Ethiopia Here We Come

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We left home on Friday 6 Feb, complete with our luggage for our two and a half month trip to thirteen countries. After one plane change and another intermediate stop for an hour and a half in Khartoum, where we couldn’t get off the plane, we finally made it to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

During our four-hour layover in Amsterdam we called our friend, Sara, in Addis. We tried to use our new Skype capabilities to call her cell phone and got completely gerschplatzled (don’t you just love it when I talk technical?) so we had to resort to our AT&T cell phone. We were hoping to connect with her for church tomorrow (it’s now Saturday) but found that she is at the end of her three-day mourning period for the death of her uncle. She said she would however, be able to meet us on Tuesday when we will have a free day in Addis.

Sara is the sister of Misrak, our church secretary, and her mother also goes to our church.

The thing about international flights is that they constantly stuff you with food. It’s actually pretty good. With all the inactivity, we will probably gain about five pounds each on this set of flights.

Since we are flying twelve Sky Team segments on this trip, many of which are a bazillion hours each, we booked ourselves into Business Class. The Around the World fare up to 29,000 miles and up to 15 stops cost only about 30% more than a single coach ticket round trip to Australia. Here’s Cheryl relaxing with her personal movie on the way to Addis Ababa. I’m just relaxing, the movie sounded like too much work.

When we arrived at our hotel it was after 11 PM. We’d been travelling about 26 hours with only 14 hours 38 minutes of time actually in the air wheels up to wheels down. The scheduled flight times came to 17 hours 45 minutes, so you can see how much “fudge factor” the airlines build in to their flights. In other words about 1 hour per flight for taxiing, waiting for take off and landing, etc.

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Photos

Here We Go!
We're ready with our luggage for two and a half months

Movie on the plane
Cheryl just relaxing on the way to Addis Ababa. I thought a movie sounded like too much work

Comments

[Rosie]

WOW!
Hi Cheryl and Hal, I am enjoying the blog! What a great way to follow your trip of a lifetime. I have lotz of Ethiopian friends here and have had injera often. I always pass on the coffee, too strong and too much sugar needed to make it tolerable. Sounds like you have lotz of things to do each day! I pray your sleep is deep when you get to the bed! Keep healthy, Love, Rosie

[Joan Rogers]

You
This is just so wonderful to share this amazing time with you. We'll continue to think about you, talk about you and pray for you. Love you. God Bless Adam, Me and Joe (I tell him about you)