Goodbye America, Hello Africa!

After a winter storm scare, we left North Carolina earlier than planned. It was a bummer to miss out on some ministry opportunities, but if we wanted to be sure we made our flight, we had to get back to sunny FL. So late Saturday night, we got back to Orlando. We spread out through different houses, and got to meet some of the new Winter DTS students. It was actually a blessing to get back earlier, because we were able to catch up on laundry, on packing and organizing, and last minute shopping trips. Tuesday, we were able to go out the property and be part of Family Night as well. It was so fun to reconnect with our YWAM Orlando family again! Wednesday, we packed up the vans and said a final goodbye to the base, and headed to the airport! We gave ourselves plenty of time to get all 25 of us checked in, and things went pretty smoothly. We had our first flight to Atlanta, GA. There was some concern about flying out of Atlanta, because of all the snow and ice the south had been getting, but we made our connection with no problem, and a *short* 14 hours later, we were in Johannesburg, South Africa! OK, short was an exaggeration, it was actually super long, and we couldn't wait to get off the plane. Being on solid ground was a relief. Also a relief...all of bags made it through! Praise Jesus! We were picked up by some staff at the YWAM Rustenberg base, and loaded up for another 2 hour van ride. It was almost 10pm on Thursday night by the time we finally got settled where we were staying. We briefly met the staff, and then went off to a much needed night sleep. We were weary from the travel, but so blessed to finally be in AFRICA.