Beyond Malibu part one

Two months later I begin the tale of my 8 days at Beyond Malibu, arguably one of the most physically challenging events of my life thus far. At this point the story will be the abridged version, I guess I waited too long to tell you my story- but I will do my best to recount the moments accurately.

Day 1: Malibu Landing
I get up early for a living, I work at a coffee shop so I am often up before most making their coffee. This day however was a rough one! I was up at 3:45 am and off to B'ham to pick up a someone I had never met before, April. We discovered early on that we both love coffee and were fast friends from there. Its funny, I am not sure we could be any more different, but our love for Jesus, coffee and adventure was a great foundation for friendship. We joked on the way up that it would be funny if we were the only two going- nobody else had called for a ride afterall. But we were totally kidding. We pulled into Egmont and Kristin met us at the car (she is kind of running the show up there) and sure enough it was only going to be April and I. Unbelievable. Now let me explain what this trip is all about. Beyond Malibu is a Younglife adventure. There is Malibu, which is a resort camp and there is Beyond. You can do Beyond Hiking or Kayaking. Easy choice for me, I love Kayaking. This was a FREE leader trip, so if you lead a group of kids then you qualified for a free trip. Are people crazy- so many leaders passed up such a cool opportunity! I can't even imagine- it makes no sense. So it turned out that April and I are the only two leaders out there who were up for the adventure. We had two guides, Rachel from Chicago and Suzanna from Vancouver, BC. They were great. I was the oldest, by a lot. Its funny that people so much younger then I can teach me so much! Day 1 we stay at the landing. This is the day we check gear, get to know each other and yes- the dreaded moment- practice flipping a kayak and getting out under water. AUGHHHHH! I was a little scared, I almost started crying I was so scared. April and I were in the double, we are out in the middle of the inlet- and we were just suppose to flip? April wasn't scared at all. This one little thing was standing in the way of me and an amazing trip up the Jervis Inlet- only that could make me do something so scary as purposefully roll a kayak. I did it. Just barely.
Day 2: lunch at 2Bear and McMurry Bay
6:30 am wake up call. The cool thing,( but slightly hard to get use to,) on this trip is that your guides serve you. So Rachel and Suzanna made every meal for us. Its really amazing to be served in such a generous way. It takes a while to be ok with it because we as leaders are so use to serving others. And as Christians I think we strive to follow Christ's example and serve those around us. So for both April and I it was such a blessing to be served- but we both felt a little useless at first. We got the Kayaks down to the water and loaded up our gear and food- a small miracle that it all fits! The "crew"- the guides not out on trips, helped us out - and they have a fun tradition - as we kayaked away they all jumped in the COLD water after us! It was a great way to send us off! We paddled for a few hours and then stopped for a "floating" snack. We had to eat about every two hours, all that paddling works up an appetite! It was so beautiful. I was in the double with April. It only took a little while for us to both be feeling the tiredness in our arms. The day was beautiful- all God's glory out for us to breath in. There won't be enough words throughout this blog to describe the awesomeness that surrounded us. We pulled into 2Bear for lunch. Now normally trips are with kids, so there are lots of Kayaks- but also lots of helping hands. Pulling our Kayaks out of the water was a big challenge- because you normally carry a double with 6 and we were only 4 we had to unload almost everything. Fun times. We had lunch and the girls shared with us the trip Psalm, it was number 145. We had our quite time and enjoyed the peace of leaving all but the intangible behind.
After a time we loaded up and set out for another four hours of Kayaking. Now, I should tell you that April is a Marine Biology major. This means that she was in her mecca, and easily distracted. It was on this leg of our journey that one of the more memorable and laughable moments happened. We are cruising along and April saw a jelly fish in the water and leaned WAY over - and seriously almost flipped us. She yells out " I gotta see it I gotta see it!!" I react with PANIC and yell back "yah gotta warn me!" Now, I know its hard to imagine as funny, and it took a minute or two for me to get there- but our guides were highly entertained. Thank the good Lord we did not flip- and she promised to be more careful. As the day wore on paddling got progressively more difficult. My arms hurt. The scenery around me was all that kept me going. Now April and I don't really know at all where we are going. So the idea is that we are just having to have faith and push through whatever mental block is going on in our heads. This is where the Beyond part of the trip comes in. When we (finally) got to camp the girls set up the fly (daytime tent like thing) and April and I did the tent. I think this bay should be renamed Mosquito coast. After such physical days the only energy left is for eating and then going to bed. Its kind of nice to be that tired.
Day 3: Floating lunch, camp at potato Creek
We woke up to POUNDING rain- or at least it seemed like it. And a huge headache- not enough water consumption. The problem is that the water is from the streams, and then we add chlorine to it to purify it. Well, it tastes like crud and is hard to drink. So we have juice crystals, aka sugar. Since I try not to eat a lot of that, I thought I would try drinking my water without the juice crystals, and didn't drink enough water. Oops. I was going to pay for that later. The guides get up before us and make breakfast and then wake us up. Its great. We even had coffee. They do such an amazing job of serving us. Its humbling because there are so few ways out here that we can serve them back. The verse this morning was 1 Kings 19:11-13. It was cool to be reminded that God speaks to us in so many ways. From a loud rumble to a quite whisper. It is our job to be ready to hear His voice regardless of the form it takes.
This turned out to be my toughest day of the trip. It rained all day, and though I brought the "right" gear- it wasn't good enough. Before lunch I was so cold I could barely paddle. My energy fell, and I just wanted to sleep and I thought I would be losing breakfast at any moment, plus that dang headache. This might be the closest the wild outdoors has evercome to shutting me down. And then my amazing guides came through, I think they could see me falling fast. Rachel gave me her jacket- sooo amazing the difference. We ate, I refueled in all ways- and we were set to head out again. The Lord even provided a glimpse of the grand mountains He created for us. Peaks would come out of hiding for just a minute or two and then go back to hide in the clouds and fog again. The rain would mist and then pour down like the heavens had opened up. We saw rainbows, lightening and a little bit of sun. The Jervis was giving us quite a ride. We made camp and were so thankful to be dry, or almost dry. We studied some verses and it was just cool to be surrounded by all of His glory- to be still and listen. I struggle to put down on paper exactly what these moments were like, but I can say that it is these moments that I return to when I need to remember what it is like to be still.