Welcome to Camp Jo-Ota in Clarence, Missouri.  Clarence is located about fifty miles west of Hannibal, Missouri.  To let you know how far out in the country we are, we are about 15 miles from the closest Wal-Mart.  NOMADS judge how far away from civilization they are by the distance from the nearest Wal-Mart.  I think this is the furthest we have been from one in a long time, probably since we left Kentucky in March.

Camp Jo-Ota is a lovely place.  The facilities here are great.  There are several cabins for campers, a pool, very large well equipped dining facility, a couple of outdoor chapels, and a great RV parking area.

Sarge and Marisa, the camp directors are great host.  They have made our visit here one of the best, and that is a lot since we have been at some great places this year.  Scott, the head maintenance guy, has been a wonderful lead on the work we have been doing.  He not only has made sure we had the right materials, and tools we needed, he has been working with us providing us with his experience and his back when needed.

We started off our week last Sunday with morning worship at the Clarence First United Methodist Church.  We were blest not only with a great message from God's Word, but also with some great music from the church choir and special music from a soloist.  As all the small town churches that we attend, the people were very warm and welcomed us to their church. 

After church we went to lunch at Kemp's family restaurant.  Kemp's menu offered everything from sandwiches to plate dinners.  I can tell you that all of us really enjoyed our meals.  No one left hungry.

Later on Sunday afternoon the team met for our first get together to meet and greet each other.  Our team is made up of NOMADS from Indiana, Arizona, Tennessee, and of course Alabama.  George and Terry, our team leaders, started our meeting with a short devotional and prayer.  A wonderful way to start the project.  Our team members, Scott, Dave & Marilyn, Sharon & me, and George and Terry.  Sarge and Marisa also attended our meeting to tell us about the camp and to let us know about some of the work they had for us to do.  Sarge had supplied George with a long list of things that needed to be done around the camp.  At the head of the list were things like repairing benches at an outdoor chapel and putting down new wood chip mulch, replacing some doors in a couple of buildings, closing up the pool for the winter, much painting, rebuilding some outdoor metal framed benches with new wood, and many more repairs to camp facilities.

By the end of the first week we had painted the inside of the garage at the director's home, rebuilt seven eight foot long benches and painted them, removed and re-installed the post for thirteen benches at the outdoor chapel now ready for new wood for the bench, removed a set of double doors from one building and re-installing them in a cabin to enclose two hot water heaters, replaced several vents on the roof of one of the cabins, closed up the pool, and several other small projects.  As you can see we stayed very busy.  We still have a lot to do during the next couple of weeks.

 

Here is the team meeting for devotions and getting our work assignments for the day.  That is George and Terry on the right, they are the team leaders.  Scott is on the end of the table, Dave and Marilyn are on the left.  Sharon is hiding behind Dave.  That is Sarge leaning down on the bottom of the picture.

We have a beautiful place to park our RVs.  It is all in the shade and very quiet.

Here we are backed up into a very nice spot.

George and Scott are discussing what we need to do at The Cross outdoor chapel.  We removed the telephone post that the benches are attached too, cut up some newer telephone poles for post and installed them.  The fire pit was removed and new mulch will be put down when we finish with the benches.

Terry is painting one of the benches that was rebuilt.  Five long benches were taken apart and the metal frames were used to build seven shorter benches.  They will be used to supplement seating at The Cross chapel and other outdoor areas when needed.

As you can tell we were busy this past week.  This next week looks to be just as busy.  We have to finish the outdoor chapel, complete closing in the wall where we removed the double doors, and much more painting and repairs.

Stay with us for more about our project here at Camp Jo-Ota.

You all take care for now and remember,

God Loves You

Gary