Road Trip

So. This has been one crazy week. We decided to take a road trip to Mulanje, a region in southern Malawi to do some hiking. "Oh, we'll just take the car!" HMMMM. LETS THINK ABOUT THAT. 5 people, a shit-ton of luggage, and extra petrol because you never know if there's going to be a petrol shortage. I think this journey is best communicated through photos. So, here we are at the beginning, PACKED into the car like some damn sardines.

Oh wait, did you see that face? Let's zoom in. I entitle the following 

"SKEPTICAL"

I had a feelin. Anyways, I decided not to fear too much, because a few days ago we couldnt help but spend the $1 to get this bumper sticker that we keep seeing everywhere:

Well. We must have been runnin low on the blood. Computer mal-function here, rainstorm there, emergency pee stop with crazy ants all over the place, a slowly deflating tire.... which eventually looked like this about 20 minutes outside of Blantyre:

 But the blood was still with us- we managed to change that sucker in about 10 minutes to our little spare tire that happened to be about 90% flat. Awesome. We also managed to somehow create a huge gash on the underbelly of the car because there was a dispute about whether or not to put the jack on the body of the car or the frame. I said the frame but I dont think anyone listened. Anyways, this postponed our trip a great deal and we realized we would not be able to summit. 

BUT WE STILL DID NOT LOSE HOPE!!

We finally made it to Mulanje to see this beautiful view:

I also realized that one of the most fun things you could ever do on a road-trip here is to just stick a camera out the window and snap away. This entertained me and the other passengers for HOURS. (big word up to Finn who drove extremely well the entire time)

Here are some of my favorites:

What an inspiration. 

The colors!

The hike itself turned out to be ok. With the lack of sleep and substantial food to eat, it was pretty rough for me on the way up. But the views were great. There were many other disasters on this trip that I dont even feel like going into. In the end we had a good but exhausting week.

*whew*