Tricks on Boys and Backpacking up the Mountain

This picture has nothing to do with tricks or mountains -- it's just a cute picture of Priya helping Candace with her food.

One morning the girls were in charge of breakfast. Unbeknownst to the boys, the girls had a couple tricks up their sleeves.

Joreth and Amaris are very innocently (or otherwise) preparing breakfast.

Joreth cut bacon into proper lengths and lined muffin cups with the pieces. Then she broke an egg into each one and baked them. I wanted a picture so I could show my family. I've never had this before.

Making pancakes. The girls made a couple "special" ones for the boys by putting some little pieces of cloth in. The cloth was in the middle of the pancake, so the pancakes looked like all the others. Somehow the girls managed to make sure that Es-via and Ezra got those pancakes. We girls were having a hard time controlling our snickers as we waited for the victims to find their special flavoring. In time, they did. "Someone put cloth in these pancakes!" Es-via gasped. But he and Ezra were good sports and ate their food anyway, minus the cloth.

Then Amaris gave Ezra his tea for the morning. The tea was "special," too: at the bottom was an egg Amaris had broken into the cup. We watched Ezra drink his tea -- egg and all! Joreth said,"I thought he would do that!" Yes, that's typical of Ezra. Nathaniel informed us that our jokes would be reciprocated, but they never were.

This is the mountain on the Van der Merwes' ranch. One afternoon we packed gear to camp up there. Obviously, the only way to get up there is by foot, so we had to pack lightly to get everything up there in one trip.

Amaris and Joreth.

We toted as much as we could in backbacks.

Joreth and her load.

Phil brought along little Antonie.

Going up.

After a steep climb, we made it to the campsite under the rocks that rim the mountain.

Phil went back down to get bread dough to make weiner buns. The dough is rolled, then wrapped around a stick and baked over the fire.

Making our supper.

A close-up. The weiners are supposed to go inside the bread, but the holes weren't quite big enough. Oh well. It tasted fine just taking a bite of weiner, then a bite of bread.

The next morning we went up on top. I loved the view. The picture doesn't do it justice.

I zoomed in on the house and outbuildings.

This was a swallow nest clinging to the rocks.

On the way down, some places were so steep we had to slide. Whee!

Ezra very kindly insisted on helping some of us girls with our loads.

Going across the stepping stones.

This last picture is of the tent in Lesotho where we cousins sang and Phil preached. There was a good response to the altar call.