Pictures from Julie's Trip Interior.

These first few pictures are from Piramapun, which is just down river from Saman where the NTM missionaries are considering as there location of service.  The first picture is the landing area at Piramapun it's nice and wide with a gentle curve in the landing and takeoff area.  The ocean is there as well but we choose not to operate on the ocean for a few reasons so a gentle curved river is our preferred landing zone.  

This picture is of Saman from overhead, the curve in the river here is a bit sharper.  Hopefully in the next few months I'll have gained enough experience to be able to up the level of difficulty of my landing and takeoff locations.  

A random photo from the trip that Julie wanted me to include.

 This next group of photos are from Senggo, which is the place Julie mentioned regarding the book our family is reading together.

They are not standing on water as it may appear in the picture, there is a dock of sorts below their feet and yes below the water.

These next pictures are from Tanah Merah which means red soil.  We don't have a dock here so we just find a good spot along the shoreline to pull up to and secure the plane.  The location changes depending on the water levels.  The week before these picture was taken, the high area where the people are standing and holding the rope was covered by about a foot of water and we ended up docking up river against a wood dock that during this visit was high and dry.  When the water is lower than this (which 2 days later was the case) we beach bit further down stream up against a gravel beach that is visible during low water times.  This like many of the places we go to our docking methods/locations vary with conditions.  (The flying is the easy part some days)

This picture is of the Boma or Bomakia airport terminal building.  This was our last stop before heading home that day.  Boma was previously an MAF base for float plane and wheel plane operation for the south coast several years ago. 

The MAF hanger just in front of the tower (left side of the picture) as we approach to land back home in Merauke.

Hope you enjoyed seeing some of what we have the privilege of experiencing daily.

My Time on the Water

     As Greg mention in our last post I was able to have my very first ride along in our float plane. MAF allows wives to go along twice a year which allows us to really see what it is like for not only our spouse but for the people that we serve.
     For the first stop of the day Greg was able to land at a new place to drop off another missionary who had missed his plane ride the day before. He was hoping to meet up with other missionaries to help them with the process of surveying the area for possible places for three new missionary families to move to.  Since this was not a normal place for us to land you can imagine that having a float plane land next to your village would be greatly noticed. There was even a school at the edge of the village that I am hoping was having recess while we were there. For it seemed like all the kids where standing along the river in the white and red uniforms waving to us.
     After dropping off our missionary we headed to our next stop to pick up a load of local pastors from a retreat that Greg had dropped off a week before. The cool thing about this stops is that we are actually reading a book about one of the first missionaries to this area with our kids. Since those first few years this village has turned into a large trading post for this area. So right on the edge of the water were small stores where you could park a boat/canoe and find food or clothing as well as bring stuff to sell. My favorite part was watching all the kids swimming off the docks. However, but I had a hard time watching people drive their motorbikes down the boardwalk as I noticed all the boards move and shake a little more then I would be comfortable with!!!
     Also, this is were I got to see just how tense it could sometimes be for my husband. As one tries to load passengers and their belonging on a dock that if you step in the wrong place it would start to sink. After watching this for the first time I am very thankful that one of our staff rides along to help him out with this as well as docking the plane. When you are out in the village there is no way for them to weigh belongings so the guys have to do this as the passengers get on, write out their tickets, collect money, and make sure the plane is not over weight. Now remember that this group of guys had already been flown in a week before and knew about all of this. However, through the course of the week they ended up collecting a lot of stuff and most of them had way to much stuff.
     After getting that all figured out I was able to see two different places as we started to return all the pastors to their destinations. I loved how it felt landing on the rivers and taxing down them to where they docked (or where they had someone just hold the rope). I loved looking along the banks and watching people appear to see what the noise was or to just watch the plane. And I was really blown away by the different types of boats that I saw on the rivers. I saw those small canoes that barley have room to sit in to larger canoes that they had added a motor to. Then smaller fishing boats to larger ones as most of the rivers do connect to a larger river that would lead to the ocean. And I even saw some very nice looking speed boats especially at our first stop. And I was really surprised for a few minutes when we landed at our second place as one whole side of the river had different types of satellite. Then I remember that was the only way for the people to connect with the outside of the world.
     At the end of the day I would have to say that landing on a river is my new favourite thing to do. Even though I enjoyed my time it did open my eyes a little more to what my husband has to do daily. Not only does he fly the plane and deal with passenger but he has to deal with some pretty extreme heat that just drains your body. After I arrived home I could hardly move and he told me that I was feeling this way because of the heat and the continual change in altitude. This would explain while on flight days my guy is falling asleep before seven at night.
     I am so thankful for my husband and how he uses his gifts that God has given him daily. Whether he is landing on land or water, dealing with passengers, or dealing with government paperwork he is always trying to honor God in all things.