A Wonderful Day, And a Major Prayer Request

It was the best of days, it was the worst of days.

Today couldn´t have been more extreme in either way. I spent the morning in pain and tears and the afternoon/evening in rapture, laughter, and frankly still quite a bit of pain.

This morning everything that could go wrong, did. Almost without exception. We got on the metro at 7:35 for what should have been a 30 minute ride to the train station to catch our train to Gibraltar which was scheduled to leave at 8:35. In the middle of the train ride the metro stopped, made all of us deboard and wait 10 minutes for the next train to go by, then in the middle of the next metro ride it stopped again for a few minutes. We were incredibly stressed by the time we got to the train station, at 8:20, but still sure we could make our train, because we thought we knew how to board the train. Yet another instance of us thinking we knew more than we really did.

We ended up having to run for the train, up the escalating staircase where I lost my balance (running with a huge backpack + being a huge klutz don´t go well together) and fell on the moving sidewalk/staircase. Insert awful pain and a sprained, swollen, black and blue, scraped up knee and a crying hurt Katie still running to make the stupid train to southern Spain.

With one minute to spare we made the train, where my hubby took wonderful care of me and even managed to communicate with the man in the dining car enough to get me a bag of ice for my knee. He prayed for me on the train, made me elevate my leg as much as possible and just generally babied me. God gave me the best husband, and I know it! He has been carrying both backpacks (I married the strongest man alive!) and supporting me. I couldn´t be more blessed with a wonderful loving hubby. He takes such good care of me!

Thankfully the hotel was just across the street from the train station, so I hobbled over there, and we assessed the situation. It´s not good, but it could be worse. We decide to go ahead and take the train to Gibraltar and see what we can do. Dan said he´d carry me the whole way if necessary (and he was serious! I love my strong hubby!).

In Gibraltar we saw the amazing Rock of Gibraltar, which is breathtaking. The huge expanse of stone surrounded by the beach reminded me of the need to build my house on the rock that is Jesus Christ, not on the sinking sand of the world.

We decided to take a taxi tour because Dan didn´t want me walking on my knee more than necessary. The taxi driver, Dennis, was a joy to be around. He was very kind, knew all the ins and outs, helpful, and knowledgable. I´d highly reccommend a taxi tour, even if you don´t have a bum knee, because we got to go in areas that other tourists can´t get into, and you get the insider experience.

Best of all, we got to hold wild monkeys! I´m completely serious and have the photos and videos to prove it!

In Gibraltar, Barbary Macaques run wild (in fact, it is the only area in Europe with wild monkeys) and the taxi drivers know how to interact with them. Dennis stopped in a special area where they came right up and jumped on the taxi, and eventually on Dan & me! Dennis fed them and let us both hold one big one and one small one. It was amazing! We actually held and interacted with 2 wild monkeys! There are approximately 250 wild monkeys on the Rock of Gibraltar and this was an experience we will never forget!

For reference, until I can upload my pictures & video from our camera, here are some pictures from wikipedia of Macaques:




Tomorrow we venture into Morocco, Africa! Exciting!

So a reminder of our main prayer requests:

Please be praying for healing of my knee. It makes it difficult to enjoy backpacking with a swollen painful knee.

Please be praying for our saftey in Morocco.

Thank you, dear ones, and forgive the scatterbrained post. I´m exhausted, and in need of food! Love to all.