25 June 2011

Kargi, Kenya

Since our trip to Africa was 13 days long, I am going to break up the trip into different blog posts.  I like to tell stories through the pictures.  This one is dedicated to our LONG journey to Marsabit and Kargi.  We left on Saturday morning, May 28 (one day after graduation!).  We travelled on a plane for 25 hours.  We lost eight hours because of the time change!  We were exhausted.


We made it to Amsterdam after an 8-hour flight.  We were tired enough to sleep on a cold tile floor!  We still had another 8-hour flight to go!  "Amsterdamians" are not friendly.


Nairobi aiport... Joseph's guitar didn't make it!  It got lost in Amsterdam

 The guest house where we stayed in Nairobi.  It was a house with bedrooms that people could rent like hotel rooms.  This was a Christian organization so we met a lot of other missionaries, some from USA and Canada.  These were the mosquito nets that we slept under!

Breakfast at 4:30AM before we left the guesthouse


We left at 5AM the next morning to embark on a 13 hour drive on "the beast".  8 hours of the drive was on paved road, and then the pavement abruptly stops and the "fun" part of the ride begins.  We drove down a gravel road for 5 hours of the trip.  Where the pavement and the gravel meet, bandits have been terrorizing vehicle passengers and raiding their cars. 


Luckily we had an armed guard!

 From left to right are Paul (our driver), Reuben (our cook), and Daniel (our guide).  Daniel was wearing a MSU track and field shirt by the time we left!

Along the way, we saw some beautiful scenery.  The country of Kenya has as diverse as a landscape as America does. 

Closer to Nairobi, there is lush greenery and coffee bean fields

There are mountains that remind you of the Lion King

Then you get into the part of Kenya that resembles Arizona: rocky and dry.
If you look closely you will see a dust storm in the distance
 

Paved road...


Turned in to rocky, gravel road


As you get closer to Marsabit, there is very dry, desolate land


A few traffic jams along the way... you can see their "shepherd" if you look closely in the bottom left corner

Joseph slept on our guide

We had to wear masks to keep from inhaling all of the dust, and it got really windy since there were no screens on the vehicle


But by God's grace, we finally made it to Marsabit safely! More to come!







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