Road to Lae

4 hours from us, is the town from which we get most of our supplies.  There has been so much rain lately that the road is flooded badly, thus hiding the potholes.  These gentlemen are willing to guide you past the hidden potholes (for a modest fee).

Flying in the Rain

A picture of a crocodile skull, with teeth and some hide in tact in Madang.

My wife and I were recently in Madang, having never flown there before.  It was a good time, perfect weather.  Everything went smoothly.  We saw interesting things.

And then, there was the flight back.
It is a 30 minute flight, or a 6 hour drive.
This was the first time we had flown.

The two pilots in the small plane were very experienced at flying in country.  They told us 'We have just heard there is a lot of rain at our destination (our home), and we may not be able to land.'

The pilots seemed very concentrated on looking for holes in the weather.  We occasionally would bank left, or bank right in the little plane made specifically for jungle landings and take offs.  It was bigger than a Cesna 206, but engineered with a short take off and landing distance needed.  At one time we pulled up, sped up, then moved this way and that.  It was actually all rather smooth, but we are experienced flying passengers in this type of weather, and so no one was really worried.

Some lightning was going on in the clouds around us, but we felt perfectly safe because we knew these pilots personally and had tremendous respect for their professionalism.

Soon we were over the landing strip, but couldn't see it.  It looked like we may have to divert to a different place.  The pilots circled around once... then it looked as if they saw a hole, and came in from an angle we've never come in before, and landed, a silky smooth landing.  After landing, we heard one pilot say to the other 'if you hadn't found that hole, we would have had to divert."

We were very thankful we were able to get home to our kids, and that everything went so well.  Those pilots were flying all day, loading unloading, etc.  Working hard.

It is a pleasure to be supporting Bible Translation along side people of that caliber.


(why did I put up a pic of a croc?  Well I didn't take a picture of rainy weather from the plane because I never enough thought to snap one... and then speaking of SNAPPING... I had this croc pic from madang!  We found it in a craft hut (kauvinghaus aka - house of carvings) but did not buy it.