New Britain Survey: Travel

One of the biggest unknowns on this survey was travel. I can sum it up by saying God worked it all out. :-)

We didn't know how we were going to travel when we got to New Britain, but just a few days before the survey, our plans for even getting to New Britain fell through. However, our amazing Aviation department came through for us, and we flew from Ukarumpa to New Britain on the Kodiak!

Once we'd reached New Britain, we needed to travel by boat. For the first two weeks, we went by dinghies (with outboard motors).

We had a few rough rides, and spent a night sleeping in the open on a dock, but overall our travel worked out great!

Here we are, life jackets and all. (People weren't familiar with life jackets and asked us if they were a special survey uniform...)

We also traveled some by sailing canoe. This picture was taken after these kids had taken us to church (on another island) and back. A number of times, we also went on the same kind of platform outrigger canoe, but with people paddling rather than using the sail. (These canoes are massive - they can hold all four of us, plus all of our backpacks, and four people to paddle!)

Some villages are located on little islands just off the coast, while the church and school are located just across the water on the mainland. Since Bonnie and I wanted to interview school and church leaders, we would canoe over to the mainland... here we are setting off.

We took turns paddling in the front. As you can see, the canoes are really skinny! Rather than sitting on a seat inside the canoe, you balance on top of the canoe. And that's why you're glad there is an outrigger!

Many of the islands have no fresh water source, so people canoe to the mainland to bathe, wash dishes and clothes, and get drinking water. It was fun and refreshing to paddle to the mainland and wash in the river. The particular time pictured here felt like it was straight out of a movie... as we paddled up a winding river past beautiful, exotic trees!