A Long Walk for Children

For the first time in a month, we slept in until 8 am.  We didn’t walk anywhere either!  Other than feeling a bit like a slouch, it wasn’t too bad.  Tomorrow I start putting plans together for next week’s official walk completion with the staff and kids at Open Arms.  Linda and Sipho flew back to East London this afternoon – it was the first airplane ride of their lives and I think they were pretty excited to fly the route home.  They flew in 90 minutes the same route it took us 30 days to complete on foot!  That’s the difference between 500 miles per hour and 4 mph!

For the next week, I’ll be doing a brief blog each day on topics related to the Home.   Please feel free to check in so you can learn more about our mission and some of the staff and children.  I hope you’ll find it interesting until the end of next week when we get everyone to Cape Town.

For today, I’ll just share a couple of photos I took today in Cape Town.  It’s a beautiful city – called the “Mother City” and has mountains, beaches, vineyards, whale watching and incredible scenery all around.   None of our kids or staff have been here before so they’re in for a real treat.

Regards to all.  Thanks again for the prayers for our safety … they are appreciated and they worked!  Until tomorrow ….  Bob

This is an area of Cape Town called Camp's Bay.  It is a 

beautiful community with incredible ocean views.  

Behind Camp's Bau are twelve rock spires nicknamed 

"The Twelve Apostles."  

This is looking south out of the Camp's Bay area.  Maybe not 

the scenery that most people think of when they think of 

Africa.  But I'll take it any day!

Because the remnants of yesterday's storm remained, the 

surf was incredible today.  Here's a sample.  Cape Town is 

roughly at the same latitude as Buenos Aires but you can't 

see it from the beach!

This is a photo of the famous Eastern Boulevard bridge to 

nowhere in Cape Town.  It was "completed" in 1977 and 

remains to this day.  Luckily, this wasn't on the walk route.  

We never would have seen that last step in the driving rain.  

See you tomorrow!  

Day 30 was one to remember:  we finished A Long Walk for Children except for the last 2 kilometers that we’ll do with the kids!   Today’s 52 kilometers ( 27 miles) in horrendous weather put us right down in the Waterfront area where we will board the boat for Robben Island and Nelson Mandela’s prison cell on September 13^th. Thankfully, our staff and children will be here for the big finish!  They can’t wait and neither can we.

In all, we have traveled 1097 km or 681 miles in 30 days.  Even with the two days we took off, we still averaged 36.5 or 22.7 miles per day.  That certainly exceeded our expectations and should be an indication of only one thing – our enthusiasm for the cause!  The kids at Open Arms kept us going on days like today when the elements were not in our favor.  Combined with the generosity of our donors, it has been a winning combination thus far.  I am so grateful to everyone who has been a part of this effort – there are too many to mention – but I know that God will bless you for your role in making the walk a success.  (More details to come tomorrow).

 

I hope you enjoy our photos from August 30 – what a day it was!

We woke up to a heck of a winter storm in Cape Town and 

we didn't escape it all day.  Forecasters had said that it 

looked to be the worst wind and rain storm in Cape Town 

in more than 7 years. Although the conditions were worse
than bad at times, we wanted to finish today and not have 

to deal with the elements on Sunday.  So, off we went, 

hoping as usual for the best.

Early in the morning, we got a lot more wind than rain.  

But the wind was literally a never ending gale in our faces.  

This morning's 20 km were by far the hardest 20 of the entire 

trip.

While on the road, we are never too far from seeing people 

in difficult situations.  Here were some street kids, I believe 

sniffing glue.  It was really sad but reinforced why Open Arms 

exists -- to prevent such things from happening.

People say these are wild animals ... I found him rather meek.