Banff and Herbert

Sorry its been so long in writing... we will have a Pelican Narrows update too soon :)
Here is Gemma's update!!!
Blessings
Kiri
xxx

Hey there!
Hope everyone is doing really well, and enjoyed celebrating Easter last week. We were in Banff in the Rocky Mountains over Easter, and we climbed a mini mountain for sunrise, but the problem was that the sun was rising behind some other mountains, so couldn't actually see the sun, but it made the sky look beautiful, and it turned some of the snow on the mountains different colours, so that was really cool, Laura found i nice spot to sit, over the bar i might add, and her bottom almost froze! We had a great time in Banff, we were there for a week, did a day of snowboarding, a day of skiing, a few hikes, and other random bits and bobs. Banff was so beautiful, the whole place was covered in pine forests, and there was a big river that was frozen over, and then the whole skyline was snow covered mountains, and a famount of blue sky, although it did snow a few days. It was stunning, and so peaceful walking through the pine forests, everything was so still. Banff is in a national park, so there were lots of deer just randomly walking around the edges of the town, a few came into our back garden one day. They weren't very shy, I guess they have got used to lots of people being around. Some of us found snowboarding quite hard, spent a good amount of time on our bums, and then trying to get back up again, but it was good fun. The second day Kiri, Becky, Laura, Hannah and Nadia carried on snowboarding as they were really enjoying it. However Millie, Lauren and Gemma who already knew how to ski decided that we would do that instead, and it was so much fun, such an amazing adrenaline rush from whizzing down the slopes, there's always that faint possibility that you are gonna catch your ski on something and go flying, but that adds to the excitement. But everyone had high spirits and by the end of the day we were all ready for a nice fire in the lounge!! We had two boys who Hannah knew form Bible school come with us to teach the snowboarding, Cody and Joash, and we were so grateful to have them as we wouldn't have had a clue if it wasn't for them! We did various things on the nights and one night we had to do a scavenger hunt. This involved us taking pictures of lots of lots of different things and trying to be crazier then the other team! If you look on facebook you should be able to see a couple of those pictures, it was good fun! Other nights we just staying in with a fire and watched a film, it really did feel like a holiday and was strange coming back to real like in Herbert. The town we are living in is like toy town, or like being on a flim set, everything is square, the streets are all in straight lines, like blocks, and the houses are mostly low and flat, although our house has two floors. So the town is called Herbert, and there are about 700 people living here. There is one fairly small supermaket, one school, a coffee shop a restaurant and a chinese take away, and about 7 churches! Everyone still goes to church here, it's still the done thing, like how maybe in our grandparents generation it was just a fact of life that everyone went to church. In some ways that's cool, because everyone has a basic knowledge about Jesus and Christianity, on the other hand, it can be a block, because people would say they are Christians, but in reality it doesn't mean that much. The church we are going to is run by Richard and Polly, who are the parents of Hannah, the Canadian leader in our group. Their church is kind of seen as the black sheep of the churches because it's the only really spirit filled church, in that people believe and practise speaking in tongues, and prophecy, and think that the Holy Spirit is present within each of us as Christians. That's so sad, :-( But it's a really cool church, we feel so welcome there, it is just like a big family. When we're around in Herbert, which is most of the time, we are still having sessions, doing Bible study type things, learning about different topics, and most days we go out to the cattle ranch which Hannah's parents own, and help around the farm. Lauren had to inject a calf with its vaccines the other day, bit of a daunting experience, but I suppose you get used to it. And now we are all learning how to do it just like Polly and Hannah. Then on Monday evenings we are doing a small group thing with college/sixth form aged girls, then on Wednesday evenings one with young teenage girls, and then various other stuff that crops up. We had small group tonight, and it was really cool, this was the third session we've done with them, and it really felt like they were opening up to us and each other more which was awesome. I'm really hoping that through the time we are spending together they will then feel able to keep meeting as a group of Christian girls once we have gone, that we can start something that might be sustainable. Being on the ranch is so much fun, we really feel like we are a help. As we have done it quite a bit now we sort of know what to do and can just get on with it. We get a call everyday from Jesse, Hannah's 8 year old sister asking when we are coming, its so cute because everyday we come at the same time yet she still calls to see. So we have sort of adopted her as our little sister out here which is great! We have to go on the truck to feed the One year old calves they call "yeiling" and so we all jump on the back and dangle our legs off the end and just hope that there aren't any bumps otherwise we go flying, and landing isn't too much fun! All the girls who have their driving license are allowed to drive it and its so strange and old but really cool to feel apart of it all. Next week we are going to this place called Pelican Narrows, which is about 9 hours drive north.

God bless X

(note we have now done pelican narrows... next week for us now will be our horse pack trip !!!)
woooo!
thanks so much everyone for your amazing support and prayers
xxx