The Great Trek home

At 9 am on New Year’s Eve we set out for the long drive home. New Year’s Day saw us safely arrive – thank you for your prayers. There was very little traffic but we saw plenty of animals on and by the road. We have travelled 6,178 kms since leaving home on 10th December! Caris says she feels she has spent most of her life in he car recently. And we still have the trip to make to Windhoek for the exciting arrival of the Gillhams from Australia.
Just before we left Johannesburg, David took us out to Sterkfontein, to the caves where Mrs Ples (now thought to be young Master Ples) was found; a place considered by evolutionists to be the ‘cradle of civilisation’. How glad we are to know we are fashioned in the image of the living God than an advanced form of primeval slime and rellies of the ape; that we were fashioned in love and not by accident! Anyway, the caves were exciting for the children. After that we took them to a mini planetarium. Astronomy is one of Étienne’s interests and, when the resident astronomer threw questions to the audience, Étienne had answers. When the lights went on, the astronomer asked who the boy was. When he saw and spoke to Étienne he asked if we home schooled our children!
I took the children to the movies to see ‘The Bee Movie’. It was their first visit to a cinema since we left Australia and Caris kept talking all through it as she was not used to having other people in the same room! Poor Étienne managed to get STUNG by a bee on the very day we went to see the film. He said that at least he could now wink (albeit a 3-day wink)!
Johannesburg is 1,700m asl. When the children heard that, Étienne wanted to find a trampoline to see how much higher he could jump in the thinner air and Caris wondered why there were so many people if there was ‘less’ air to breathe’!
There are a lot of mine dumps around Jo’burg because of the gold mines. David’s father used to work on the mines and has very interesting stories to tell. David’s mother was born and grew up in Scotland. After university she travelled by air and train (it took DAYS) to what was then Northern Rhodesia to teach maths. There she met David’s father who was working on the mines there.
Of course, we are back to the heat. And poor Namibia has had no rain – the rains are a month overdue already. The Trans-Kalahari, where it runs through Botswana, has had rain and the greenery was a refreshing sight for us. (I have watched Lord of the Rings a number of times and I especially lovely the verdant scenery at the opening of #1.) Seeing hills and mountains in South Africa was also a novelty for us who live on a giant sandy FLAT flood plain. And grass in a garden was also something the children have not experienced for 2 years! Ah, the things we take for granted!
Here is a snippet of information; in the Greek the wise men come to Jesus and open their ‘thesauros’. Étienne said ‘thesaurus’ means a dinosaur but we know it as a storehouse of information. The word is also used as ‘treasury’. Their treasury contained gold (for a king), frankincense (priest) and myrrh (anointing for burial). This for the Baby who was born to be King, High Priest and Sacrifice.