(Day #53) Madang, Papua New Guinea

 

When we entered the port, Dennis and I were surprised at how

green the island was.  We had just spent a couple of weeks in

New Zealand and Australia.  Those countries are very modern and

now we were entering a third world country.  It was surprising to see that most of the town had come out to see us.  There were 280

passengers going on the Highlights of Madang and it took 24 buses

to get us all going.  We already knew that the buses had no

air conditioning, were going to be small, and in our case the

guide’s  first tour.  We never learned why the buses had to travel in a convoy but we had to wait in our bus until all the buses were ready to move out.  It was like a sauna in there.  It felt kind of weird too.  I think it had to do with only one paved road in town.

 

We have never  seen native dances done like this before.  We could see bats in the top of trees.  These were fruit bats.  When they took to the air, they were has big as birds.

 

Next we left town and went on dirt roads to see how people lived in villages.  Many of my pictures were taken while we are driving and through the bus window.

The bus in front of us got a flat tire and our guide would not leave

until we could travel together.  Most of the other buses were not so kind.  Once again it was like a  sauna in our bus.

Next we went to a village.  Here we were able to get out of the bus.

There was more native dancing but this time we were much closer to the dancers.  There were women making clay pots.  There were so many children that wanted their pictures taken.   It was fun to show them the picture on the camera.