The Journey Out of Congo (Day 55, September 15, Monday)

It's a travel day! I am officially on my way home. I will back in Indianapolis on next Monday afternoon with God's help. Typically, it takes a week to leave Congo. Why? You have leave safety margins in your travel plans. My flight to Kinshasa is Thursday morning. So we gave ourselves a two day margin. My flight to the US is Sunday. So I gave myself a three day margin and another flight to Kinshasa on Sunday. Dr. Joseph obviously like to travel a night. We left a few minutes before 7pm (ahead of schedule). At night, it is cooler and almost no traffic (walking people, pushed bicycles, and other vehicles). Even during the day, we may only meet one other vehicle. We only was stuck once but had a number of outside the vehicle consultants on the better way to proceed. We even travel down the active train track for 30 yards to avoid a bad bad bad bad piece of road. It sounds and looks dangerous but it is not. The train only runs about twice a week. We drove almost non-stop (planned stops) and arrived outside of Kananga about 4 am. We waited until almost sunrise before going into town. The doctor and two other passengers in the cab slept periodically. I watched the driver dodge and negotiate the holes, bumps, crevasses, and smal ravines in the road.