ROADTRIP!

I took these pictures on the first of May, when we moved to Namibia from South Africa. We took a 16 hour long road trip, it was over 1000 miles, and it spanned 3 countries. I took these pictures intending to blog them as soon as we got to Namibia, but the internet is not very reliable out here, so here you go, (70 days later) our road trip from South Africa, through Botswana into Namibia.

 This is the last view of South Africa. The Lobatsi border crossing is about four hours from my parent's house. It took a long time to get through the border, they still process all the paper work without computers, so we stood in line for a long time. My parents cried, and prayed for us as we set off on our trip. We stopped at a service station to buy some snacks for the road. It is illegal to take meat across country borders, so we did not pack any road trip food. We had two bags of chips and some muffins, but we assumed we would be able to stop at a restaurant in Botswana.

 David refers to Botswana as Afro-Kansas, it is flat, the population is tiny and spread out, and one may see the occasional cow. There are more trees in Botswana though!

 The areas that the main road goes through only passes by smaller settlements, where most people live in shacks or other small homes.It was interesting to see that most of these little informal homes had satellite dishes on the outside. I am guessing it has something to do with the first African world cup.

African bugs leave bigger splats than their North American counterparts...

 It turned out to be a rough road trip. There were no restaurants, we saw one that looked like one would be gambling with one’s life (or at least colon health) by eating there. So we did not eat all day! It was extremely hot too, and our truck was fresh out of Freon. Anyways, not only could we not find a restaurant, but gas stations were scarce too. We had two Jerry cans filled with Diesel, we used up both before we reached Namibia. Also notice David's fantastic color coordination. He tries to travel in style. Actually he is wearing a South African World Cup jersey, which made the border officials extra friendly : )

Finally the sign we had been waiting for, and praying for, and preparing for for so many years. We were finally in Namibia!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We made it to the border before night fall, so we decided to try and make it to the YWAM base. We had previously thought that we would stay at a hotel as it is dangerous to travel in the dark because of all the wildlife. In 2002 we hit an Oryx while driving at night, this picture was taken the next morning.

 The night fell fast, so we ended up crawling along the road for the last 200km of the trip. We made it to the base by 10pm, and were welcomed by the Hunters with homemade hamburgers and a warm bed! We were so thankful that the road trip was over, and almost overwhelmed with the thought that we had finally made it to Namibia. We spent many years preparing for this. Thanks for all the prayers, continue to lift us up to God as we live and work in this city.