Every Language . . .

Day 1 of the 3-Day Hike

We were packed up and ready to go in the morning by nine o'clock, but because we didn't actually have very far to walk before lunch, we delayed our startint time. After taking our "before" picture, we headed out of POC at 9:50. Myself, 3 other ladies, our national guide and two ladies made up the "namel" (middle) hike group.

After hiking for about an hour, we arrived at our first "malolo" (rest). The "isi isi" (easy easy) group, who had left a full hour before us had just arrived. We discovered that they had already had a small accident, someone had slipped and twisted their ankle. Luckly, one of the gals in my group had brought some medical tape to tape her own ankles, and was able to share some of that with the other group.

After another hour of hiking we arrived at our lunch stop for the day. It was along a beautiful little river, with some really nice rocks sprinkled freely alongside and throughout the river. We were so thenkful to be able to sit on the rocks and dangle our feet in the cool river water while we munched on our peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. After lunch we had plenty of time for a nice little snooze before heading out on the final leg of our hike--destination, our first overnight stay in the small village of Batab.

When we arrived in Batab, they really had laid out the red carpet! It was a small village, 2-3 houses and a few other small sheds. They had built a little shady spot, stretching a large tarp over a bamboo frame and covering it with large palm leaves. They served us each a fresh kulau (not quite ripe coconut with lots of juice inside) which was really refreshing after a long hike--and doesn't have to be boiled like water would. They killed a chicken and cooked it for us, to go along with the rice that we had brought with us. We slept in luxury that night--they gave us a whole room all to ourselves, with one giant mosquito net and pillows and even a night stand with a candle!