Iquique and the road to Alto Hospicio

Alto Hospicio is about 1800' above Iquique, a little tourist city on the coast.

Do you know what I love about this picture?  That's REAL grass!!  And it actually looks healthy and beautiful.  It's right next to the beach.

 

A beautiful view of the city from the road to Alto Hospicio.

 Hang gliding is very popular and it's a perfect ride from Alto Hospicio down to Iquique.

The most we've seen have been 8 hang gliders at once.

Our Home in Alto Hospicio!

       

This is our home in Alto Hospicio.  They call them condos and ours is the one on the right, surrounded by the fence.  The car, a new Chevy Cruze, is what we are renting from the Church/mission.  Many people are adding fences and cementing around their place.  We're grateful that's all done for us.  As we're new here it's appropriate that our home is green.  

To the right of the water bottle is our little washing machine.  It's a small kitchen but sufficient.

For now we have boxes as our curtains but today we found out who has the curtains and plan on getting them and hopefully get them hemmed and up this week.  The staircase is very narrow but we're managing fine.

We're comfortable with our office, etc.  We're grateful to be here and getting settled, getting to know the members and doing what we can to help.  The people are wonderful!

On Friday, January 30th we drove up to Alto Hospicio, our assigned area.  The drive up was extremely interesting as we drove along the coast, passing the Tropic of Capricorn.  We saw a few cactus growing up on the hills/mountains but there was truly nothing growing along the road.  There was just dirt and more dirt.

We passed a golf course so had to stop and take a picture.  The "greens" were nothing more than the dirt blackened.

The ocean is beautiful and felt wonderful as well!!

                                                                  We've arrived in Chile!!!

Here we are with the elders and sisters who came from the MTC in Santiago, except for the 2 Americans who came from the Mexico City MTC.  President and Sister Dalton/UT are in the middle with us.  Unfortunately, I don't remember all the names of the missionaries.  The Latins come from 

 Brazil, Ecuador, Columbia, Mexico, Argentina, Peru, Bolivia, and Chile.  Quite a mix!

  

The rock formation behind us is called El Portal.  It was a beautifully clear day.

This is our MTC district with our morning teacher.  From left Brother Nick Gubler who served in the European mission that includes Austria. Germany, and Switzerland, the Diehl's serving in the Chesapeake, VA mission on military relations.  They're from Aurora, CO!  The Hamilton's serving from home in the St. George Mission.  Their home is Mt. Pleasant, in the middle of the state of UT.  The Peterson's, serving in the Chivate, Philippines mission.  They're from Las Vegas.

Same district with our afternoon teacher, Sister Mindee Sharp.  She served in one of the Santiago, Chile missions.  We really enjoyed our time with getting to know all of them.

The MTC

We'll be serving in the Antofagasta, Chile Mission.  We're enjoying our stay here.  There are 4 couples in our district.  One couple will be serving from their home in central Utah, one going to the Philippines, one serving at a military base in Maryland, and us.  Four couples are going to Europe, 1 couple to Africa,  1 couple to Samoa, and none to Australia, nor New Zealand.  The majority are serving in the US and Canada.  Several couples will be working with the young single adults and on military bases.

We leave on Monday for Chile!!

We're busy packing up and getting ready for our next mission.  We enter the MTC in Provo on Monday, January 19, 2015!!  Needless to say we're busy cleaning the house, packing our suitcases, and dotting our "i"s and crossing our "t"s.