We are finally Home!
It’s so nice to be back in our home in Telefomin, we were greeted with smiles and flowers when we landed, and found more decorations around our front door. It’s been a busy few days unpacking and doing some maintenance, but we are home now!
New Street Lights in Mt Hagen
When we were in Mt Hagen last week, we drove home from the airport to town one evening to discover the brand new, solar street lights which line the road to the airport, were actually working!
The newly completed road leading to the Highway, which they are still working on, is so smooth to drive on, it’s such a treat compared to the pot-hole filled side roads. Let’s hope it lasts!
Breakfast at 6pm???
We had a restful sleep in the Airport Hotel in Doha and now we’re having breakfast before we get onboard our next flight, to Kuala Lumpur. This is the first time either of us have stayed in a hotel during a layover, but as we were stuck here for 27 hours, we are super glad we did as we feel so much more rested than we would have felt on a reclining airport chair.
International airports are not cheap places to visit so we’d like to say a massive thank you to the lovely people who have sent us financial gifts recently, you have reduced one of the stress factors of travel for us! Thank you!
Two Flights down, two to go…
We have safely made it to Hamad International Airport, Doha, Qatar! We’ve been up for almost 24 hours straight, but we’re trying to get our body clocks on PNG time.
We have a 27 hour layover here in Doha before we catch our next flight to Kuala Lumpur, so we’re heading to the airport hotel shortly. We don’t have to collect our baggage here, but that means we have no guarantees that our bags made it here with us…
Please keep praying for our journey and our luggage! Thanks!!!
Rush, panic, wait!?
Our first flight sadly got us into Montreal more than an hour later than planned. Also, our domestic flight was booked on a separate ticket to our international flight, which meant when we landed we had the rush of collecting our baggage and checking-in again, but this time with lots more checks to ensure we were allowed to transit in Doha, Qatar. Thankfully we were on all the right lists and after being given a very fetching face mask, we are now sitting on our flight out of Canada.
One step closer… Thank you for journeying with us and praying for us!
Checked-in for our 1st flight, Calgary-Montreal.
We’re checked in and through security in Calgary airport. Our first flight is due to depart at 11:55.
It’s such a relief to be taking this first step home, towards PNG!!!
As internet allows, we will try to keep you updated along our journey, both on our blog www.RyanAndShiv.net/blog and also through Facebook.
Please continue to pray for us as we travel over the next 4 days until we reach Mount Hagen on Wednesday 19th August (God willing!) and start our quarantine in the MAF accommodation. Please pray that all of our baggage travels with us on each leg of our journey!
We are also still waiting for our COVID test results to come through… Please pray!!!
Our Flights are Booked… Again!
Despite many challenges over the past few days our wonderful Travel Agents in Australia have been able to book us new flights. We depart Canada this Friday, routing:
Calgary-Montreal-Doha-Kuala Lumpur-Port Moresby
More than 3 whole days of travel with over 32 hours of flying!
Click on Read More, below, for more details including our flight numbers.
An update on our Travels…
We have a booking to fly from Malaysia direct to PNG on a humanitarian Charter flight departing Tuesday 18th August. We also have our 4th COVID test booked for Monday 10th.
Our prayer points now are:
1) Our COVID test results would be negative and we would be able to get a print-out before we leave Canada.
2) Our flights to Malaysia would be booked this weekend at MINIMAL additional cost to MAF!
3) That we would be on these flights!!!
Thank you for all the encouraging words and prayers we have received, it’s so great to know we are not standing alone through this frustration!
Latest COVID-19 Test
We took our 3rd COVID test this afternoon, not because we’ve had symptoms, but because PNG requires a negative test result within 7 days of departing Canada. Our previous tests were negative, but they were too long ago to be valid.
Please pray these results come through by FRIDAY as we can’t enter PNG without a print-out to say we are negative! Thanks!
The Cole Special Communiqué
This Newsletter was sent out on Friday 10th July - sorry I didn’t link it through our Blog immediately, I’m still learning all the tricks to our new website.
We have our plane tickets!
This morning we got our plane tickets through, so on Sunday 12th July, almost 8 weeks later than we had originally planned, we will be leaving Canada and starting the long journey back to our home in Telefomin, Papua New Guinea.
We will be traveling for approximately 60 hours and flying for just over 33 of those hours, a lot longer than usual! But we are so relieved to finally have our tickets in our hands!
There are so many new procedures and regulations as a result of COVID-19 so we would REALLY appreciate LOTS of prayer over the next 2 weeks. Thanks so much!!!
Click on the picture, left, to watch a video of our friend, Nurse Rhema, one of the local health care workers who MAF supports and we fly out of Telefomin.