Day 3 (Teamed with Jake and Nik)

Today was seriously amazing. I cannot even begin to describe how full this day has been. I wish I could have a hidden video camera that just followed us around all day so that I could experience it again whenever I wanted.

We started the day with Prayerwalking. Even though this had been described to me, I had no idea what it was going to be like. This is one of the most intense disciplines you can imagine. You are literally walking through the town and praying for people you encounter or people in buildings you pass. Whatever the Spirit leads you to pray for. It is very hard to stay focused. I think this is going to revolutionize my prayer life when I get home. Then there is a time of “listening prayer” where you just sit and pray for whatever God brings to your mind. This may sound weird, but the leadership team told us a story about how they prayed over a building, specifically for the people in the building and not even a week later they happened to meet those exact people at a pub. What seemed to be completely random was actually something orchestrated by God. They told us how excited they were when they found out where these people lived because they had just prayed over that house.

We spent the morning doing that. Each team does different zones of Caenarfon. Tomorrow we will be in different teams doing the same thing.

For lunch Jake, Nik and I had Fish N’ Chips from Ainsworth’s, which is supposed to be the best in town. I’ve never had it before, but it was definitely amazing. Well first, we had some donuts that were also ridiculous. They were very different from donuts at home, but still really good. We sat in the square and ate and talked about our testimonies and what God has done in our lives. It was very cool.

After lunch we did our “Narrative Mapping”. Basically this is where we just started conversations with people. Jake had 3 questions he wanted us to answer, by asking locals the questions. We had to find out 1. Who were the first people here? 2. Who built the castle? 3. When was the castle built? We had a great conversation with the owners of “Gray Thomas”, which is a shop right across from the castle. They answered all our questions; actually they gave us the answer to #1 without us even asking. After that Jake had another adventure for us. It was kind of like a scavenger hunt. He wanted us to find out what “Foxwist Coat of Arms” was. We had 30 minutes to find out and then meet him at Café Roc. We immediately went into a bookstore and asked about a book on coats of arms. She didn’t, but told us about a building that had the “Foxwist Coat of Arms” on it. It was literally around the corner. We walked over, took a picture, went to the information center, got some details on it and had the information to Jake within 15 minutes. We were so excited that we had figured it out so fast. He bought us some hot drinks as a reward.  Jake had been giving us some great information throughout the day so we asked him to take us to a place he had mentioned earlier.

We took a walk to Segontium. This was a fortress that was actually built by the Romans in 286AD. PURE CRAZINESS!!!! It was so awesome to be somewhere that has been around that long. The Romans came here to eliminate the Druids that lived in Anglesey. Druidism actually began in Anglesey. We can see that island from our rooftop terrace. It’s right across the Menai Strait.

After that we took a walk to an old cathedral that is supposedly haunted by a banshee. J There was also a graveyard that had crypts and graves from the 1400’s. We took a little trip through the brush to get to some of the old ones. Jake and Nik were being pansies and were afraid of the spiders, but after I ran right in, they followed me. (I don’t think they wanted to be shown up by a girl ;) )We took some more paths, but eventually turned around because it got so thick.

The whole walk back we got more information than we could have ever hoped for. Jake is seriously a wealth of knowledge. We learned more about the Caenarfon Castle. Edward I built 5 castles, but he built this castle last. The first 4 were all built in very much the same form, much like the Conwy Castle. But then Edward took a trip to France and really liked one of the castles he saw. So he got a Frenchman to design it, French masons to build it and had French rock imported.

We also found out that at one point the Welsh actually overtook the castle from the English for about 6 months. They actually tore down one of the walls. When the English rebuilt it, they did it with holes in the walls so that more archers could protect the castle. They also built a large lookout on top of one of the hills because that is where they were overtaken from.

We came across a chapel called “Gwladfa Patagonia”. This very chapel was mission minded way back in 1856 and sent a missionary colony to South America. That is how the country of Patagonia was started. Seriously!! How cool is that?

I wish I could remember everything that was said. It is just so fascinating to think about everything that has happened in such a small area of the world.

We had an amazing dinner of chicken carbonera. We went out for “missional encounters”, but apparently Monday nights are pretty dead around here. We went to the Black Boy Pub and I had some “lemonade”. However, it’s not exactly like lemonade at home. It’s carbonated and super yummy!!

Now we are back at Isfryn and I’m wrapping up for the night. However for some reason I’m not tired at all!! Hope I can sleep tonight J