Friday, Salama, Rabinal, and the trip home and Saturday and Sunday

January 15^th  through January 17th:  Friday we got up and had breakfast in a little restaurant right across the street from where we stayed.  We loaded up and were on our way, thinking that we would be home between 1:00pm and 2:00pm. 

The market in Coban on our way out of town.

Mom wanted to drive through Salama and Rabinal, so we headed that way.  This route turned out to be not the quickest way home. 

The market in San Miguel Chicaj.

Inside the Market.

We stopped in Rabinal and the next town on the map was Chol. 

The church in Rabinal.

Making tortillas in Rabinal.

We found the road and it was a dirt road and not a very good one at that.  So we turned around and found a policeman and told him we wanted to go to Guatemala.  He took us and pointed us back to Salama.  When we explained that we wanted to go the shortest way and we wanted to go to Chol.  He took us back to the dirt road and said that in about 10 kilometers the road would change to pavement.  We headed out on the dirt road. 

Dirt roads.

It was slow going; the road had a lot of ruts and pot holes.  It took us about an hour to get to pavement and then the pavement would appear and disappear.  In every town we passed through, they were having some kind of political celebration and in one town they made us take back streets to get through town.  We rubbed our mirrors a few times and were on streets with at least a 45% incline, but we made it.  The “back way” that might have been shorter in kilometers was definitely the long way.  We arrived home about 5:30pm.  I was exhausted from driving all day long.  The winding roads and the dirt roads were a lot of work.  We won’t ever come home that way again. 

Some of the bridges were kind of narrow.

But it was a great trip and we saw a lot of Guatemala and feel very blessed to have had this opportunity.

Our poor car when we got home.

We are ready for the temple to be open.  Saturday I crashed.  Sunday we went and spoke at the Mariscal Stake conference.  It was a really nice conference and we felt the Spirit and came away uplifted and edified.  We love sharing our testimonies of the temple and the work of salvation.  It was a nice way to finish off the week.  We came home and the Hursts had us over for a great dinner.  It has been a wonderful week.

They had a great turn out for conference.

The choir was very good.