Mills wrote on September 23rd..........

Hey momma,

We went down to one of the rivers this morning after church to swim and Henriette prepared a picnic for us. After we swam for a bit we sat down and ate. Someone said, "I smell smoke".... Then I said, "There is a lot of ash in the air right now....." We looked on the other side of the Land Rover and we saw a HUGE fire raging towards us with the wind. Henriette switched into instinctive mother mode and we all started running to throw the things in the back of the car. We cleaned up in about 25 seconds
and started rolling on the bush-path we made from the dirt road. In the rush we couldn't find the path we made and started trailblazing with the fire blazing behind us. I jumped on the roof rack to direct us through the tall grass that was soon to be consumed by the fire. Then Normand had to jump out to break down little trees that were in our way, and Henriette started driving. While in her instinctive mother mode she blazed a non-existent trail much faster than any of us could have. It was quite
funny seeing her handle the large vehicle; she is maybe 5'3 and might weigh 105 lbs.

I gotta run so I can go catfish with the local boys down in the river. They get pretty excited if you catch anything, but the biggest we get is maybe 3 inches. Nevertheless impressive with sticks, string, tiny piece of metal for a hook, and termites...

Love you Momma
Mills