All through my life, God has given me access to places of great beauty. It’s funny that the one with the least beautiful name was of such central importance. The family of Kenyan British friends of ours had a vacation place, on the coast of Kenya that they shared.  They also had a twisted sense of humor.

Apparently after driving past 20 other places romantically named things like “Whispering palms”, “White sands,” and so on, they went to the dark side and called their place Bilgewater. Bilgewater is the filthy water that collects in the bilge, the lowest part of the hull, of a ship.  It usually has wastes and old oil in it, and almost always stinks.  In slang, bilgewater also means worthless nonsense.

Starting from when I was about ten, for the next several years, Bilgewater was my happy place.  It was near

Watamu, just south of Malindi, and so beautiful! It was there that I began to learn to really look and see a little of the laughter, risk, and joy in nature. For me, Bilgewater was literally wonderful. The definition that fits what I was learning was “Wonder: a feeling of surprise mingled with admiration, caused by something beautiful, unexpected, unfamiliar, or inexplicable.” For me, it was tied to my love of God our creator.  I felt the way described in Luke 5:26 says, “Amazement seized them all, and they glorified God and were filled with awe, saying, “We have seen extraordinary things today.”  That’s exactly how I often felt!

There were 10-foot tides that bared big areas of reef studded with pools full of life. In that intricate ecosystem, many creatures had some kind of weapon that wasn’t always obvious.  I learned early to carry a “reef stick”, a smooth, light, two-foot driftwood branch. Finding the perfect reef stick meant a hunt in the dry driftwood at the top of the beach. So fun to find a good one! With my reef stick I could poke and investigate.  So many weird and amazing creatures!

Some extraordinary things were not initially hidden. Once I found a four-foot tube shaped creature crawling along the side of a tide pool.  It seemed to be made of rough brown and black corduroy. Fuzzy tentacles in a ring groped as it moved. I slid my reef stick under it and lifted. It had no substance! Like an empty piece of cloth.  Appalled, I dropped it, and it was round again.  I still don’t know what it was. Maybe some kind of sea slug?

Others amazing things weren’t initially obvious.  Learning to go where it’s a bit uncomfortable, wait and really look has given me joy all my life. Near the house, there was a lone mangrove tree with golden bark in its own tiny bay. At half-tide, it had its own pool. The mangrove roots poked up through the sand like sharp thumbs. I learned if I walked slowly and carefully into the tree’s pool and stood still, small fish would surround my knees. Hermit crabs would walk across my toes. Almost invisible little shrimp like things would come out. Over to one side in some coral rock, a moray eel lived. He would poke out his fierce looking head and watch me while I watched him.

For the first few years we were there, there was a Swahili man named Hasaan who worked for the owners of Bilgewater, keeping the place safe when no one was there. He spent a lot of time out on the reef hunting. Sometimes he let me follow. Hasaan didn’t speak English, and I only had very poor Swahili, but I learned so much! His reef sticks were metal, and he carried a bag woven from palm fronds over his shoulder. Once he pointed to a swirling pattern in the sandy bottom of a tide pool. He fanned water at it and pointed again. A row of what looked like orange knuckles showed. They made a kind of shrugging movement and settled lower.  He reached with his reef sticks and dug under neath the spot, bringing up the curving arches of a big orange and yellow helmet conch. Another day, he glanced at a pool that seem kind of dark and foggy at one end.  He exclaimed, stepped into the pool, and dug under the edge at one side with both metal reef sticks. Long tentacles snaked out and grabbed his arms.  An octopus!  I stood open mouthed. He stripped off the tentacles with a noise like tearing canvas leaving circular marks on his skin. The tentacles grabbed again, writhing toward his face. He yanked upward, ducked his face into the writhing mass and bit it!  It went limp.  Grinning at me he said in Swahili “these are good to eat!”.  I just nodded, but yikes! Not how I want to catch supper!!

I occasionally found unbroken sea urchin skeletons looking like round and segmented elegantly starched lace tablecloths with strange angular bits inside. But the spines of the live urchins were no joke! One had to wear old tennis shoes and watch one’s step carefully.  If bare skin bumped a spine hard enough it stuck into the skin, broke off, and hurt! There seemed to be a  burning chemical on it and tiny back angled scales making nearly impossible to get out. There were several kinds of sea urchins. My favorite were the long spined black ones with florescent blue bits that lived in hollows in coral rock slightly deeper water. I found that if I very carefully inserted a finger into the spines, the nearest spines would close gently around my finger. If I quietly picked up the urchin and sat it very softly on my palm, it would move, feeling very strange indeed as it “walked” off my hand using the short spines on its underside.

Dad bought us masks and flippers and a whole new world opened. The water was color coded for depth, a lovely light almost golden aqua where it was shallow, shading to deeper blue in deeper water.  Sailing over the sand, flippering fast to get into the deeper area with live coral, sometimes a disk like creature with eyes on top and a trailing tail would fly up from the bottom. Grey with neon blue spots, these were small sting rays. Harmless unless one stepped on them. That happened to one of my friends and the heavy bone “sting” part way down the trail left a lifelong scar. Attention and respect were needed!  

A few times we saw octopus. I only noticed them when they rose up a little to watch me. Their eyes looked almost human!  They seemed so much nicer than my first impression of the one Hasaan caught.  If I held very still, sometimes they would go about their business. Rising slightly to land on lumps of corral, changing color to match, and feeling underneath for food. If I got too close, the octopus would jet off pumping water through its head looking rather like a deflating balloon let loose in a room.

More than once, I stayed out too long snorkeling without a shirt and was very sorry later. Tropical sun is beautiful but nothing to mess with!! The tides demanded attention and respect as well.  Bilgewater was near only a couple of miles from Mida Creek, a long inlet that generated powerful tidal currents in for five hours, out for five hours about an hour after high and low tide. The flow was far too fast to swim through safely. In fact, the tidal stream extended a long way into the ocean and was too fast for coral to grow, so a wide channel cut right through the reef to deep water. We’d been told that most sharks big enough to be dangerous stayed outside the line of whitewater beyond the drop off (check out Finding Nemo 😊).  I thought likely that those sharks that they could cruise on in through that deep tidal channel.  I remember after a long walk, standing at the edge, knee deep at low tide when the current had stopped and watching huge shadows in the water.  They were likely big groupers that lived in the caves the current blasted in the coral edge of the gap, but I imagined sharks. What at rush! Glory, power, danger there on the edge.

Waves at high tide could give that heightened awareness as well! I still have adrenaline fueled dreams of trying to catch a wave. It is all about timing and reading the power in each wave. Misread a wave, and one got rolled into a ball, bruised, buffeted, and deposited on the beach with sand in the ears and seaweed in the hair.  Read a wave correctly and it would give you a powerful lift and an exhilarating ride. Such a wonderful dance with God’s power. Reels on my phone are still full of surfing videos.

There were other dangers. Mambas in the brush, huge spiders, deadly camouflaged stone fish, gorgeous and yet poisonous lionfish. Remember the “no fear” T shirts? My favorite was, “If you’re not living on the edge, you’re taking up too much space!”  I began to learn that freedom isn’t ignoring guidelines.  It’s knowing how to catch the wave, knowing not to carelessly touch things on the reef, paying attention and respecting the tides. It seems to me that beauty often comes with exhilaratingly power. Think of thunderstorms, mountains and cliffs, white water rivers. To me it seems that God is laughing with us and trusting us as we learn to dance safely.

For example, one has the freedom to play in powerful surf only if one has learned the patterns and timing of the waves. This understanding of freedom has helped me to understand Psalm 19. God’s law doesn’t limit a person’s life. It is the way to freedom and joy.

Psalm 19:7-11: The law of the LORD is perfect, converting the soul;

The testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple;

The statutes of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart;

The commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes;

The fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever;

The judgments of the LORD are true and righteous altogether.

More to be desired are they than gold,

Yea, than much fine gold;

Sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb.

By them your servant is warned;

in keeping them there is great reward.

It’s interesting that the part of the Psalm before these verses is about God’s power and beauty seen through his creation.

God was so good to me and my family. When my own children were nine and six years old, we were able to visit Kenya and go to the coast (top photo is me with my daughters and my sister’s oldest). Then when my younger daughter’s children were eight and ten years old, I traveled with them to Kenya and to the coast (bottom photo is me and grandkids). Such joy to share!  Check out the reef sticks in the photos 😊