11/27/08

This morning I got up at 5:20AM and began working out before I left to go on a hike. Most of the missionaries got up and met at 6:30AM to go on the 8th Annual Thanksgiving Hike. We hiked through town and into the hills which is a tradition here for Thanksgiving. To get to the top of this hill, you need to hike thought what seems like a jungle intermixed with fields on the hillsides. The fields are all terraced and plowed/dug by hand. They do not use any machinery for their farming here. It is an interesting trip to the top where a tree stands and had been named by the missionaries as the "Thanksgiving Tree". Once we get to this tree, we all stop and sit on top of the hill talking and enjoying the incredible view of Port de Paix below us along with the surrounding blue ocean with the island, Tortuga, in the distance. Below are a few pictures from the hike.





After hiking to the top, we hiked back in time to have brunch at Roger and Norma's. We were gone about two and a half hours so it was a nice start for Thanksgiving to get a little exercise in before I spent the rest of the day mowing down all the good food that Norma prepares. For brunch Norma had made fresh doughnuts, breakfast quiche, waffles, and had fresh pineapple, mangos, grapefruit and bananas along with fresh squeezed grapefruit juice. It was delicious.

Later today, we all got together and had a real Thanksgiving feast. Norma didn't hold back on anything. She had a huge turkey (maybe two, I cannot remember) along with a massive bowl of mashed potatoes, mashed sweet potatoes with chopped pecans on top, stuffing, an asparagus dish, green beans, and plenty of deserts. I am sure I left some things out, but there wasn't anyone walking away hungry. It was nice because we all sat around afterward visiting and I pulled out my favorite board game, Beyond Balderdash. This is my favorite game to play with my family and since I couldn't be with them, it was still fun to play with some of my friends here. After the game was over, we were all saying how we hadn't laughed that hard for a while. Not that we hadn't laughed recently, but we really couldn't control ourselves during that game. All in all, it was an awesome day.