First Day on Guam

We arrived in Guam at night so when we rolled out of bed before sunrise we thought we better go take our first look at our new island. It was the the first time seeing the ocean. We were up on a hill with a beautiful view of west side of the island. It was humid. Tyson's glasses fogged right up when we stepped outside and so did my camera lens.  

We heard roosters crowing all over the island below us doing their job and waking everyone up. It was a unique and unexpected sound. 

The lights in the distance were beautiful and so was the sky. 

 Here is our residence for the first few nights. Navy Gateway Inn and Suites on top of Nimits Hill in Guam. It is on a part of base. It isn't fancy but it has everything we need including a nice kitchen and a large fridge.

 We spotted our first Gecko. Lydia thought they were pretty cool.

 We hopped back into bed and relaxed before ready for the day. Then we ate some breakfast and soon after Matt (our new friend/sponsor) came to pick us up. He took us to this look out point. It had an amazing view of this place. Once again my camera got foggy due to the humidity. I need to figure this out.

 The while building with the red roof is the brand spanking new hospital where Tyson will be working. That was our next stop.

They tore down the old hospital and built this one in its place. It just opened a few months ago. 

 Matt showed us what these contraptions were, they are the Brown Tree snake traps. We went over to get a closer look and this trap had TWO snakes inside.

Matt had never even seen one before. 

Here is how they work: On the top are two mice and a potato. The mice eat the potato to stay alive and they lure the snakes in through the black circle. The snakes can get in through the circle but not out. They brown tree snakes can't hurt the mice because they are on the bottom. Cool eh?

We drove through the old part of the town and then the newer part.  

Matt drove us to Gun Beach so we could explore a little bit. It was our first time putting our feet in the ocean on this side of the world. 

It feels as if we just stepped into a postcard. This place is breathtaking. 

We went for a small hike. 

Everything here is SO green. 

We spotted some hermit crabs. 

The next beach he took us to was to Fish Eye. Lydia and I want to come back here and go snorkeling to find blue star fish. 

We were all fairly jet lagged by this point but we still had some things to take care of. Next we went on base and got a short tour from Matt. I think it looks great. It has everything such as stores, restaurants, school, library, movie theaters...etc. 

Matt showed us his neighborhood and took us on a tour of his home. We will get a similar 3 bedroom home eventually. We don't know what is available yet and in what neighborhood we want. 

We needed to rent a car to use as ours will not be arriving for a few more weeks. We went to the car rental shop and none were available. Our second option is to just go and buy one so we will do have two. 

We wanted to go to the store to pick up some more groceries. We bought bread and things to make sandwiches, some Ramen and a pizza to get us through to the next day or two. When we walked out of the store Matt had good news for us. His neighbor is visiting the States and said that we could borrow his car. He's never even met us and we were floored that someone would be so generous. We picked up the car and it is SO nice. What a blessing to have it to use until we can buy one. 

We came home hungry, sticky and tired from our tour of the Base and part of the Island. We all could have crawled into bed and fallen fast asleep but we decided to power through our day with no naps. Lydia had woken up at 3:00 a.m. and we had woken up at 5:00 a.m. We let her watch a movie while we slept some more. They say it takes about two weeks to get used to the time change but Tyson was determined we do it sooner. So no naps for us. We chilled in our hotel for an hour and then went out on the town. We drove to go find our new potential church building. We experienced our first rain storm. We walked into a market so Lydia could use the restroom and when we went to go find Tyson it was down pouring. We ended up at the Micronesia mall after that. We heard they had a Ross and Tyson needed a new swim suit. I will describe that experience later on. It was insane!!!

After shopping we came home around 6:30 p.m. I made some sandwiches and then we put Lydia to bed at 7:30 p.m. We tried to make it until 8:00 p.m. but couldn't fight sleep any longer. 

We woke up Sunday morning at 5:00 a.m. and Lydia slept until I had to wake her and get her fed and ready to go to church. 

It was a great first day on the Island. Its hard to believe we are here. We have been thinking, talking and often dreaming (good and bad) about this place for months now and it is finally real. Every time we get in the car to go somewhere it hits be again that I live so far away and in such a beautiful place.