The Adventure Begins...

12 hours in airports, 22 ½ hours in the air, one 2 year-old, 2 adults.... Getting to the other side of the world... Difficult, but worth it.

We are so happy to be here and our journey to Malawi went as planned. Emma was great and only had a few problems as we were landing in Johannesburg. We were all so tired and she cried, "Duck, duck!" as we strapped her in to her seat belt for the 150 th time. Either she was complaining about the pretty yucky airplane food and wanted some gourmet cuisine, or she was really trying to say, "Stuck, stuck." In fact, we were all stuck and we were anxious to almost be to our destination. It was about 100 degrees as we walked off the plane in South Africa. No matter how much I told myself that it would be warm, it was still a mental and physical challenge.

We arrived in Malawi on Friday afternoon and were met by Jeremy and Beth Barr, longtime friends of Janice and all the Peters'. All our checked luggage arrived (praise the Lord!), except for the car seat we brought for Emma. Jeremy and Beth were able to find a car seat from their girls and Emma has a seat. We will deal with the fact we lost our good car seat in Africa later.

Saturday Janice arrived and we drove to Paul and Marilyn (Jeremy's parents) Barr's farm about ½ an hour away toward the Lake. Our plan was to go to the Lake and spend a day relaxing, but the rains came and stranded us indoors. They started at about 6am and the pounding on the tin roofs made conversation impossible for about an hour. I had forgotten how hard it rains here! The thunder and lightening was also impressive.

Malawi is a beautiful and developing country and I was interested to take in the sites as we cruised along on their perfect roads. Since I had only seen Mozambique, it was a stark contrast for me. Mozambique was in a civil war up until 1992 and still suffers from the crippling effects of war. This is such a fascinating place and I have lots to reflect on.

Monday we started for home in Lichinga and stopped at a game park for one night in southern Malawi. I was especially pleased with the detour since we missed out on seeing any African wildlife when we were in Mozambique last time. We traveled in to the park by boat (the rain washed out all the roads) and I immediately started snapping pictures of the Hippos that peaked with heads up. Janice and Jeff were not as excited as I was and I soon realized why. Hippos are plentiful and we would see thousands while we were at the park. We arrived at the secluded lodge and checked in to the very nice accommodations and immediately went out on a safari. We saw impalas, wart hogs and more hippos, and crocodiles. The next day we went out on another boat ride on the Shire river for 2 hours. We were all a little disappointed that we didn't see much, but were happy with our time there. Right at the end of the ride, our driver gasped and stopped the boat so we could see 2-3 elephants on the side of the river. Again I started snapping pictures, amazed to see those beautiful creatures in the wild. There was a tremendous rumbling in the grass and more elephants started to come to the water. In all we saw about 40-50 at the water and the driver said that herd had about 180 in it. It was so incredible and a completely unforgettable experience. Even Janice, who has seen lots of wildlife in her years in Africa, was impressed. We were about 50 feet away from the elephants and they are so amazing up close. There was even a little 3 month old calf -- too cute.

We made it back down river to Janice's car and drove the remaining 5 hours to Lichinga with little incident. At the border between Malawi and Mozambique, we were delayed only a bit because the person in charge was sick and at the hospital. Janice left Jeff, Emma and I at the border crossing while she went to find the official visa stamper. I was a little worried as Janice drove off, but she soon returned, we got our visas stamped and continued on.

We are now in Lichinga and much has changed. When we left 3 years ago, the house was not finished, the fence half done and there was no running water. Now the house is very nice with a beautiful yard and electricity and water that works most of the time.

We are going to run errands today and see if the tile arrived from Maputo. The huge tile project will hopfully start tomorrow. Amazingly, we all recovered from the time difference and have been sleeping well. I was worried about Emma and how she would adjust, but she has been really good. She doesn't seem to notice that the people here have different color skin than she does and says, "Hi," when they stare at her. J

Thanks for your continued prayers. We are in good health except for Emma and I being sunburned. I wish I could share pictures with you at this time, but I forgot to bring a card reader for my camera. We are working on getting my 300 pictures off the card and I will send them as soon as I can and post them here.

-- Alysun for the others