TRAVELING ALL OVER THE PLACE

I have been very busy behind the steering wheel in March which accounts for why so few blogs. I have been in the office seldom. The rains continue in Samburu and much of Kenya so the roads are really getting to be a mess. I have been at Arsim 3 days now after my last travel and my body still aches from all the bumps. Pray for my left knee as it is still sore from clutching every 30 to 60 seconds for hours at a time, as my left leg is used for clutching and the right for brakes or accelerating. I made 3 trips to Maralal in 8 days for several meetings and picking up staff who have been out. We are chasing after some government funding (HSSF) in Maralal and Marsabit to help our health work. Pray for these efforts to succeed. Praise the Lord for a couple of people who donated to our Maternity Ward needs. So far I have gotten a table and 2 chairs for the nurse's office there, as well as some required buckets for various waste. We also have painted the windows in the delivery room as the doctor in charge of Samburu District asked us to do. He said curtains were not adequate for privacy! Now when I go to Nairobi for Easter I will buy a few other things we were needing to get to stock the ward. Pray for the promised government CDF (Constituency Development Funds) in Maralal to be released soon to help us install the solar system and water pipes and system in the Maternity Ward. It has been challenging to deliver babies without lights or water close by. Another trip took me to Korr to look for signatures of people. I also needed some signatures in Namarei and Ngurunit. I tried to take the shortcut from Korr to Namarei and found the river crossing impossibly deep with muddy sand. A lorry had gotten stuck there the day before and left a hole the size of my whole vehicle in the middle of the crossing. I sent someone on foot to try to cross and he sunk up to his ankles there and at other sites we used to cross at. So I had to turn back to Korr and then to Illaut and then over to Ngurunit and then to Namarei. Then back to Ngurunit, Illaut and finally home to Arsim. So a 4 hour trip took us 10 hours instead, due to one river we could not cross! I never got stuck anyplace, but you can see the challenges we face in travel in rainy season by this one example even if we don't get stuck in the mud. We are grateful to God for the green life all these rains have brought inspite of the challenges. The mass distribution of Zithromax in Samburu was cancelled until May due to the rainy conditions.

THANKS FOR PRAYING FOR RAIN

I went back to Arsim for a few days and it began raining out of season. It has continued to rain since in many parts of Northern Kenya. On March 2 I headed back to Nairobi with the second vehicle we are selling and also with Yolanda who had a plane to catch on the 3rd at night. We got to Maralal in mid afternoon and after lunch and a few errands we decided to start towards Nairobi planning to get to Nyahururu for the night. It is normally a 4 hour drive from Maralal but it turned into a 7 hour drive! Although the road was muddy and damaged by the heavy lorries bringing food relief, we managed well up past Suguta Marmar when we got into more mud and big trucks getting stuck. One very big one had mechanical trouble and another truck was towing it through the mud and then stopped and left it in the middle of the road on an earthen bridge with very little space on either side and 10 foot drop to the ditch on both sides. I was told this was intentional so he would block the road so he would not have to be the only vehicle to sleep alone on this lonely place where there is a history of vehicle robberies at gunpoint in the last few years. Also the hyenas were howling outside nearby looking for supper undoubtedly. As I looked at the narrow space on both sides of the truck with the steep drop off to the ditch, I prayed and chose the side less muddy and less tilted and crept by the truck with 2 inches to spare on both sides of my vehicle. We were on our way to Nyahururu again and it was tough going the next hour or two when we met another challenge. The road was flooded for about a length of 800 feet, no road was showing, only water and the bushes on the sides. There were headlights at the other end of this lake, obviously vehicles wondering, like me, if it was safe to go through or not. I sent a couple of the guys in the car out to walk a bit in the water to see how deep it was. It was only up to his knees for 100 feet so I decided to proceed. About half way it got deeper and then very deep until the headlights were under water! I just kept going and thankfully made it through without any problems. One of the drivers on the other end asked me after coming out of the water if I thought he could make it also. I said, "I did so you should be able to as well!" He replied, "But I can see you are used to driving up here in these conditions!" He was a driver in an AMREF vehicle from Nairobi bringing supplies up to Samburu for the upcoming Mass Distribution of Zithromax in March in Samburu. I wonder if he made it through alright and if he ended up sleeping on the the road with the hyenas and the stalled truck! We got to Nyahururu by midnight and the next day to Nairobi. I accompanied Yolanda to the airport that night. I am sure she is sharing lots of exciting stories with her family this week end. Since being in Nairobi we have heard that the alternative route I was planning to take home has been blocked at Archer's Post where the old bridge over the Waso Nyiro River has been swept away by raging floods. I also heard that part of Samburu Lodge in the game park there where we were for staff retreat has been swept away by the river. I called Arsim on our sat. phone and they say it is still raining. I had come to Nairobi to buy supplies for a lorry from our area to bring to Arsim for our project work, and the fuel for the Zithromax distribution in our North Samburu District area. The lorry always uses the Archer's Post road so I wonder what will happen now. Pray for the government to open up one road that is passable to the northern part of Kenya. Pray too for the final details of the vehicle sales to go well and quickly. It looks like the old pick-up will get a good price.