Sunday

Sunday morning: wake up call 8:15. It gets cold out here in Oregon at night! During the day it would be 30 degrees and the evenings are warm but the temperature drops every night and most of us wake up freezing. A couple of us slept outside under the stars for a change of scenery J There was the regular general melee as everyone ran around finding Sunday clothes, making our hair pretty, eating breakfast, and shaving (thank you Bubba J) At promptly 9:15 we were rushed into the vehicles and everyone tried to grab the last couple things we needed as the chaperones hollered for us to hurry. Turns out the hurry was completely unnecessary! We got to church at quarter to ten just to discover that their church service started at 10:30 NOT 10… we were 45 minutes early! So we entertained ourselves by walking down the nearby streets, talking to another couple who had showed up early and just hanging out. Finally people started showing up and we went into the church. All the members of the congregation were talking and mingling as we sat down and waited for the service to start. When the minister came in he welcomed us to the church, and Mr. Harthoorn was invited to the front to tell the congregation why we were there. Then the service proceeded as usual and we had a sermon on the order of worship. After church we had coffee in their outside foyer with the congregation and enjoyed the sun. Everyone was friendly in this church too! There weren’t many young people in this church (not like Lynden) but they were all friendly just the same. We proceeded to use the upstairs for lunch, and some of our awesome girls whipped up ham and cheese buns and chicken noodle soup. We took a little break after lunch… some of us napped on the couches that were provided, others of us used the floor and Kaitlyn graced us with some beautiful piano playing J. Then we plugged in the DVD that Momma Froma had brought and watched a sermon from Rev. Louwerse. We finished our second service at around 3 and headed back to our campsite. We grabbed our air mattresses once again and strapped them to the roof of our van. We stuffed 11 people into the van and drove very slowly a ways up the river. We had talked it over and decided we were brave enough to try ride the rapids that we had discovered running under a bridge. That’s right…Canadians ride rapids! :D We carried our mattresses down to the rivers edge and hesitantly climbed into the cold water eyeing the rapids with unease. Mr. Harthoorn decided that he should try ride them first so that in case he died, then everyone else would know not to go. I hopped on with him (they decided to sacrifice me too) and we cruised over the rapids, dodging rocks, with waves washing over us. It was such a blast! So we waved to everyone else and they followed us down the river with squealing and yelling. We floated down for quite a while, relaxing on our mattresses and enjoying the sunshine and cool water. We climbed out and started walking back on the road but the black asphalt was so hot we could hardly stand it! We kept looking for the white lines to walk on to save our feet. We made it back to camp and then did it all over again J Mr. Harthoorn’s group was on supper duty and we ate a delicious Sunday supper of barbeque chicken, fried potatoes, beans and an amazing taco salad. After supper and cleanup a couple of us took Bubba down to the river for one more run. We knew we were going to have to get up early in the morning so the girls took down their tent and we all slept under the stars in the cold. We are trying to enjoy our last bit of Oregon camping and hot days. Back to Canada tomorrow, and the vanilla coke is disappearing quickly, but we are starting to miss poutine J Caitie finished the evening with devotions.

We are coming home! See you all very soon ♥

[Written by Annette]