We had a bit of surprise this morning. The schedule had us attending a church service with Mike preaching but no location. The surprise was that the service was at the church we help build on Friday. On Friday, we had commented, “Wouldn’t it be fun to join them for the first service in the new building.” But we thought we were schedule elsewhere and we did not know if the work would continue on Saturday. Mike with Alphonse, our GAiN Benin host who is translating. What treat to be in this community again for this special day to enjoy the start of a new chapter and celebrate God’s provision of t ..read more

Today was a R&R day. We played tourist in the morning and shopping in the afternoon. Our tourist experience was a guided tour of the 4 km Slave Road that leads from Ouidah to the ocean shore, pictured above, where over one million slaves were loaded on boats headed for Europe, North and South America. The Slave Road consists of six main stages: Plaza Chacha, where enslaved people who arrived were auctioned. The “Tree of Oblivion”, replanted in 1992, that commemorates the tree where men went around nine times and women seven so that, in accordance with the voodoo tradition, they would forg ..read more

Our day was spent in a village where we provided our unskilled labour to the construction team of three that were building a new church. The church was planted in 2018 after the a GAiN well was drilled in that same year. It has grown to 25 adults and 35 children. They have out grown their current 15 x 20 ft building. Someone has not read the safety rules! The new church is 25 x 50 ft. The cement pillars that will support the roof were pored on Tuesday. Our task for the day is to help construct rafters and if we have time, the roof of metal sheets. All the work is being done with hand tools, no ..read more

It was GAiN t-shirt day. Our arrival gift from GAiN Canada was a t-shirt and a hat. We looked so clean. It did not last long to change that! Our morning departure was delayed because of mechanical problems with one of the cars. Once that was addressed, we headed out to observe a training session organized to equip church members in the area where we were last night. They are called the Action Group and are volunteers who will provide encouragement and help to the men and women who indicated a desire to follow Jesus. Mike and Rob are very familiar with the content of the training because it is ..read more

Our day started with an introduction to the GAiN Benin staff team. GAiN was launched in Benin by the GAiN Canadian in 2005 and since then this partnership has resulted in 1756 wells. Their work with local churches has resulted in 78,919 people indicated decisions for Christ. GAiN has assisted in helping build 591 village churches.  In rural Benin, 25% of the of the population are drinking water from wells provided by GAiN! Map of the Wells provided in this past year. It’s one thing to hear numbers, quite another to see first hand what is happening… We visited two villages today. The first ..read more

Near the end of our 2021 Cycling 4 Water ride, the thought surfaced, “Wouldn’t it be great to go to Benin, West Africa and see some of what our cross-country rides in 2014 and 2021 accomplished.”  Through the generosity of so many, funds were raised for over 100 wells. Lyndon’s Missing! He’s taking the picture. That thought has turned in to reality! After 35 hours of travel, our crew of 11 arrived in Benin on February 3. Our group includes Lyndon and Monique representing GAiN, Rob and I from our Cycling 4 Water team plus 7 others who support the work of GAiN. After what felt like a very ..read more

We planned a slow start to the day, coffee at 8 am. Then we had bacon and blueberry pancakes at the picnic table on the edge of the Arctic Ocean! Just as we finished, Pastor Roy from the Baptist Church join us with his wife and three children. The have served in this area for 3 years. We peppered them with lots of questions about their live and ministry in the area. A really fun opportunity came up in a conversation I had with Roy before leaving Abbotsford. When I asked if there was any thing we could bring along, he mentioned his 9-year-old daughter would really like to have a bike for her b ..read more

After breakfast, Timo went to the hospital to get checked out. I got ready to go. Jacquie me cycling on my did not think that me cycling on my own was a great idea. She said, “Do you know your way from the campground?” I assured her I would be okay. When I got to the first stop sign, about to turn right, she yelled, “Turn left!” LOL The day was perfect, great temperature and even a tailwind! The road was well packed with very little loose gravel. In my optimism, I pictured a flat ride to the Arctic Ocean. It was not flat but compared to what we had experienced it was going to be an amazing ri ..read more

The alarm went off at 6 am. I heard Richard say, “I did not sleep very much and I don’t feel good.” Timo had a similar night’s sleep and was concerned because he was having some irregular heart beats!! Not a good start to our forth day of cycling. We decided I would start cycling while Jacquie discussed the situation with Richard and Timo. I literally cycled into clouds to the border to NWT/White Pass. By the time I reached that point, visibility was bad and the wind was ragging. I was chilled to the bone. Climbing into NWT I reconnected with the support vehicle at the pass. Turns out Richard ..read more

Overnight it rained but it stopped before we hit the road. The nice thing about all the rain is… NO DUST! We started peddling at about 7:30 am with a layer of fog that slowly dissipated leading into a mix of sun and cloud. Good news to was very little wind! Nothing flat! You may remember I mentioned in yesterday post the hope that things would flatten out. Well, that did not happen! We had incredible hill climbs for 113 KM, all the way to the Arctic Circle. Most of time we were on a high ridge with views in both directions. Amazing beautiful views. The road was not as smooth today, which comb ..read more