Wednesday night we had to stay in a hotel because the furniture from our house was broken down to be moved with us to Ft Dauphin for another family to use. And very early Thursday morning, I would say, "before the rooster crowed", but that's not true because roosters in Madagascar crow whenever the heck they feel like it, Chandler ran by the house, picked up the dog and a friend of ours and his son and headed south. At this point, everything we brought with us from the States on the airplane was in the back of our truck. By Thursday evening, Chandler had driven halfway to Ft Dauphin on decently paved roads with no major setbacks.
That same day, Waverly and I headed to Tana with another couple who so graciously offered to drive us to Tana so we could catch our flight on Saturday. We had one last opportunity to enjoy our favorite Tana activities: lunch at The Cookie Shop, which so lovingly dubbed itself "The American Centre of Madagascar", playtime at the mall, a delicious burger, which we enjoyed on the 4th in honor of America's independence, a walk through Jumbo, and a couple rides on the carousel. Really, nothing exciting happened for us the two days in Tana before we flew out.
On Friday, Chandler drove another quarter of the trip. Why so slow going, you ask?
Puddles...
Ferries...
There were about 10 ferries; most of them man-powered.
And just generally bad roads dirt paths and rock faces.
But enough of that sob-story. Waverly and I clearly had the more difficult of the two trips... Saturday morning, at about 3:00am, we woke up and I showered, stressed a little more about the weight of our suitcases and about leaving mostly empty bottles of shampoo behind - If only we could have used up those last drops so they wouldn't got to waste! Whhyyyy! - And we headed to the airport to catch our 6:00am flight. We arrived around 4:45am, checked in - our bags were 10 kgs under the limit... I could've packed that shampoo... Whhyyyy! - and walked through security. At which point, the security guy got more enjoyment out of watching Waverly remove her shoes, than actually watching the x-ray screen. Nor did he bother weighing our carry-ons, which was a positive because we were definitely over the limit - shampoo... - Then we waited in the terminal. 6:00am came and went, as did 7:00am and at 7:20am, we finally boarded our plane. Oh Africa. And here's the irony: Our flight was originally scheduled to fly out at 6:45, but was moved up to 6:00, then we left at 7:30, so there you have it.
Chandler finally arrived in Ft Dauphin at 2:15 on Saturday afternoon with a bumper tied to the top of the truck:
Not our bumper, but the front bumper of our friend's truck, another couple also moving to Ft Dauphin. These roads don't play, y'all.
And 17 hours after we awakened that morning, we finally laid our heads down in our king-size hotel bed. All three of us back together again.
Monday afternoon our first truck of possessions arrived and we unpacked most of our kitchen wares, some clothes, and a couple boxes of toys. The second truck, which busted it's transmission about 300km outside of Ft Dauphin, will load it's goods on another truck and should be here tomorrow. One day, we'll have all of our stuff... one day.
Oh, and did I mention that we're having fresh, grilled lobster for dinner tonight? That's what happens when you live on the coast, folks!
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