A 100 miles into the trip we got a flat tire (moments like that make me thankful that I check the air pressure in the spare). It was another rough ride in the Ranger, but it made it there and back with no issues. It didn't even make the noise that it had during the last outing.
We stopped at a little (and I mean little) place to eat. It was like we were eating in their dining room and it was a small dining room (I didn't get a picture). We really trust God that the food we eat is good and we try not to think about what we are eating. There were so many flies around I couldn't count them all. We ate rice and beans with goat meat. One thing that I have to get used to is the fact that they do not use things like saws to cut up the meat which leaves you will one solid piece of bone to eat around. They use machetes and that chunks and chips up the bone which makes it difficult to eat around. I am still trying to get used to eating things that I either don't like or that don't look too good to eat.
On the way up we stopped to see at a couple churches. One was about a 20 minute hike to go visit. No one was there since it was a Saturday. The hike was steep down and steep up. Here is a look of the way to the church:
and on the way back:
There is no way the truck would have made that. We spent 20 minutes there looking around at the building to make sure that everything was OK and then hiked back. Pastor Rob and I helped a little girl stop her runaway donkey on our way there. It came trotting up to us and we held our hands out to stop it.
Here is another that is a school too - this one is brand new and was paid for by one person in the US:
Our trip to our final destination took a total of 8 hours (that's the time we were moving). We left at 6:10 AM on Saturday and arrived around 4-5 PM (the Total Time is wrong because the unit shut off when we were stopped). When we were moving, our average speed for that 8 hours was 20 MPH for a total of 165 miles (I am rounding if you are calculating). My neck was getting sore near the end.
We got there and we were showed around a bit and led to our place where we would sleep. Rob and I took one room and Darlin (the translator) took another room. Rob and I were in the room that looks like it was about to fall from the building. Mom and Dad, you would have loved this because the floor was slanted so much you wouldn't have to jack up the head of your bed (haha!). It had an outhouse with a BYOTP policy (Bring Your Own Toilet Paper).
The bed was comfortable and I got a decent amount of sleep (not great, but decent). Bugs were flying around my ears and keeping me awake, so I put my ipod headphones in to try to sleep better - it worked pretty good.
We got up the Sunday morning and ate buttered bread with hot chocolate for breakfast. You have not had sugary hot chocolate until you have had it hear. It was so thick that my spoon stood straight up (not really, but it tasted like it could have).
We went to church at 9 AM when the service started and Pastor Rob didn't start preaching until 11:15 AM.
By the time everything was done, it was 12:15. We ate with some of the other visiting pastors from the area and took off a little after 1 PM.
Pastor Rob started driving and about 30 minutes into the drive he asked me if I wanted to drive. I certainly did.
We drove thinking that we would be staying overnight at the Mission's Camp and then leave for home in the morning. I started out a little slow because I wanted to show that I could drive and then Pastor Rob said that we better move a little faster to try to make better time. This is where my fun really started. I jumped at the chance to speed it up. It is really hard and technical driving to hustle on those roads, but it sure is fun. (See, Mom and Dad, all those quarters playing car racing video games paid off!!). We made such good time that we decided to head all the way back.
It got dark when we were about 3 hours away. Dark is DARK out here - no street lights, people walking on the side of the road (lots of them), cars coming at you with no lights, with bright lights, cars in front of us with no tail lights, huge pot holes, sleeping policemen (aka speed bumps), goats, cows...you name it! It really was like playing a video game. On some corners (in the daylight) I hugged the apex and accelerated out of the corners bringing the back end around. I practiced a little trail braking as well. (Those last two sentences were for you Mr. Storm.)
We made it back to the mission at 9 PM without any incident. This included stopping for drinks once, potty on the side of the road once, and filling up the tire with air after we patched it Saturday (I handed out a few pieces of candy to some cute little girls who wanted to see what the white people were doing - that was fun!).
Time to go eat breakfast with my family. It sure was great to see them last night! Thank you for your prayers for a safe trip!
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