Day 1
Let the adventure begin! Today, April 15th we set out on the first leg of our trip. We began by driving ourselves from Karanda to Harare. I think we are very excited to have a break from the bush. We have been in Karanda 6 weeks straight, and are anxious to get in a car and head to an actual city. We are traveling with a group called ACTS. They are a group that specializes in leading short term mission trips into remote places in Africa, and they also plan and lead vacations for long and short term missionaries. We were informed by them that we should pack light, probably backpacks and small bags, so as to fit everything in the vehicle for the long trip. Its a tall task to pack “light” when you have 2 kids and your traveling through Africa for 7 days. We did our best to comply, and we'll just have to see how this “backpacking trip” really goes.We didn't get far from Karanda when our first obstacle presented itself. You see, there are 2 ways to get from Karanda to the paved road that will take us to Harare. One way is 25 Km of bumpy, rocky, winding roads that takes adds about 40-45 minutes to the trip. The other-way just recently became a possibility as the river waters are just beginning to recede (200-300 feet wide at the crossing point, and probably mid thigh to waist deep at some points). This way is only 4-5 Km on dirt road and is a straight shot to the highway. Now we are driving a Land Rover with 4 wheel-drive....so that is to our advantage. We also just talked to several missionaries who recently braved the waters. Two of them said it was difficult, but thought we could make it, the other said she made it but she would not advise trying to cross it at this time. So naturally, that's 2 to 1 in favor of giving it a shot. So......as we approached the river we could see that it was quite high. There were Shona people walking across, but the water was above their knees, probably close to there waist in some areas. I turned to everyone for one last bit of encouragement, made sure the kids were all buckled in, said a quick prayer.........oh yeah and made sure Paul got his video camera out(sink or swim we had to make sure we got this on camera). Then......I decided to go for it. I had two people in the front seat with me. I had Dr Smith (a visiting neurologist from the US), and Shea both eagerly awaiting and pondering every move. It was nice having 2 opinions as I began my plunge into the waters, but unfortunately they both shouted opposite commands as I began driving in the water. Shea shouted “faster”, Dr Smith shouted “slow down”, and April and Paul (in the very back) were shouting other commands as well. As we approached the deepest area of the river I could see that water was approaching the hood of the truck. I could also see that we were making quite a wake (and for a brief second thought: “this could be fun to ski behind.....then I went back to reality), the tires were covered with water, and I knew we were very close to stalling out. I really started to doubt why we were doing this, and wished we had just taken the extra 45 minutes of driving. Unfortunately the middle of the river was no place to turn around. I kept driving, as I continued to get conflicting orders from my 4 backseat drivers: “More the the left!”, “no more to the right!”, “stay in the middle!” “Were not going to make it!!!” But thankfully, after a bit of stress, some shouting, and a few prayers.......we made it to the other side. It was a great feeling! We got through the first major obstacle of the trip, and shaved 45 minutes off the trip as well (always nice with 3 kids in the back).
We made it to Harare with no other issues. We enjoyed a nice big pizza dinner, as we always do in town. Paul and April went to the store and loaded us up with some excellent drinks and snacks for the road. We bunked down for the night, and awaited pick-up from our ACTS tour guide in the morning. I'm sure more good stories are sure to follow!
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