethren missionaries on their way to Sakeji to teach at the Brethren School where Jacob was most fortunate to have Dennis as a teacher in 6th grade. Jacob came home (12 hour drive mostly not paved) between semesters and was so excited as he said that every day he learned something new in his class. He loved the food at Sakeji and could not say enough about what a good cook Miriam was at the school. Miriam’s mother met us at the airport and when we tumbled into their car she gave each one of us a shiny red apple.  First apple we had seen in three years. 

I was in awe when I saw the huge 220 foot long pool that Esther Williams was daily swimming in at the Grand Hotel.  She was really friendly, and when she smiled at me I was so happy not realizing that there were many folks behind me and her smile was not just for me.  What I could not get over was that there were no cars on the island. The Grand Hotel gave everyone that walked around snow cones for free.  My favorite thing to see beside the swimming pool is what they called the Arch Rock.  It was huge and it had a big opening that you could walk through.

BRAZIL • Mission Trip

 I went to Brazil in 2011, and loved every minute that I was there.  The team I was with was under the leadership of Dr. Dan McIver from Canada who is with CPE which stands for CHURCH PARNERSHIPS EVANGELISE,   and evangelize is just the word to describe our time spent in San Paulo, Brazil.  My testimony was translated and used as part of a Gospel tract.  I partnered with local believers to share the gospel on pre-arranged appointments.  CPE was wonderful to work with as their motto is to engage the Body of Christ in Evangelism, Discipleship and Church Planting around the world.   Pastor Sergio and Regina Pinto of the Vista Verge C& MA church in Sao Jose dos Campos, Brazil was our hosts.  What a lovely couple to get to know and their children plus their vibrant CMA Church.  There were 5 Canadians, and two from the USA which included me.  I went house to house cold turkey with an interpreter and gave my testimony.  Some accepted Jesus as their personal Savior, and some did not.  I was happy to hear that many that accepted Jesus are attending the local church now.  Pray for them, and pray for the ones that need more encouragement to attend the local church and to fellowship with believers.  I absolutely love Brazil, the people, the churches, and the warm welcome I received from everyone.