Just before 6am, all that changed. We bumped into a traffic jam on CA-1, the Pan-American Highway. We had had some rather unexpected rain (since it's still the dry season here) and a mudslide dropped nearly a million cubic meters of mud and rock on the highway. It was over 12 hours before they got one lane open. We figured as much and turned around to go back.
So we took the long way around. We had never driven down near the coast, but that's exactly where we went. For those of you who know the geography here, we went back to Quetzaltenango (Xela), then down to Mazatenango, over to Escuintla, then up to Antigua. We live at 6700 ft altitude. Antigua is around 5000 ft. Well, at one point we were around 600 ft altitude - yeah, a little out of our way.
Isaac didn't really appreciate the extra several hours in the car, but we all made it. And Matt even got his errands run. So all's well that ends well.
Wednesday morning, we got up and headed back to Chichi, where Heidi, Kaitlin, and Charlie had a surgery. Since you might have noticed that Charlie wasn't mentioned in the story above, it's because he took the day and made a Chicken Bus run down to Lake Atitlan. The first picture below is of Heidi and Kaitlin with the uterus they took out on Wednesday afternoon.
Today, we all went to ASELSI for clinic there. Heidi diagnosed one patient with a miscarriage, which is always sad, but the upside of being at ASELSI is that there are always plenty of K'iche speaking pastors there to pray with people and minister to them. In addition, we saw Fredy, our little imperforate anus baby. And Charlie got to sit in with Dr. Edgar, our orthopedic surgeon friend who comes up once a month from Guatemala City.
Charlie will start his residency in orthopedic surgery in a month or two, so it was good for him to see some patients more along the lines of what he'll be able to expect then. They saw a couple of hip dysplasias and a really severe scoliosis, among other things.
After clinic, the docs went to go round on their patient from yesterday and hit the tourist market in Chichi. Matt and Isaac went home to check on the construction crew.
The two last pics are of the foundation for the new addition. It's 80cm tall and has a rebar cage in it with 12 inch spacing (vertical and horizontal). This place isn't going ANYWHERE! So far, there are over 4,000 lbs of rebar and 20,000 lbs of concrete in the foundation alone!
Tomorrow is Heidi's OB/GYN clinic in Chichi.
1 comment:
The best laid plans are still open to detours! It must have been a frustrating drive. As Dad says, "it was an adventure!" even though it took many, many more miles and hours.
I'm with Isaac, too much riding. He has to be a trooper with Mama and Daddy's schedule. Hugs from Grandma and Grandpa, Sweetie.
Love and prayers,
Mom and Dad
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