Sanananda Day 2

Day 13

Everyone was slow to wake today  Must be getting ready for back to normal life. I however was up at about 5:45.  The sunrise was blocked by the clouds again, but it was still nice.  After a while we had a nice breakfast and a walking tour around Sanananda form the elder that told the stories last night.  We visited the location of the actual landings and the guest house is on "new" land that was formed after a volcano erupted in the 50's.

On our tour we visited another school.  The Kokoda track authority had helped build this one.  Some of the money from each of the medals that David had presented us goes to the authority.  At the school David was reading them a story and decided to turn it into a play.  He asked for volunteers and I put my had up to help the kids out.  It was great being involved and I think the kids thought it was funny.

After a few more spots we came to a collection of Japanese things. I was able to buy a Japanese water bottle!  Pretty cool bit of memorabilia.

After lunch Allan and I went for a run up the beach and then a swim.  It felt good to be active again.  Little did I know we were going to be walking that afternoon as well.

We headed out for a walk down the path that the Americans had built.   It was made of rocks.  This made it pretty hard to walk on and slow going.  We saw a Japanese field hospital on the walk, which was pretty interesting, including lots of things we have not seen before, including dentures.  Jim is a dentist in real life, so  bet he found this very interesting.  We also cut into the bush toward Huggins Road Block, but we did not make it there as the forest was pretty thick.

Eventually making it back to camp we had a swim to cool off and then a great dinner of fried rice, fresh veggies and a curry dish.  It tasted so good and we all had heaps.  After dinner we had "SingSing" which was a band playing music and some ladies dancing.  It was a very good and we even got up for a dance as a group in the 3rd song.  A little girl came over and asked if I would dance with her, which I of course accepted.  Freddy and Allan were left to dance together.  The elder said I danced very well :D  I later found out that usually only the ladies dance.  Since we got up, we opened the flood gates.  I think I was asked to dance about 7 times and dancing in the sand is rough on the legs.  The entire village was out watching us.

Tomorrow we head back to the lodge and then onto home.  So looking forward to hearing your voice and giving out some big big hugs!