A 3 Day Chicago Detour

We left the Mercy Ships International Operations Center Wednesday at 8:00am with the intention of arriving in Conakry, Guinea on Thursday at 8:00pm.  Half of our team would fly out of Tyler and the other half DFW. Well things didn't exactly go according to planned. As you may know there was a huge snow storm. The storm rerouted us from Newark to Chicago where we met up with the rest of our team who had flown out of Tyler.

Made the best of our wait time and introduced
Esther to her first carmel macchiato, thanks to everyone
who gave me Starbucks gift cards!

Esther and I got creative in entertaining ourselves in the airport! 

We got on the plane in Chicago after several hours of delay to leave for Brussels. After taxiing just a little ways down the run way, we were told we would return to the gate due to mechanical problems. After several hours it became clear we would not be able to make our Brussels connection to Conakry. Because there are only 2 flights a week into Conakry we would need to wait until Saturday evening in Chicago to go and catch the Sunday flight into Conakry. Because of the mechanical problems the airline provided meals and lodging for our team in Chicago. 

This was not what we had planned but it has been a treat to get to experience Chicago as I have never been here. This has also been a time for the team to continue to build relationship as we prepare for our 2 week field service before we head to the ship. 

When you are headed to west Africa and you
 get stuck in Chicago in for 3 days you are not exactly
prepared for cold temperatures. Dave and Chris got creative. 

We got to visit the John Hancock Center.
It was a beautiful view of Chicago! 

Last full day in Chicago. Headed to the Navy Pier.

Please pray for us! We fly out at 6pm tonight from Chicago and will arrive in Conakry tomorrow at 8:00 pm. We will begin our field service first thing Monday morning.