A not so warm welcome to Haiti, also known as the scariest day of my life

Our flight into Haiti was uneventful. Everything went as planned, except for being delayed a few minutes.

And then we got to Haiti....

You might recall my biggest fear was our driver not meeting us at the airport to pick us up and drive us to the guest house. We got off the plane, got our passports stamped, and walked out to meet our driver. In the past, we have gotten picked up right when we walked out of the airport doors. This time, nobody was there. So we walked out to the parking lot thinking maybe they were out there. Yeah.... not so much.

We saw nobody who resembled a driver from our place. I must admit I was a little worried. But at the same time, when you walk out of the airport, there is probably like a hundred people standing around. So it was still very likely that our driver was there somewhere. Brandon's and my phone had no service. Luckily, my mom's phone was working so we got it out to call. I pulled up my email on my phone to get the phone numbers. The office was closed already since it was after 5, so that number was no good. We called the cell and home numbers and we couldn't get either to go through. Of course during this time there were a handful of people trying to get us to get in their taxi. Um, no thanks. After all, our ride just HAS to be here. One of the guys who worked at the airport let us use his phone. He tried calling the numbers we had and he said the recording said the number changed. Excellent. So we literally had no way to get ahold of this man. And it is getting dark. And Port au Prince is not a place you want to be out after dark.

At this point, we had limited choices... take a taxi. Which is not a good idea, for safety reasons. Plus, I don't even have the address of the guest house. Or we could sit outside the airport and pray someone comes for us and hope that noone bothers us.

We pulled up the guest house's website and got the address. And decided to let the guy we had been talking to take us to the guest house. I knew it wasn't a wise idea. But I really didn't know what else to do. It wasn't until we were in the taxi and on our way that I was overcome with fear and the realization that the two guys driving us literally had our lives in their hands. They could have taken us anywhere and dumped us off.

During the ride, my mom got a text that Dr. Bernard was looking for us. Turns out there was a mis-communication with the driver and he was on the way to get us from the airport. After explaining that we waited for over an hour and it was dark, I told him we got in a cab. His response was that he was concerned for our safety and to be careful. I guess that was my confirmation that I should be worried. He then talked to our cab driver and asked him to take us to the police station in town and he would have someone come get us. After some arguing and disagreeing about where we should be dropped off at, we agreed that was a good idea. I think it was about this time when they decided to up our fare from $60 to $90. Really?? But we did want to live and make it to our destination, so we didn't argue.

After what seemed like a really, really long drive through town, fearing for my life the entire way, we finally made it to the police station. A few seconds later, Katie and Ralph showed up. I have never been so happy to find a familiar face!! We followed them in the taxi to the guest house.

Whew!! We made it!! Alive and well. Dr. Bernard was waiting on the porch for us. He walked over and proceeded to yell at the taxi drivers for ripping us off on their cab fare. At that point, money was no object and I would have paid whatever just to get there safely.

We took our luggage in the door and peeking around the corner, were my 2 babies waiting on us!! They had brought them up from the creche to greet us. At that moment, none of what just happened seemed so bad. Although I don't want to go in a cab there again any time soon. Or ever for that matter.

And the adventures begin......