Dave Bengston sent us these updates from his wife Joanne. He also supplied the photos from his previous trip to Cameroon.

Wednesday Morning

Today the trekkers head out, and we leave for Bamenda to spend the next nine days with the orphans there.  We are all excited to get to the places we have been planning to go, but have mixed feelings about leaving the team.  We are having a lot of laughs together and feeling that sense of family here.  But all of us are missing everyone back home.

Wednesday Evening

We made it back to Bemenda, the roads are getting worse with time, it now takes 1-1/2 hours to get from Ndu to Banso (about 20-25 miles).  It took us four hours to get to Bamenda, we were packed in very tight, four people in the back and three in the front, very dusty and hot but we are glad to be here.  The house we are staying at is really nice, we all had a hot shower and have a real toilet to use! : )    Tomorrow we will begin painting at the orphanage in the morning and then when the kids are done with school we will be playing with them and helping them with their homework. Tell Nathan and Hannah they are very lucky to be children in America, I have many pictures to show them and stories to tell of the difficulties of the children here.

Thursday

We had our first day in Bamenda today, in the morning we painted three rooms and then came back and cleaned up and at 4:00 we went back to the orphanage and the kids had a program for us with singing and memory verse.  It was so good!  Then we gave them the blankets what a joy to watch their faces as we read them the messages and as they saw their blankets.  It was really a joy to be there.  We are very impressed with this orphanage and the program they have set up.