Dominican Republic Trip 2017

As the last brief posts reported, we spent an extra night in New York on Friday when our evening flight was cancelled due to a medical emergency on the plane after we had boarded but before takeoff.  The situation was resolved, but we had missed the curfew in Santiago, and were forced to spend the night in New York.  Delta generously provided rooms for us at the nearby Hilton, and we caught the 3:30 and 4:00 a.m. shuttles back to the terminal, and easily boarded our flight, which took off at 6:30. Three hours later we were gazing our our windows at the lush green hills of the DR, framed by puff white clouds. We landed to tumultuous applause from throughout the cabin, and easily made it through customs with our carefully-packed luggage, full of items which we will be donating and using in the health clinics this week. We transferred our bags to a cargo van which went straight to the hotel, and then boarded our bus with Glen, our Driver.  Soon, we were on our way north,...

We took off from JFK at 6:30 this morning  (after a 3:00 wakeup and a 4:00 shuttle bus!), and had a smooth flight to the DR.  We cleared customs easily, and were greeted by Rita and Chris from AZ and Glen, our faithful and supremely skilled driver.  We're here now at the hotel, and after a lunch and siesta we are headed to the village to watch some baseball.  Much more later today!

As many of you know, we had our Friday flight to the DR postponed until Saturday.  We managed to make it to JFK on Friday, got our luggage checked in, and were all boarded and ready to go.  A passenger on the plane had a medical emergency, and was assisted by one of the nurses in our group.  He needed to be evacuated form the plane, and by the time things were cleaned up and they had searched the luggage hold for his baggage, we had missed the cutoff for arriving in Santiago in time for their curfew.  Bummer! We are all re-booked for a 6:00 a.m. flight on Saturday.  All of our luggage remains checked in, a huge relief.  Another wonderful development was being given eight free rooms by Delta Airlines.  We took a quick train ride and then caught a shuttle to the JFK Hilton.  We checked in, had some supper in the crowded hotel restaurant, and are ready for a short night and a 4:00 a.m. checkout.  Our arrival in the Dominican Republic will allo...

With less than a week to go before our departure to the Dominican Republic, the excitement is building and the preparations are continuing on schedule.  Today is Packing Day!  We're all meeting at the Norwich Congregational Church to sort and pack the huge amount of material that has been donated for distribution in the DR.  We have tons of stuff:  toothbrushes and toothpaste, flouride for "painting" teeth, childrens' clothing and boxes of tee shirts for all ages, eyeglasses and sunglasses, and even some donated baseball equipment for young players in a country that is devoted to baseball. In addition to the practical aspects of packing all of this material into 50-pound lots for each of the travelers to bring in a checked suitcase, today's Packing Day is also an important opportunity for us to bond together as a group and begin the process of working as a team.  This will be the first time that all (almost all, save for one or two) of us are together.  W...