September 22

I was so tired this morning.  We have not been home one night this week.  I needed a people break, however, Scott insisted that we go with the senior couples on their outing today.  We were late, because I just could not move fast enough.  We always meet in the temple parking lot.  Scott always drives as we have the van and can take six beside us with ease.  We have had as much as nine which is a little tight.

We met at 8:30 a.m. to go hiking is a forest near Suva.  It is called Colo I Suva.  I have not idea what that means.  We paid our fee at the forestry office and took two university student with us to the car park at the beginning of the trail to the upper pool.  The university students were our car security.  They volunteer to do this because it gets them internship hours.

At Colo I Suva
Us, Wells, Jacksons, Elder Whitehead, Jarmans,
Whitings,  Forestry Student

They suggested that we walk to the upper pool come back to the car park, and then drive to the lower pool.  We wanted to see the forest as well as the pools so we did not take their suggestion.  It was an easy but brutal walk.  All rough stair steps some so tall that my 5'3" legs had a hard time.  Several times I just jumped down from one step to the next.  The forest was beautiful and the pools with their little waterfalls were lovely.

Waterfall into the Upper Pool

The Upper Pool from the trail

Along the way we say this on the trail.  

Look carefully!  Talk about ugly.

Not sure what this is--a hard shelled centipede?  but it is huge.  The students at USP say there is an even bigger one on campus.  The tale is that if it spits in one's eye, the eye will go blind.  Wish I knew a  biologist.  

When we got to the lower pool, two of the men walked up to the car park to get the girls and the cars.  Scott, Pat Whitehead, Connie Whiting, and Elder Wells took advantage of the rope swing.  The drop from the swing to the water was about ten to fifteen feet.  After I took pictures, I took the book I was only ten pages from finishing and walked a little ways away for some quite reading.  Doesn't get better than this.  Aaaaaah.

Scott's first swing.

Check the face and he says its fun!

Best swing of the day.  

We were supposed to eat at a restaurant just a little ways away, but the walk and swinging had taken too much time, so we had Elder Whiting drive us back to our house.  Even Scott needed some time before we had game night at the Institute.

Game night was so much fun.  We had 30+ show up.  The boys had moved the pool table from the entry way to the lounge (waiting room for the Stake President), put the ping pong table in the entry way, and we put all the games in the classroom.  I taught some of the young adults how to play Yahtzee which they did not particularly like, and Uno which they did.  It is amazing how much a person will tell you when they are concentrating on something else.  I heard some interesting stuff that will help us provide better lessons and activities for these kids.  Scott taught some other young adults how to play Chinese Checkers which they really loved.  After he went on to another activity many of them played again.  Of course, we had about eight of them in the kitchen playing cranboard (spelling?)  I think I have already explained this game, but I am going to do it again.  The "board" is about 3' X 3' and has 3" holes in each corner.  There is a circle in the middle of the board where all the taws are placed.  Each player gets one taw which is wood and is the shape and size of a checker piece.  The object it to flip your taw with your index finger and move the taws in the center into a corner hole.  The person who flips the most taws into the holes wins.  I was shocked when Scott said it was time to clean up.  Three and a half hours went by so fast.  It was raining pretty heavily so we had mostly men.

I was glad for my soft bed tonight.