In lieu of an expensive out of country vacation for the holidays myself, Mathew Cramer, Debbie Dezutter, Elena Pellizzaris, Brenda Pigeon, Will Traynor, and Andrew Tyler drove down to Harper, Liberia. Harper is the capital city of Maryland County. It’s on the South Eastern most tip of Liberia. It’s the furthest city you can drive to in Liberia from Monrovia. GPS and Google Map files.

Harper was one of the original cities founded by freed American slaves and has a lot of lovely southern United States influenced architecture. That along with some lovely beaches, and a point or two makes Harper a wonderful destination for a few in-country tourists. We were hoping to just relax in the city, and hopefully discover some new surf spots.

The road to Harper is notorious for being a huge muddy mess. It often becomes completely impassible in the rainy season. But we thought we’d come in the middle of dry season and miss all of that. Boy we’re we wrong.

The problem is a lack of drainage. A puddle of mud forms on the road and then a big 20 ton transport truck drives over it and pushes it down. This makes a little rut. Then another and another. Then after a while the little mud spot is now 6 feet deep “rutt” and even more water and mud have collected in the bottom of it. Then it gets so bad that someone cuts a bypass around that, but then the same thing happens, and the bypass turns into mud and water. As you can see from the picture on the right. These ruts got pretty deep. Here we’re digging out my 4Runner, code named Midnight. The tire ruts were so deep that my suspension was scraping the middle of the “road” and with the low traction I wasn’t able to move forward.

Things started off pretty easy. At first we just encountered low spots in the road with lots of water. Hear on the right you can see Andrew navigating his Xterra, code named Lorma Girl, through a small puddle. However things quickly escalated to 100 yard long ruts full of mud the consistency of oatmeal. On the left is Lorma Girl stuck in a massive rut. On this rut, I had opted to take the incredibly steep bypass to get around it. I’m still kicking myself for not taking a picture of my car scrambling up a 60 degree incline. Andrew opted for the slightly more traditional route and we eventually pushed and pulled him out.

All was well for us until we got about 40 miles south of Kanweaken That’s when we encountered this transport truck stuck in the mud. The truck had been stuck there for over 2 days. What’s more mind numbing is that this vehicle had succeeded in blocking all other traffic on the road. As we pulled up 3 transport trucks and a pick-up were waiting to continue south, and another pick-up was waiting to head north. As we walked up the drivers and passengers in the other vehicles told us to “get out your mats” and take a nap, because it would be a while. The pick-up truck heading north, had been stuck behind the transport truck for a day and a half. A day and a half! Thankfully we were North Americans (Andrew and Elena are Canadian) with a “if it’s not the way you want it, change it” attitude. So we changed it.

We surveyed the situation, decided that the West side of the road was best for a bypass and set to work filling in the mud with dirt, rocks, and bamboo we had cut down. This inspired the captain of the north bound pick-up, who sent his men over to help us dig. Then this inspired the other crews to start building their own road on the other side. After and hour or so of digging and chopping, armed only with two shovels, 3 machetes, and a pick axe, we were across. That was it, that’s all it took, unbelievable. These people had just been sitting there for a day and half. We worked for an hour.

At the risk of being ever so slightly politically incorrect, I’d like to say that this little incident perfectly illustrates what’s wrong with Africa. A problem arises and everyone stops, pulls out their mats and takes a nap. Then some white people show up. These good intentioned, underfunded folks fix the problem just enough to last for them to use it twice, and then leave. Meanwhile, an equally underfunded and unsustainable effort is underway, completely duplicating the other project. I’m not saying why it is this way, or how it got to be such a problem, I’m just saying, that’s the problem. I suppose for this to be a completely accurate analogy I’d have to work in a corruption angle. Anyway…

After that things only got worse and worse. We went through several unbelievably long and muddy ruts. You can see from this picture at the left how deep some of them were. This picture was taken as I stood on the side of the road.  I could literally just walk straight across the top of the car to the other side.

For me the worst part came when after 6 hours of plowing through mud we came to a spot we would later dub “The Triple Header” since it was three amazingly muddy sections all in a row. On the 2nd section Matt Cramer, who scouted out the sections and then relayed his findings back to the drivers via walkie talkies, informed me that I needed to back-up and shoot for the middle entrance to the section. It was pitch black, my windows and mirrors were all covered in mud. I knew Andrew was behind me so I backed up keeping an eye on him over my right shoulder, then BAM. I didn’t even know what I had hit. It was dark and I thought there was just road behind me. Turns out it was a abandoned transport truck. Thankfully, I did no damage to it at all. Sadly, I did total deform the rear drivers side of Midnight, and I busted out two of her windows. It did put a damper on things after that.

Minus smashing up my car, the driving was a lot of fun. The progression went from, “Awesome, some mud.” To, “seriously, the road is still getting worse.” And finally, “Bring it on!” By the end of it I had my technique down. 4 low, cause there’s no point in given it less than all you’ve got and getting stuck in 4 high. Gently, yet quickly, depress the gas peddle till the engine soars to 4000RPMs, then your off. Pretty much keep the wheels pointed in the direction of the rut, when you start to slide steer in the direction of the slide, but then back off when you start to straighten out. When you have to jump from one rut to another over steer into it and then quickly correct. Perhaps one of the best compliments I received on the trip was from an elderly Liberian gentlemen we had picked up outside of Fishtown. After I took the high revving, mud slinging, car bouncing, inaugural drive through our newly constructed road he came up to me with a huge smile on his face and said, “Ahh, you good driver.”

We arrived in Harper, 12 hours after departing, tired, very dirty, but safe, and happy. The good people at the Carter Center were kind enough to let us stay at their incredibly accommodating compound in Harper. I hope Laurie, their Harper office manager, is enjoying the bottle of Champagne we left for her in the fridge. We spent a lot of time, sleeping, reading, and relaxing in hammocks on the back porch. It was a great place to just hang out and enjoy having nothing to do.

Like I said we, or at least Matt and I, were hoping to find some new waves to surf. Unfortunately, the waves just weren’t there. We found some wonderful looking spots, but the swell just wasn’t happening. However, we did find some unbelievably lovely beaches. Like Fish Town beach, shown on the left. This is the first beach I’ve been to in Liberia where the water was calm and shallow 100′ out. Usually in Liberia you take 3 steps in and the water is up to your neck. The beaches are normally very steep, but this was anything but. It was also very pristine, as far as you could see there were no buildings, villages, clearings, anything, just water, sand, and palm trees.

Also at Fish Town was Skeleton Island. A few hundred feet from the beach is a small little island, maybe an acre or so big, where they put their dead. But they just leave the coffins above ground on the island. This makes for some rather macabre sites when you arrive on shore. Someone told me that they used to put the bodies there during the war, but I’m not sure why they still do it, and what really started it.

We also took advantage of being so close to Cote D’ Ivoire and popped over on market day. We didn’t have visas but decided to give it a try. The Liberian immigration officer was very nice to us. He asked us what we wanted to do, looked us over, and told us, “sure, just leave the cars.” He even let us park the cars close to his office so they’d be safe. Which was good since I was missing a couple of windows. So we hired a canoe and paddled across the river. Then the Ivorian immigration guys cared even less. He seemed totally uninterested in us white people. Which is strange, usually boarder crossings are a pain, and we didn’t even have the right papers. Anyway. We hung out for a while. The market wasn’t much but we did drink some Ivorian beer which was a nice change of pace. Cramer, met some nice Liberian ladies who were also there for market day and quickly made friends.

The trip back was pretty good. We took the advice of some locals and took the Karloken to Kanweaken bypass. We still had to go through the Triple Header again, but after that we missed a lot of nastiness, and the road was even a little shorter. Don’t ask why we didn’t do this the first time. Here is a little video montage of our 4WD exploits with some cometary.

I’d also like to take this time to talk about what worked and what didn’t work on the trip. Consider this a little product review of must haves, and must leave behinds for intense off-roading, on roads in developing countries. What broke: My expensive off roading Old Man Emu shock absorber. The bolt on the top where the shock attaches to the frame totally sheared off. This made for a very bouncy ride home. I had to be gentle with Midnight over those bumpy roads or else her back end would just swing out. Also we had a fair bit of over heating. Here Matt and I are pouring more water into the radiator. It seemed that caked on mud had a lot to do with it, but the problem persisted even after a few good cleanings. The 4WD system on the 4Runner. I got stuck in a really small bit of mud coming back from Fish Town and realized my front wheels weren’t spinning. After some Googling on my phone using Lonestar’s GPRS service we figured that the 4Runner had a pneumatically actuated front differential that engaged the front wheels and that, that was the problem.  But Googling on my phone wasn’t super fast or fun, so I called my dad in the states who Googled around some more and then based on his research suggested we switch the suction lines on the pneumatic actuator. Much to my surprise this worked. We just left 4×4 engaged from Harper to Zwedru. No point in taking chances. The brakes also took some intense wear. It seems the 4Runner has a metal plate around the front disc brakes to protect them, instead this just trapped rocks and mud in there and tore up the brake pads. Midnight is currently at No Lemon. Right now I’m just hoping the bill is under a thousand, cause I still have to pay for the body work.

We had 4 Midland GXT1050 walkie talkies with us. They were great for inter car communication, and coordinating our assaults on the rutts, but the chargers didn’t seem to hold the walkie talks tight enough for charging while on the road. I had a pair of Hela spot lights mounted to the front bumper, they were donated by Nick Conway, a friend back in the states. They were absolutely great for the night driving that we shouldn’t have done, but had no choice to do. I was also impressed with my Asolo boots. They were totally covered in mud, but my feet and socks were dry and clean. Also the wicking north face pants, and REI shirt I had were great. Depsite the heat, I recommend long pants for such trips, you’re gonna get dirty. Also the generic tow rope, shovels, machetes, bottles of water, and 2.5 million candle power flashlight were must haves. Andrew had a Wern winch that was super handy for pulling out other people, though we never needed it on our own cars.

And that’s about it,

John.

Check out my friend Andew’s blog where he talks about our next big trip. http://andrewarriving.blogspot.com/2009/12/operation-waterwheel.html. And I’ll do a real post sooner or later.

A couple weeks ago Meredith, Heidi (my coworkers at the Clinton Foundation), and I drove up to Yekepa to visit Mount Nimba. Arguable Liberia’s tallest point (I’ve heard that there’s a higher point in Lofa). I’ve uploaded the  GPS file and the Google Earth file should you want more details about where we were and how we got there. Getting there was very straight forward. The road to Ganta is paved, though there are lots of annoying pot holes along the way. Especially between Gbanga and Ganta. I hate driving on paved roads that have been torn up, it’s just no fun. I’d rather be on dirt. After Ganta I got my wish and we road on a fairly good dirt road. We were told to watch out for a big hill between Ganta and Sanniquellie. Apparently when it gets wet it gets slippery, and cars just can’t get up it. It hadn’t rained for 2 days when we got there, so we had no trouble, though there were some very deep rutts, I could see how it would be a nightmare when wet. On the way back. we passed taxis on the road, so somehow they’re making it up which always blows my mind and makes me feel silly for driving around with a 4×4. Anyway. We were able to go from Monrovia to Yekepa in 10 hours taking our time and stopping along the way.

Yekepa is a mining town. Back before the war it was run by the Liberian American Swedish Mining Company (LAMCO) , so Yekepa’s infrastructure is very nice, paved roads, street lights, and such. The sorts of luxuries you just don’t see in many other parts of the country. Now Yekepa is run by Arcelor Mittal. This was evident by all the private security guards we met, and the total lack of any Liberian National Police officers in the town. Thanks to LAMCO the road to Mount Nimba is paved to all but the very top. Which was a little anti-climatic. But the last quarter mile or so required a little four wheeling so that was fun.

None of us could get over how beautiful Mount Nimba was. It didn’t really feel like Liberia.  Not that Liberia isn’t beautiful, it is, but Mount Nimba was so different. The air was cool and dry, and the vegetation was different. granted Yekepa is about 2000 feet above sea level and Mount Nimba is nearly 5000 feet up so that’s kinda what you’d expect. It’s kinda hard to explain, and I imagine part of it is that I’ve been in Monrovia for so long that to see something new is super cool. I like how Meredith put it when we were driving up. As we came out of the jungle into some grassy areas she noted that it was like  Scottish highlands and then as we came to the top and saw the stepped sides of Mount Nimba she said you get a bit of “Machu Picchu action.” Just check out the picture on the right. As you can see there were some pretty incredible vistas and somehow we were lucky enough to have absolutely perfect weather. Not too bad. The guys we met in Yekepa said it snows some times in January. I’ll be back up to check out that claim. Also here’s a short video showing our drive down from Mount Nimba.

Finally I wanted to end with another antidote about driving around Liberia. I was coming back from Robertsport, Grand Cape Mount county with a few friends in the car when I was stopped at a check point. The Liberian National Police officer that stopped me, just looked plain mean. He had a scowl on his face, and appeared a bit rough around the edges. Everyone in the car saw it coming. I noticed that he wasn’t wearing his cap, badge, or ID card. I had just that week been told by a US Embassy person that my tax dollars paid for these items. So I decided that the moment he gave me a hard time I’d tear into him about his sorry state of dress and demand to see his superior.

He walked up, I said “Hi”, he said “Hello”, and as his eyes scanned the car I saw him stop at the front passenger seat. His lips slowly moved and he spoke under his breath, “Don’t bribe a police.” He was reading my Carter Center sticker that I had just put on the dash board. He looked up and waved me on. Didn’t say a word. As soon as we pulled away the car erupted in laughter and we called the Carter Center country director to thank him. Apparently to stop corruption we just need more stickers.

I had the chance to visit Kpatawee Falls in Bong County earlier this month. I drove up there with Gaurav, Meredith, Andrew, and Guthrie. We had originally started off with a few other people but their vehicle broke down not to far from Monrovia, so we forged on alone. We drove up Saturday afternoon and stayed at a guest house right outside of Gbanga. The name of the guest house escapes me, but it was a nice place. I brought my GPS along for the trip and have a Google Earth file of the trip including both the hiking and the driving, and for those of you who own a Garmin GPS you can import this Garmin Data file into your GPS if you want to follow our path.

Guthrie had been to the falls before and had been to the first and second falls, and had heard of a 3rd set of falls, but wasn’t sure how far they were. So we packed as though we’d be on a 6 hour hike, but it ended up being much shorter than that. I think it took us just under an hour to reach the third and final falls, which weren’t that impressive. The picture at the right is the 2nd set of falls. And the picture up top is the 1st set of falls.

The parking area is right at the foot of the first set of falls and is fenced in and well groomed. We arrived really early so there was no one there when we set out, but when we returned there were a few locals standing guard. They charged us few Liberian Dollars per person for security and upkeep of the park. They even gave us a receipt. It was all very professional. We ended up having a lot of fun swimming around the falls. A couple kids from a nearby village showed us which rocks you could jump off of and not break your neck, so it was a lot of fun. The picture to the left  is the parking lot, and the one on the right is looking down from the top of the falls. On the way home we made this short little film.

In other news Flag Day was August 24th and I celebrated by decking out the car with this Liberian flag. Someone had the good business sense to get a bunch of these flags in time for the Liberian Independence (Independence from what?) day and Flag Day. I don’t know who it is, but it’s a great idea. Tons of cars had them and it’s nice to see some patriotism in Liberia.

Running off the success of the “Don’t Raze Me Broh” shirts, which you can see our lovely spokesmodels wearing here, we’ve made a 2nd run of “Trying Small” Obama shirts. We’ve even started to experiment with white ink. If you want one, act quickly, they’re flying off the shelf.

Finally, I wanted to thank the Carter Center Liberia for making the best bumper sticker of all time. So far I haven’t been pulled over. Check out the use of that article.

So last we left off, Adam and I were in Prague and had seen some hills, watched the latest X-men movie and listened to some classical Music. To the left is our favorite sausage stand in Prague. I do miss $2.00 sausages.

Towards the end of our stay in Prague we discovered the areas around the castle where the moat and the gardens are.  I really liked this area. Mainly because it wasn’t super toursity. There were hardly any people there. I think it’s because I live in Liberia, but touristy stuff just doesn’t appeal to me. A hundred all shops selling “Prague Drinking Team” shirts seems so repulsive. But the gardens were way cool and moat was slick too.

So after Prague we headed back to Germany. Our first stop was Dresden. I really like Dresden. Apparently Dresden was bombed back into the stone age by American bombers in WWII. We sure are big fans of air strikes aren’t we? So the whole city has been completely rebuilt this century. This was evident by the wide streets, side walks, and plenty of parking. But they still kept the European aesthetic. So it was the best of both worlds. Car and pedestrian friendly, but with old world charm. We visited this old church that had just finished being rebuilt a couple years ago. That was awesome. The church was really pretty, and it was also kinda cool seeing that style of building looking so new. I felt like the interior wasn’t real since I’m used to old cathedrials with their drewry colors. This place was all bright and very pastel. Felt a little like a Precious Moments church or something.

From Dresden we went to Wittenberg to visit the church that Martin Luther nailed his 95 thesis to.  Wittenberg was a fairly quite and small town. The church is part of a college and was built into some other education buildings, so it didn’t like like your typical church. The door that the thesis was nailed to burned down a long time ago, and since then they have replaced it with two iron doors that have the 95 thesis on them. Adam and I are both Protestant believers, so it was neat to be at place where such a defining moment occurred in the history of our faith.

The next day we head to Düsseldorf, Germany where we met up with Dana Rosen. Dana used to live with me in Monrovia back in 2008. Dana and her parents were kind enough to let us stay with them for two nights. They had a really nice apartment in the Düsseldorf suburbs. In Düsseldorf Adam and I were on a mission to drive really fast on the famed German Autobahns. We had wanted to rent a BMW 330 or BMW 6, but when we called around to the local car rental agencies we were only able to find a 318d. I know, a diesel, not what we had in mind. None the less, we didn’t let this stop us. We were able to hit 220kmph, or 130mph. I know this isn’t that fast, and someone is going tell me how they did 150 in  Porche across TX, but A. this was done totally legally, and B. I was going that fast on cruise control. I do love cruise control. While in Düsseldorf we ate at a great steak place and then the next night hit up a Thai restaurant. For me this was huge. I so miss Thai food. Adam and I also made this stop motion video of our driving in Germany.

Dana’s father works for Siemens doing power generation, so we asked him about the huge windmills we’d seen all over the country. He said the area covered by the wing span of the blades is equal to a soccer field. And that each one generates 3 mega watts. Coming from a country that is powered solely a bunch of 1-200 kilo watt generators this was just amazing. I mean all you’d need is 2 or 3 of these and you’d have more than enough power for all of Monrovia. Granted Monrovia doesn’t have enough wind, but still. The really crazy part is that we probably saw a couple hundred windmills in Germany and they only make up 3% of German’s power.

After our two day sojourn in Düsseldorf we drove to Amsterdam. The first day we got there we just found this sweet little English style pub and watched the French open, played darts, and hung out. It was really cool. Every time someone walked in everyone at the bar would turn and be like, “Hey Charley.” It was like being at Cheers or something. It was way cool. The next day we walked around and checked stuff out. Amsterdam was another terribly touristy city, so I just wasn’t terrible impressed. We walked through the red light district and it just felt trashy.

So later that day Adam and I parted ways. Adam stayed the night in Amsterdam and flew back to the states while I drove back to Brussels, dropped off the car and then flew out the next day. All in all an awesome trip.

So yeah, I kinda left off in the middle of the story and then started another road trip. What can I say, I’m a terrible blogger. Anyway. So Day 4 we make it into Guinea. Guinea was awesome. The roads were better, they were worn and had character. They weren’t some newly cut trail made by the UN that washed out every 3 days, they had grooves worn smooth by thousands of vehicles. It was a lot of fun to drive on. Then we got to the paved road, which even had a shoulder, and I made the mistake of taking this picture. The guard at the check point saw me and got really upset, but by the time he walked up to me I now had the GPS out, so I told him it was a GPS. Then Jeff took over in french and we spent the next hour trying to explain what a GPS does, and then explaining that we weren’t spying out the location of their bridges. I wanted Jeff to tell them about Google Earth, and that we already know where everything in the world is, but I didn’t think that’d be wise. So after a while we were allowed to go, but it was quite an ordeal. They even pulled the “In your country you don’t go around taking pictures of things” line, which we can’t stand, because America is free country, and as long as your not on a military base, you can take pictures of anything and anyone.

We got to Nzerekore and spent the night in the Hotel Bakoly. Jeff and I went to the market and bought some vegetables and then the nice lady at the hotel whipped up an amazing salad. We all ate it and felt great. I also discovered a crack in the frame of the cargo rack of my bike. So we took it to the local welding shop where they stuck a piece of rebar into the hallow tube frame and welded it all back together, stronger then over.

On the way out of Guinea we had some of the most amazing driving ever. The road was windy, up and down, no gravel, and best of all, there were no villages along the way to make you slow down. It was awesome. I crouched down low, and gassed it. I was flying around corners as fast as I could. Then, I got passed by a Guinean cyclist. I tried to keep up, but couldn’t. Then, 10 minutes later, I got passed again, and this time, by a guy who had a passenger. So much for my awesome driving skills.

Right at 5 we pull into Liberia. We got stopped by immigration because I didn’t have my yellow fever card. I’ve been in and out of countries in Africa 7 or so times and have never been asked for it, now the one time I forgot it, I’m asked for it. We told the immigration officer that we wouldn’t have residency permits if we didn’t have yellow fever vaccines and after a while they let us pass.

We spent the night in Ganta and had dinner at the legendary restaurant, Abudja. As usual it was delicious. We then spent the night in some guest house that had DSTV. We watched a wonderful National Geographic show on poisonous animals and talked about how we’d be screwed if we got bit by a snake in Liberia. I’m told that all the anti-venom in the country is in some hospital in Sinoe or Maryland, and we weren’t driving near those counties.

The next day we headed to Buchanan along the rail road from Yekepah. It started off as a wonderful drive, but got more and more… what’s the word… developed. Wide roads, they got smooth, traffic even. It was just lame. The upshot is that we went through 3 counties in Liberia and only stopped at one check point. Compare this to my European vacation where we drove through 5 countries and were stopped at, well, there were no check points.

In Buchanan we visited DJ Bob who had just moved the world famous club “Black and White” form Harper to Buchanan. As always the place was looking good and Bob’s remixes were the delight of the evening. We even got a tour of the place by Mrs. Bob. Which included their stash of 90’s arcade games. I was very excited to see that shooter game “Maximum Force”. I love that game.

The next morning we easily crused into Monrovia. Both tires on my bike were terribly out of round and I needed an oil change, but life was good, and we were alive. Next I’ll finish the European road trip, but first I need to finish uploading all the pictures, and now that I’m back in Liberia, that’ll take the rest of the week and then some.

Thursday, day 6, we just slept it, and pretty much did nothing all day. It was awesome. At night we went out, got some sausages, and saw the new X-Men movie. I was super excited to watch a movie in a theater. We don’t really get Hollywood releases in Monrovia. We also ran into the cop that pulled me over the day before and got a picture of him. He didn’t seem to understand what we wanted, but was very nice

Friday, day 7, we did touristy stuff. Adam and I walked around and saw the Prague Castle. The castle complex seemed cool, we walked around it a bit, but Adam and I didn’t go inside anything since you have to pay for tours. Something about super touristy stuff like that just doesn’t appeal to me. I think it stems from my living abroad in a country where there is no tourism, that a prepackaged walk through of some old building seems like a silly way to get to know a place. Like I’d rather walk around in a super market to get a feel from Prague than take a tour. I’m probably a bit of an elitist too, but like after walking my self around bombed out buildings and rain forest in Liberia it just seems less cool to have someone else do it for you with 30 other tourist and souvenir shops everywhere. The day there’s guided tour of Liberia’s shot up downtown will probably be the day I move on.  But anyway…

Speaking of war, we saw this really cool mural of the never ending cycle of war and development. Coming from Liberia I can really identify with it. We don’t have any idea who painted this or why. If you can’t make it out from the thumbnail it’s mobius strip with alternating tanks and bulldozers/backhoes/front end loaders on it. To round out our Friday we saw a string quartet perform some classical greatest hits including the Spring and Summer from the four seasona and Cannon in D. They played at an old church right by the river. We were a little weary of how touristy this may be, and it was touristy, but they played very well and I enjoyed it.

Saturday, day 8, we went to Cesky Raj. This translates to Czech Paradise. It’s the country’s oldest national park and is very pretty. We only saw a part of it where the forest is met by some very impressive sand stone pillars. We did a 3km hike that had lots of off shoot trails that led to some amzing views. And as always just seeing the countryside was amazing as always. We took a bus out to Cesky Raj so it was nice to just sit and watch the country side roll by and then fall asleep.

Today we didn’t do quite as much as previous days. We hung around Natalie’s apartment till 1:00 and then went out for lunch. On the way out we saw an army surplus store that had a confederate flag flying out side. Not what we expected to see in Eastern Europe.

So after lunch we walked around Prague for a bit and just took it in. One thing that caught our eye was how they tow vehicles. They don’t tow them, they just lift them off the ground and put them on the back of a truck and drive away with them. This is a little scary when you drive a 231lb Smart Car and they’re picking up a full size SUV.

Then Adam and I drove around the northern end of Prague looking for a shooting range we never found. That was kinda a bummer, and then we hit some horrible traffic trying to get back into town and got lost for a while.

After an hour we finally met back-up with Natalie. From there we had dinner at a great little place and then continued to tour Prague at night. We saw some really great squares and ended the night with a drink in a bar that was in some underground catacombs. It was way cool. On the walk home to the tram we got rained on and the temperature had dropped a little. I was very happy to get to wear my jacket for the first time since being stateside in November. I miss occasional cold weather.

We started out day 3 in Tuebingen, Germany. We had spent the night at the Globalscope Germany campus house. Chandler Creel was kind enough to show us around the town. In the morning he and some other fellow GT-CCF alumni were working on the walkway to the house, so to avoid hard work Adam and I grabbed some pastries and headed for Stuttgart.

In Stuttgart we tried to find the Mercedes museum, but it seemed to be too much work. I found a DHL office and mailed in a broken part from the X-ray machine in the dental clinic in Monrovia. This is how things get fixed in Africa. Someone takes them to Europe and mails them in from there. Right as we were leaving Stuttgart we saw a sign on an exit that said “Porsche” instantly Adam drove across traffic, and we were in heaven. We didn’t feel like paying to go in the museum, so we were quite happy to just walk around the show room. We picked out colors, trim, and rims. It was way cool. We then drove on to Prague.

Along the way we stopped at a Burger King on the side of the road. Adam was disappointed that were weren’t having a “cultural experience”, but I was happy to have a first world experience that reminded me of home. We also got a little scared when we saw signs to prepay for toll roads. We thought we were just flying through the electronic payment stations. Then we asked someone and they said it was only for lorries, so we were all right. Close call.

On the last stretch before Czech the inevitable happened, we got pulled over. It was so refreshingly pleasant. After spending the last year and a half dealing with law enforcement officers that only want bribes, and not justice, meeting two of Germany’s finest who were just checking a rental car from Belgium before it got to the Czech Republic was so nice. They were in an unmarked Audi and pulled up behind us and followed us for a while. Then they pulled in front of us and a little LED screen popped up from their trunk and told us to pull over. It was way slick. If the LNP only knew. They both spoke perfect English and were very nice. They just asked for passports and if we had any drugs or weapons. We laughed and said, “No.” They started to search our bags, but then just looked at them and said, “yeah it’s OK.” They asked how far we had come and where we were going, and then told us we needed a bigger car. No mention of us going 140kmh (86mph) when we passed them. And then we were off.

At around 7:00pm we pulled into Natalie’s place in Prague. Her place is way sweet. The man who owns the apartment complex is an architect, and the apartment she has the owner built for himself, so it’s way nice. Natalie and I went for a drink in Prague to get a sense of the city and Adam stayed home and researched BMW options for the drive home.

Today we left Huy, Belgium and headed south on some great back country roads to Luxembourg. Along the way we came across some old logging trails and tested out the off road capabilities of the smart car. Needless to say we got it stuck. It seems the wheel base of the smart car is the same as the stance of a regular car, so our ride got stuck perpendicular to the ruts in the road. Thankfully the car weights nothing, so Adam put a log under the car and just leveraged the back wheels off the ground so i could push it around till we got it out.

In Luxembourg I ate at a Tex-Mex restaurant. I was in heaven. Fajitas with sour cream. What more could you want? We also had some great ice cream and then hit the road. Luxembourg seemed really cool, and less touristy that Brussels. I’ve also been noticing that everyone in Europe has sweet motorcycles. It really makes me wana buy one in Liberia, but they’re way too expensive and hard to find. I finally checked off a life goal of driving on the autobahn today, but it was in a smart car that was electronically limited to 150kmh, so I’ll need to keep working on that.

We stopped in Bitche, France where we saw the Bitche fort, then we drove through Germany to Tuebingen where we’ll be staying the night. In Tuebingen is a campus ministry that affiliated with the campus ministry I went to at Georgia Tech. It’s so nice having friends in cool places.