Water water everywhere but not a drop to drink!

It has been raining here for the past 24 hours almost non-stop, very unseasonable for this time of year.  We've had quite a lot of rain recently but this hasn't stopped us running out of water most weeks since we arrived.  This week we had to cope for three days with no water at all in our house.  We have certainly come to realise just how much we take water for granted in the UK.  Today we have got some water and we are trying to make it last as long as possible by keeping water usage to a minimum and recycling water.

Water collected whilst taking a morning shower.  Despite being a very frugal shower I collected enough water to nearly fill the toilet cistern.  The cistern still needed a slight top up despite having a brick in it to reduce the volume of water required to fill the cistern. 

Our problems in water supply however pail into insignificance compared to those of so many living in Kenya and other parts of Africa where villagers have to walk miles to collect a bucket of dirty water.  It feels so unjust that those in the Western nations have so much whilst so many suffer elsewhere in the world. 

Thankfully MAF is part of the solution as it multiplies the effectiveness of NGOs and others who are working hard to improve water supplies and sanitation.  It regularly flies these experts to areas that they wouldn't otherwise be able to reach safely or without several days travel on flights such as our Marsabit shuttle.

I shall be writing more about the Marsabit shuttle soon but today it is unlikely to fly, despite having passengers booked onto it, as the heavy rain would make it too dangerous to land on the basic runway at Marsabit.

Our water butt in the garden collecting rain water during a down pour.  In the foreground you can see another of our energy saving devices, a solar light, hanging from the rails on the window.  These lights are very useful as we suffer power cuts most days and so the lights enable the kids to do their school homework during a blackout.