Well, I am back in Honduras! It is always good to be here and I am excited to see what God has in store for us.
The journey here was somewhat eventful and I was beginning to wonder if God was trying to tell me something. Do you ever get that feeling? I had hoped to leave B'ham by 2 on Monday and make my way to New Orleans (I flew from there this year as it was much cheaper!) but a few things got in the way. One was packing. It is usually something you need to do when traveling to a foreign country for three months. Well, in tyical Mark fashion, I put it off and of course it took a little longer than I thought t would. Then I remembered that I needed to get a check from Ben so as to get it in the bank before I left. I called and arranged to pick up the check at his office. It was now around 3:30 with the bank closing at 4. Fortunately the drive thru was open until 5!! I got to the bank about 4:20, took care of the bank stuff, and then was heading out.
I had not eaten yet at all, so I decided to go to McDonald's before I got on the highway. A #3, large size, no ketchup, extra mustard, diet coke (watching my weight, you know). As I'm leaving the drive thru, I blow a leak in the exhaust manifold and my truck is all of a sudden very loud and losing power. I've had my truck for four years and have had no trouble with it at all, but Monday it decides to literally "blow a gasket". I head back to the house to check it out and decide there is no way I can drive it this way to New Orleans. After calling Continental to see how much it would cost to change my flight to B'ham or to Wednesday (either option would have been over $100, I decide to take Lori's car instead so I put all my stuff in her Jimmy, talk to Adam about bringing my truck to the mechanic, and finally head out, again. It is now close to 6:00! So much for getting to New Orleans at a reasonable hour.
So off I go. I get on 459 and before I get to Morgan Rd. I hear a thud, thump, bang! I look in the mirror and see rubber bouncing down the highway. I think, "How did I not see that before I hit it?" Then I notice a vibration in the car. I pull over and sure enough, the piece of rubber was from my own left rear tire. Unbelievable. A six by six chunk of tread was just gone. Alright God, why don't you want me going to New Orleans (as if he was the one giving me all this grief). Am I not supposed to go today? Is the plane going to crash? Really, I actually was starting to get a premonition of dread. Maybe God was trying to tell me something and I wasn't getting it. Well, I changed the tire and headed out. It was now almost 7:30.
I finally get to Tim's house at about 12:30 AM and along the way, of course, I have had three cups of coffee to keep myself awake on the ride down. Now I'm wide awake knowing that at 3:45 I have to get up and head to the airport to catch a 7:00 flight. I did finally doze off at some point (last time I looked at the clock it was 2:15), got up and Tim brought me to the airport.
My flight from New Orleans to Houston was going to give me an hour lay over so I felt pretty confident about making the connection. As we began to taxi away from the terminal we get the message that we will be delayed 40 minutes because of congestion over Houston's airports. Great! There is only one flight a day to Tegucigalpa, Honduras and it now looks like I won't get there. The Houston airport is quite large and it can take 30 minutes to get to your connecting gate. After about 30 minutes we took off and amazingly enough, got to Houston only ten minutes late. Must have had a led footed pilot.
Of course the whole time I'm flying that stupid thought about God not wanting me to make the flight because he was trying to protect me from a crashing plane kept coming up. "God, I put myself in your hands. Take care of my family." I prayed this with each take off and landing. I know, pretty silly. Of course, now that I am safely in Honduras, I can say how silly it is. Keep us in your thoughts. There is a bus, taxi strike going on today. There is no traveling on the roads at all. They have the whole city shut down. Hopefully this will only last a day or two and we can get out soon. Good thing Dunkin Donuts is within walking distance!! There was a group here that was supposed to leave today, but they are unable to get to the airport so it looks like they will be staying an extra day or two.
Welcome to Honduras!! Talk to you soon.
The journey here was somewhat eventful and I was beginning to wonder if God was trying to tell me something. Do you ever get that feeling? I had hoped to leave B'ham by 2 on Monday and make my way to New Orleans (I flew from there this year as it was much cheaper!) but a few things got in the way. One was packing. It is usually something you need to do when traveling to a foreign country for three months. Well, in tyical Mark fashion, I put it off and of course it took a little longer than I thought t would. Then I remembered that I needed to get a check from Ben so as to get it in the bank before I left. I called and arranged to pick up the check at his office. It was now around 3:30 with the bank closing at 4. Fortunately the drive thru was open until 5!! I got to the bank about 4:20, took care of the bank stuff, and then was heading out.
I had not eaten yet at all, so I decided to go to McDonald's before I got on the highway. A #3, large size, no ketchup, extra mustard, diet coke (watching my weight, you know). As I'm leaving the drive thru, I blow a leak in the exhaust manifold and my truck is all of a sudden very loud and losing power. I've had my truck for four years and have had no trouble with it at all, but Monday it decides to literally "blow a gasket". I head back to the house to check it out and decide there is no way I can drive it this way to New Orleans. After calling Continental to see how much it would cost to change my flight to B'ham or to Wednesday (either option would have been over $100, I decide to take Lori's car instead so I put all my stuff in her Jimmy, talk to Adam about bringing my truck to the mechanic, and finally head out, again. It is now close to 6:00! So much for getting to New Orleans at a reasonable hour.
So off I go. I get on 459 and before I get to Morgan Rd. I hear a thud, thump, bang! I look in the mirror and see rubber bouncing down the highway. I think, "How did I not see that before I hit it?" Then I notice a vibration in the car. I pull over and sure enough, the piece of rubber was from my own left rear tire. Unbelievable. A six by six chunk of tread was just gone. Alright God, why don't you want me going to New Orleans (as if he was the one giving me all this grief). Am I not supposed to go today? Is the plane going to crash? Really, I actually was starting to get a premonition of dread. Maybe God was trying to tell me something and I wasn't getting it. Well, I changed the tire and headed out. It was now almost 7:30.
I finally get to Tim's house at about 12:30 AM and along the way, of course, I have had three cups of coffee to keep myself awake on the ride down. Now I'm wide awake knowing that at 3:45 I have to get up and head to the airport to catch a 7:00 flight. I did finally doze off at some point (last time I looked at the clock it was 2:15), got up and Tim brought me to the airport.
My flight from New Orleans to Houston was going to give me an hour lay over so I felt pretty confident about making the connection. As we began to taxi away from the terminal we get the message that we will be delayed 40 minutes because of congestion over Houston's airports. Great! There is only one flight a day to Tegucigalpa, Honduras and it now looks like I won't get there. The Houston airport is quite large and it can take 30 minutes to get to your connecting gate. After about 30 minutes we took off and amazingly enough, got to Houston only ten minutes late. Must have had a led footed pilot.
Of course the whole time I'm flying that stupid thought about God not wanting me to make the flight because he was trying to protect me from a crashing plane kept coming up. "God, I put myself in your hands. Take care of my family." I prayed this with each take off and landing. I know, pretty silly. Of course, now that I am safely in Honduras, I can say how silly it is. Keep us in your thoughts. There is a bus, taxi strike going on today. There is no traveling on the roads at all. They have the whole city shut down. Hopefully this will only last a day or two and we can get out soon. Good thing Dunkin Donuts is within walking distance!! There was a group here that was supposed to leave today, but they are unable to get to the airport so it looks like they will be staying an extra day or two.
Welcome to Honduras!! Talk to you soon.
posted by Mark at 9:00 AM
2 Comments:
!No es mi cupla hu! Welcome to Honduras! You have to love it!
Hey Mark, glad you arrived safely after quite a trip. Yes, I'm a bit late in the reading. Just catching up here and a thought...NO you are not silly for your thought and your prayer in you travel...perhaps you got there safely BECAUSE of the prayer. You put yourself in God's hands and He carried you (and everyone else on the plane). I pray a similar prayer on every take off, because I believe it is only God's hand that holds up that big hunk of metal...I mean really how else could something that heavy just float thru the air?? *smile*
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