Pucallpa's Official Stadium

It was a really nice stadium. It was some quality time on a quality pitch. Its the best field down here.

Cow Tongue

Ok so here is our veggie girl getting outside the box and trying some cow tongue and rice. There was a whole crew of them that ate it. The rest of us unadventurous people just had rotisserie chicken and beans and rice!

National University of Ucayali

So we played the local university team tonight. They really enjoyed us as we did them. We played at the Official Stadium of Pucalpa. It holds about 2000 people. We were the prelude to a pretty important club cup game for the men in the city.

Motorbike

So we arrived in Pucallpa today and it was not what we expected. It is really a big city. (200,000 people) It is the end of the line as far as the travel on the Ucayali River is concerned. The Ucayali is a headway to the Amazon. Meaning, past here there is only dugout canoes with outboard motors to take you farther. The town is filled with about 50,000 “motorbikes.” It’s a moped with 3 seats. The main mode of transportation. There are more of those than anything on the road. Its like slalom skiing. Hers is Nat and Jonesy getting a ride to the night game. Super fun!

The Clinic

Here is the field we did the clinic on. That’s Paul and Bitty demonstrating the proper technique for knocking the ball. The clinic was good and we organized a scrimmage between campers at the end. It was the Grace Soccer Academy, on location in the outskirts of Pucallpa, Peru.

The Village Reception

So the participants in the clinic and the sports ministers there have away to receive you as you enter the village. As we exited the bus they formed a straight line and sang to us. It lasted about 10 minutes. The song was accompanied by drums, tambourine, and a flute like instrument. The look on the women’s face was priceless when they joked with us about, “now its your turn to sing us a song from your homeland.” Songs like happy birthday and Michael Row Your Boat a Shore came to mind. Fortunate for us, and them, we did not have to sing. Lol.

Pucallpa

We flew from Lima to Pucallpa. Its about an hour by plane on a regular jet plane. Upon arrival in Pucallpa we headed to a village just outside town to do a clinic. It was an eye opening experience to the real life of Pucallpan Peruvians living conditions.

Breakfast Day 2

So anytime we eat together its fun. We had eggs and fresh bread with jam and some fresh orange juice. The bread was amazing! Its so fresh.

The Hotel in Lima

So we slept well last night and the hotel was great. It was a quick morning as we took of for Pucallpa in the AM. Thats our ride for around Lima.

Ok so we were able to hook up AK and Messer's camera and add some pics. So here are some from Lima. This is the hotel that we stayed in when we got in to Lima.

We are in Peru!

Wednesday, July 30th – day 1. We are in Lima. Well the day started early at 3am. It was more like one continuous day from the 29th since most of us slept less than a few hours. Personally it was a 20 minute nap for me. We had great support on our night before. Coach Briscoe and Scott Feather came and prayed for us last night. In fact, even Jeff Burriff came and prayed for us as we left Winona Lake at 3:30am. The women were really moved by the commitment and backing of all of the Grace Community.
Obvious is the fact that we are noticed as we travel, so it provided many opportunities to share our passion for Christ and soccer. Story for the day. We got to encourage a Cuban man on the flight from Chicago to Florida. I noticed he had a “Santa Biblia” and I asked him if I could see it and then teased him why he would read that. Turns out he was a Guantanamo Bay detainee for over a year. He was released in Panama and accepted Christ there. He was going back to Panama after some time on his first mission trip. He was pretty nervous but excited so we shared several passages and used Danae Walker’s Spanish/English dictionary to break down some word barriers. It was awesome. He recently lost his son and we got to speak about how scripture relates to this as well. Wow! Pray for us that we will not only be transformed but that we will be able to share of the God who raised the dead and made the lame to walk and is mighty to save. We want to be like the friends who carried the lame man to Jesus in Mark 2.
The women are doing well and travelled well. Other than crazy pictures of all of us in funny plane sleeping positions and napkins stuffed in mouths of the drewlers….nothing to report. We met up with MAI’s Paul Shedd in Chicago and he travelled with us. Pray for us. Out from Lima. mv

Peru Tour

Bienvenidos! Greeting from the Grace College Women's soccer team! We are a US College soccer team that seeks to follow passionately after the Lord Jesus Christ and play soccerpassionately all for the glory of the one who saved us from our sin and gave us life! John 10:10.

We are in Peru, South America right now on tour with the Seahorse Soccer Club, a division of Missionary Athletes International. We are going to assisting with a sports minister who is proclaiming the gospel through soccer here.

Read our blog and lets us know what you think.

Peace in Christ.