Events happened on 10/12/10 (I know I have a blog about my attitude on this day. This is an accounting of the actual day)
3:45 AM: Our eyes faintly make out the metal roof above our heads as we wish for more sleep. It is time to head to Coban, a ‘six hour trip’ that will turn into nearly a 10 hour adventure.
7:30AM: Breakfast time in the van which consists of granola bars and yogurt.
9:00AM: First pit stop. Drinking water and eating has a logical progression. We scrounge up some tissues and personally decide if we will actually sit on the toilet seat or squat over it.
Noon: We are only about an hour away when we encounter a Mayan protest. They want more attention from the Government, so they have blocked the road. Pit stop #2.
1:15PM: Every hour or so they were letting the line of cars/vans/buses through the roadblock. So we were off to what I now know was to be a huge surprise.
2:45PM: We arrived at a steep dirt hill that topped off into a half mile of pot holed dirt road. Enter motion sickness for a couple teammates.
3:00PM: Marco stops the van in front of the side of a mountain. We look at him, wondering what we were doing.
3:02PM: I finally start realizing that he is serious about us climbing a mountain with all of our stuff.
3:30PM: At the top (about a mile uphill later), I start to realize just what I have gotten myself into. Civilization is miles away, my pack is still down the mountain, and my worst fear is living in my toilet. (Spiders)
We are fed lukewarm beans and corn tortillas. And sugar water. Then back down the mountain for a few of us to get our packs, which some of the local boys carried for us (some of them were smaller than the packs they were carrying!)
5:00PM: It is decided that we are staying on the dirt floor of the church building a quarter mile from the pastor’s shack. Good thing we brought our mosquito nets and sleeping bags.
Somewhere between here, Josh and I play with the kids and the rest of the team learns how to make quilts.
7:00PM: The electricians we brought with us are finished with the lights just in time for the night prayer service. This is the first time the people of the surrounding mountain have worshiped with lights.
8:00PM: We are served soup that contains one of Pastor Luis and his family’s of chickens, one of their roosters, and one of their best ducks. A huge sacrifice, and a very delicious meal.
(That is not potato)
10:00PM: We begin setting up our mosquito nets. Way harder than it sounds without tents to anchor them to. Eventually, six out of seven of us are protected. (One gave up and slept without)
7:15AM: I can no longer hold out and I end up using the jungle as my bathroom to avoid the spiders in the cement toilet bowl up the hill.
Miracle blog coming soon!
