Mission Trip to Cuba, October 2006

(Me and Pepé at Santiago)

My friend, Steve Draper, from Shades Mountain Baptist Church and I were blessed to go on a mission trip to Cuba, during October, 2006. We were able to work with three different Seminaries. This Page is a photo journal of our adventures.

For more information on the water purification systems installed during our trip, please visit www.waterfortheworld.com.

All pictures below are "thumbnails." Click on a picture to see a bigger copy, afterwards, use your browser's back arrow to return to this page. If you see any pictures that you want a higher resolution copy, just email me. Most pictures have ~1 Mbyte originals

We flew out of Miami directly to Havana.

José Marti airport:

We were picked up by Pastor Martiz and his wife and carried in an old VW van (aka double-slug bug) to a Baptist nursing home in San Fransisco de Paula. There we were able to view and discuss a working water system with Mario, the maintenance technician from the nursing home.

Mario, Pastor Martiz and Steve and then with me:

Then, on the way to the Baptist Seminary in Santos Suarez, Havana, we stopped at the house of the mother of a good friend of mine from Samford.

I would say that she hasn't changed much in the last two years since I was able to visit her last.

Now on to the Seminary. It had a beautiful location overlooking the city of Havana:

They even had their own "welcoming committee," with three members! Here's one of them.

My favorite place to spend quiet-time was on the patio of the visitor's apartment:

We installed the first water system in this seminary . . . The guy in the yellow is the maintenance technician for the seminary, Leonardo, and the guy in the white shirt is the director of the seminary, René.

Sunday morning we were able to go to church with the director and his family:

Monday morning we headed out to Santa Clara to meet with the church and seminary there:

Around the main square in the morning on our way to the church:

We stayed at the Casa de Hospedaje with Elsa and her sister, Noris. In the second photo we have Noris and Elsa on either side of a neighbor holding her beautiful baby girl.

Then on to the Church/Bible Institute/Seminary. My earlier trip has some outside pictures of the church, but here are some new ones of the inside. They have made slow progress, and still need a lot of help.

We had a great goodbye lunch and then headed to the bus station for a 13 hour ride to Santiago de Cuba:

At the bus station, Pastor Homero and our driver waits for our departure:

On the Way across Cuba:

We made to the Baptist Seminary about 15 kilometers outside of Santiago de Cuba:

One of the children at the seminary (what a cutie!):

We set up another water system and got it running, and then trained the main guy, PEPÉ to run it:

Pepé was one of those types of brothers that was always faithful to his task. As part of his responsibilities, anyone that wanted his help would yell PEPÉ across the compound and he would come running to help. It was a real blessing to work with such a servant.

Before we got the system running we went into Santiago to find a water tank and to get lunch:

At the Estern Baptist Convention headquarters:

We found one! Now lets get lunch: Our guide was the son of the Seminary Administrator, Rudy.

Back to the Seminary:

After we finished getting the system running, we were waiting for the water to finish, and decided to walk along the highway towards Havana. Only 955 km to go!

Of course it waited until we were around two kilometers away from the seminary to give us an example of what "tropical climate" really means! We were soaked!

Our worked finished, we headed back to Havana. This time we were smarter. Instead a 18 hour bus ride, we had a 2 hour flight. At the airport and in the plane:

(If the pictures look a little foggy, they are. My camera still had some condensation inside from our stroll in the rain.)

In Havana we tried to stay at the particular, Casa Colonial, but were bumped:

We stayed at the "Room for Rent" (catchy name, huh?)

We went to a late lunch with Pastor Martiz at my favorite restaurant in Havana, La Roca:

After a rest in our Casa Particular (private house), we headed back to La Roca for dinner with my good colleague from the University of Havana, Professor Calviño and his wife:

Saturday morning we had a few hours before we were heading out, so we took a walk along the Malecón and into Old Havana to get some exercise before we headed out. We saw an outdoor market, but unfortunately we were not able to get anything because of our restrictions.

Along the Malecón (the main street along the Havana harbor)

In some park and at a train station:

Our Casa Particular is three blocks down that street behind Steve.

Back to the US! On the way to the airport: The Plaza of the Revolution and a Sports Stadium:

Bye, Cuba, ¡Hasta Proximo!

All pictures above are "thumbnails." Click on a picture to see a bigger copy, afterwards, use your browser's back arrow to return to this page. If you see any pictures that you want a higher resolution copy, just email me. Most pictures have ~1 Mbyte originals