Travel day one:
9am Kenyan time (KT): packed and waiting for our 9 am pick up so we can be checked out of our apartment by 10 am when the next guests arrive.
9:10 am KT: rides show up.
9:20 am KT: we've said our goodbyes to our landlord Ricky and are pulling out of the drive. We head to a church member's house to spend the rest of the day.
9:42 am KT: the church member's house is actually a hotel room that Manna Worldwide rented us for the day. This is a very true of the Race, we often think we know what's happening and then find out that the reality is not quite what we assumed. Two bathrooms and eight beds. The showers are in the same room as the toilet (and when used soaks the toilet bowl). With the exception of leaving to get dinner we'll stay here until we leave for the bus station.
8:00 pm KT: sitting waiting for our pickup to take us to downtown Mombasa to catch the bus.
8:15pm KT: truck arrives, we load our hiking pack into the bed and our daypacks into the backseat. We're off.
8:42 pm KT: moving along somewhat slowly due to traffic, some places are slower than others and all are busy.
9:05pm KT: arrive at bus office. The "terminal" is just a reserved space big enough for a bus at a time to park in front of the office.
9:13pm KT: say our final goodbyes to Mama Anne and our driver Alex. Bus should load at 9:30.
9:50 pm KT: start loading the bags into the bus.
10:17 pm KT: we pull off for our 9ish hour journey to Nairobi.
Travel day two:
3:10am KT: bathroom break. Head to the squatties and remember that lines are only a suggestion and that anyone at any time will push past you if you don't stand your ground. Bring your own toilet paper.
9:00am KT: still riding the bus, our 9 hour trip has turned into almost an 11 hour trip. We seem to be in the right city but we're sitting in stop and go traffic and progress is slow. We're all hungry, tired, dehydrated, and the proud owners of swollen feet. Shockingly sleeping on a bus is about as appealing as you would imagine, but add in bumpy roads and giant sped bumps to your cramped space and you'll start to get the picture but we have air conditioning and even had wifi for the first part of the journey. Shouldn't be too much longer now.
9:10am KT: we've pulled in to the bus station/office.
9:32am KT: we've found and loaded a matatu and are starting the journey to the airport, which even though it's in the same city, we're estimating may take us two hours to get to because of traffic.
10:04 am KT: we've passed through the first security check. The van with our stuff drove through and we walked through a separate scan system.
10:11am KT: at taxi drop off waiting to unload. Fortunately the traffic was smooth sailing going out of the part of the city we were in.
1:45 pm KT: we go through security at the airport, we weren't allowed to go through until 1 and killed time eating at a coffee shop.
3:44 pm KT: waiting at the gate to load our plane to Dubai. Boarding was supposed to start at 3:40.
4:20 pm KT: our zone (the last one) boards.
9:00 pm KT/10:00 pm Dubai time (DT): land in Dubai and get on a bus taxi to the main terminal. We meet up with the rest of our squad (coming from Ethiopia) in the Dubai airport.
Travel day three:
3:00 am KT/4:00 am DT: we board the last leg of our flights. I haven't slept since the bus ride from Nairobi to Mombasa and sleep for the first time on this flight.
6:06 am KT/ 8:36 am India Time (IT): begin descent into India. India has it's own time zone and they are 30 minutes off from the closest time zones.
6:15 am KT/ 8:45 IT: after a slightly bumpy landing, we unboard the plane and prepare to go through customs. Here we need our India visas, our passports and proof of our yellow fever vaccinations.
8:16 am KT/10:46 pm IT: squad has made it through customs and baggage claim and has loaded the bus to get to our first destination where we will do some development and preparation for India. Expected travel time: 1 hour. We're now 10 and a half hours from East Coast time (U.S.).
10:16 am KT/12:46 pm IT: arrive at the covent we'll stay at for our first few days in India. Our travel is complete until our leadership development weekend and India orientation is done.
Total time commuting by bus/van/matatu/plane/etc:
22 hours and 30 minutes (rounded estimate)
Total time elapsed between leaving our Kenyan home and arriving at our first India home: 73 hours
This should be our third longest travel day (in actual distance) for my race route. The longest will be from Malaysia to Central America and the second longest was the one from America to Africa.
We're so excited to be in India and working with Covenant Worship, I hope to get a blog up soon about some of the things we'll be partnering with them in and how God's working this month.
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