Shortly after I found out that my son David would be flying for Mission Aviation Fellowship (MAF) in Haiti, I started researching the country that I only slightly learned about in high school geography class. One of the books I read was, "Mountains Beyond Mountains," by Tracy Kidder. Monday I got to experience some of the sights Kidder described as we drove into the mountain foothills above Port au Prince.
The road was "Highway 101," but there was zero resemblance to the nice paved road along Oregon's coast. Near Port au Prince there was pavement, but by the time we reached our destination of "The Lodge at Furcy," Highway 101 was a narrow rocky path of bumps and lurches. The hour-long journey covered only 15 miles!
After parking at the lodge, we walked along a side road where we met Cassionel and his family -- caretakers/farmers for one of the houses and the surrounding hillside farming property.
This blog entry's introductory photos were taken near the place pictured above where Cassionel was tending some parsley plants. While we waited, family members descended a steep path to another plot of ground and returned with some fresh vegetables for us to buy. (And, I have to say that the broccoli, green beans and spinach tasted much better than anything we can get at the store in Tualatin!)
This day's experience will provide a great answer for the question I get sometimes: "Is Haiti still a pile of rubble like we saw on TV after the earthquake?" Now my answer can be to show them the "mountains beyond mountains," with their green, fertile farming areas.
If you'd like to see the rest of my photos from that day of Haiti exploration, see this 19-picture Flickr set.
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