Landslide

4-24

I did finally get picked up on Monday at almost 6pm after waiting at the same place about 2 hours again. The trip was an adventure. We didn't get going until almost sunset so much of the trip was in the dark. Way past the farthest village I usually go to we had to stop because the road had become a raging river with big stones and all. We backed up about 1/4 mile to a dry spot and waited about 45 minutes to see if the water would go down. It did, we saw a couple of vehicles coming from the opposite direction so the driver knew it was passable. He paid a couple of guys about 15 cents to trot ahead of us so the driver could judge deepness and more or less which way to go, avoiding the biggest rocks. (This in a 4-wheel drive vehicle). About an hour later we came to a landslide in the middle of the forest. We were parked about an hour when the driver came back and said it would be awhile yet. I was just trying to get myself psyched up to maybe have to spend the night sitting in the car holding my computer. We were in the middle of the forest with no houses nearby, and it was raining. All of a sudden I heard somebody call my name. It was two guys from the village I was heading to!! They had driven down from their village and parked on the other side of the landslide. They helped carry my bag and computer. I felt a bit like being miraculously and unexpectedly led out of prison in the middle of the night as I bid my travelling companions good bye and we slogged barefoot through the mud of the landslide. I could see then that it was going to take a LONG time to clear They had cleared enough for a motorcycle to go through and that was still mid-calf deep in mud. The rest was nearly waist deep. On the other side we climbed into a small pick up and began the last hour of the journey. My feet were coated in mud halfway to my knees but as it dried it was like wearing boots- kept my feet warm. So a bit after 1am, I finally arrived. (The car I had been travelling in didn't get through the landslide until about 9am the next morning! Did I mention that it was carrying several jerrycans of gas and the fumes were a wee bit strong? Was feeling a bit toxic already.)

It has rained heavily parts of every day. It's cool but not frigid. You can easily wear your clothes 2 days in a row without smelling :-) But my feet are rotting from being wet all the time. The checking is going well and we should be able to finish on Wednesday. SO I should be able to leave on Thursday. Hopefully the return trip will be less adventurous than the going trip.