After taking a few minutes to skype with our adorable munchkins back home, we loaded up early and headed for the mountains. Our goal was to see a vetiver planting Michael had done, enjoy a picnic, and try to make it back in one piece. The terrain is extremely difficult, even for their well suited land cruiser.
For those of you unfamiliar with the vetiver project, it's a community development project M and S are involved in. Vetiver is a special grass with amazing root systems that have the ability to stabalize steep areas around roads, preventing landslides and erosion. (Fun fact-we also learned today that vetiver is sterile and won't spread without being divided and replanted.) Michael has been working with locals and the government to install plantings.
The trip took about 3.5 hours each way. We saw beautiful views of the mountain range along the way. As we hung on for almost the entire ride (back seats, no seatbelts) had ample time to consider what hardships the poor roads cause the locals who take the trip out of necessity.
1 comment:
I bet the main road we took from Lae to Goroka and Mt. Hagen on the PNG side was somewhat better than this, even back in 1979. The views look familiar. We visited three very unusual (to our Yank eyes) tribes.
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