Central America ALUMNUS BLOGS
Spring 2008 CAM Semester
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
panamanian adventure
alright. eileen and amelia reporting from team marshall.
we are now back
in puerto viejo after the
most incredible 2 days in panama. can't write much now
but jon, clara, max, julia, eileen and marshall headed down to puerto viejo for free travel and then were joined by amelia as we headed down to bocas
del toro in panama. the
islands were incredibly beautiful and we all had one of the best days of our
lives down there. we met all sorts of cool people, saw
dolphins, snorkeled, had a beautiful boat ride, swam in pristine blue water and
it just kept getting better.
that's all for now, but we are all wonderful (and getting tanner by the
day!) now the whole group is reunited again and heading to san jose tomorrow to catch a flight early thursday
morning for our last leg of the trip in roatan in honduras for scuba diving.
we can't wait!
we love and miss
all of you!
love amelia, eileen
and the rest of team marshall
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Group "Team Heather"
Greetings to those at home leading...lives that
are not nearly as cool as ours! (hehe...kidding...sort
of)
Abbie and Dannielle here, in Puerto Viejo
Talamanca..(i
think) Costa Rica! Thats all
that´s important really. Its
totally a Rastifarian beach town, with black and
white sands and clear waters!
Today was our first full day here, which we
rented bikes and went swimming!! Yay!
"We"...aka Team Heather, which includes, Emily, Amelia (sort of, she
left with Team Marshall to Panama today) Abbie and Dannielle, are having a wonderful time!
Taking a few days backwards... The turtle project was a sucess, we saw turtles!!! AND Mommy Abbie
had her first baby turtle hatch and was released into the ocean on our watcH! It was all very exciting for all of us! Abbie named him Dominic, to which she comments
"he was very cute". After a week of no sleep and many hours of
midnight turtle sightings, we separated into two groups for FREE TRAVEL! Team
Heather headed to Sarapiqui, the OTHER puerto viejo (Why they have two?...we don´t know). Heather used
to live there, so we decided to travel somewhere that had some familiar
grounds. Team Marshall headed straight to Puerto Viejo Talamanca, the one we
are at now...but you will have to wait to hear from them about their own
adventures!
As for us, in Sarapiqui,
we went on a canopy tour (aka ZIP LINING!!!!!) AND white
water rafting!! ALL IN THE SAME DAY! AHH EXCITEMENT..
*ahem* Abbie loves
exclamation points and capitals.. It was very exicting,
we saw a SLOTH! and vultures!! Yay
wildlife.
That was our Friday! Then we decided to come to
Puerto Viejo a day early! So, now we are here.... and its
been really difficult NOT to spend all of our pennies here! Abbie
and Dannielle...well lets just say our luggage will
be a little heavier.. *wink*
Tomorrow we are going to explore a beach area
that has potential to go snorkelling! (P.s. Abbie bought goggles already!! YAY
GOGGLES).
*Sidenote: Dannielle and Eileen are in a friendly competition to see
whose right big toenail will fall off first! Unfortunately, during the downhill
parts of the trek that was weeks ago, did damage to our nails..
so they are heading..south? off?... into space?
We aren´t really sure, but its really gross and feels
funny when we go swimming. We will keep you posted about who wins.*
Moving on, On Tuesday, Team Heather will be
spending the day in Cahuita! Not really sure what
else we will be doing there, but we will let you know how it goes! Team
Marshall will be returning from Panama on Tuesday as well, so we will be a
whole group again with many stories to exchange as we swim, fly, jump, scuttle
like a crab (*see Abbie*) and walk headfirst into our
last week in Honduras *tears of excitement...and sadness..
and just for the sake of tears*
See you soon families!! We love you, talk of
you often and miss you.. kind
of...*tee hee*
Love Abbie and Dannielle xo
Thursday, April 24, 2008
Hola,
Just thought I´d put
another photo up...this was during our time in Antigua, Guatemala ' some of us
did a half day trip to Volcan Pacaya.
Lava is so cool! We even got to roast marshmellows
over lava! Hooray volcanos!
Friday, April 18, 2008
free internet
as usual, we are
far too tardy with our blog posts, but we are just
having such wonderful adventures, we cant possibly imagine spending time at a
computer rather than out in the wonderful places of central america.
so. it`s been a while. we are currently in costa rica, but let`s backtrack for a
little bit.
quick recap: the trek was awesome. we all
emerged relatively unscathed, just some blisters and a few bumps, bruises and
cuts. the final walk up to see the sun rise over lago atitlan was TOTALLY worth it
and a wonderful way to end the trek. we then spent a
nice week of meditation and yoga in san marcos at
hotel la paz. nice and
relaxing and a few adventures along the way. next we
spent a day in antigua (where we probably should have
updated the blog, but oh well...) and THEN we flew
(very early, as usual) to NICARAGUA!!! we were very excited.
we drove to laguna de apoyo and stayed at a beautiful hostel place called the
monkey hut. we relaxed and played in the lake and in
tubes, and had a wonderful few days there. julia, danielle and eileen even made some phenemonal
banana and peanut m&m pancakes for breakfast.
then we got to spend a few hours in the lovely town of grenada where we had a fabulous meal as usual and found
some gelato!! (much to eileen`s
excitement...)
THEN
we headed out
toward san juan del sur, or
near there for a project. we stayed at a developing
hostel called kokoro which is on the beach of playa maderas. incredible.
we made two
solar powered ovens out of cob (which is a substance made of water, hay, dirt
and sand) planted some lemongrass and did other fun things around tyler`s ranch. we also watched
amazing sunsets over the pacific and even got in some surfing (at least marshall and heather did). we took
a boat tour and we have a few boogie boarding experts in our midst.
when we left tyler`s we crossed the border
by land into costa rica. and now here we are in san jose. it is all very exciting.
we leave early
tomorrow morning for the turtle project where we will be patroling
the beach through the night and hopefully seeing lots of turtles and turtles
hatching. We’ll be at a very remote spot just north of batan
on the eastern coast of costa rica for those of you who’d like
to look at a map.
after that we’ll be doing free travel. we have
decided to split up into two groups, one will travel down south to the
beautiful caribbean beaches near kauita
and puerto viejo while the
rest will head inland for a wild adventure of ziplining
and white water rafting. neither of us can go wrong. well meet up again in kauita for a
few days and then head out to honduras for our final
week. *tear*
missing you all and hopefully later we can get some more pictures up. and maybe a blog entry sooner next
time, we’ll cross our fingers.
love,
eileen and danielle
Sunday, March 30, 2008
farewell quetzaltenango
Just a couple photos from the market at Chichicastenango...
We spent the night in chichi on Sat night and
Sunday morning went shopping at the market. So many things to buy!! We all had
successful shopping and are ready to start our trek to Lago
Atitlan mañana. We'll be out walking until Wednesday,
wish us luck!
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Cloud forest community work photos
The work site Day 1, before we started clearing
land.
Hard at work, clearing the land with pick axes
and hoes.
Walking to the store.
On the left, one of the two houses the group
lived in.
Progress made during our stay!
Sunday, March 16, 2008
xela
Hola!!
this is blogmaster eileen
writing from a fantastic internet cafe in quetzaltenango
(or xela...pronounced shay luh).
we finally made it. and oh
what a few weeks it's been.
we're now officially in our homestays where
we will be for the next two weeks. it was a slightly nervewracking affair for all, but now that we're in our
homes, we're great. max john and i
live very close to eachother in zone 3 of xela, which is quite fantastic as max and i live on either side of a chocobanano
store which also sells helado (ice cream) and other
delicious treats. life couldn't be better. food is very important to us all...can you tell??
last week was an incredible time for all of us. we
stayed in a tiny remote village near coban in the cloud
forest with no electricity and no running water. it
was freezing at night but we got to do some satisfying construction work during
the day which tired us out. it felt awesome because
the village had wanted to construct a community center for a long time but
never had the funds and we were finally able to make that possible for them
with our donation and our manpower. the village was
about 80 people full of a few families that lived quite a distance from eachother. i
think being there made us all very appreciative and aware of how nice we live
in the united states. the only mode of transportation
in this village was our own two feet, so we definitely got lots of great
exercise.
well, i think that about wraps it up for now
in a quick update. i
honestly couldn't be happier and i think everyone is
on the same page as me. we are all very excited to be
in a city and we're ready to tackle spanish school
again.
Thursday, March 6, 2008
group photo at Tikal!
our lovely CAM
group at the Mayan ruins of Tikal:-)
from left to right:
Heather, Emily, John, Clara, Danielle, Abby,
Amelia, Eileen, Marshall, Julia, and Max
Monday, March 3, 2008
mangos + sandias = paradise
hola padres amigos y otras personas que nos gustan!
well, apparently we haven’t quite been too good about updates, but
that is only because we are having an amazing time (to say the least). we are currently blogging from san
andres, peten guatemala! we have been here for a
week in this beautiful small but very steep and hilly (san francisco
has nothing on san andres!) town. spanish school is going well, none of our tutors
speak english, so it is a daily challenge we are
rising to. san andres is a
BEAUTIFUL town on the bluest lake, which is the second largest in guatemala. our days are filled
with sun and swimming, except for when it rains, which is often. but no complaints from us, we’re happy as fish in a lake.
our group
chemistry is muy bueno. we get along unbelievably well and the laughter has not
stopped since the sfo airport. every
day we all eat about 4 frozen and chocolate covered bananas which cost 1
quetzal which is about 14 cents. we. love. them. chocobananos. !!!!
before san andres, we were in the lovely
village of ixobel, which is a 15 minute tuk-tuk ride outside of poptun. our time there was filled with digging a large hole, lagooning, painting, eating fabulous meals, and playing go
fish with the local rascals. after that we spent a day
walking around a beautiful touristy town called flores,
which is on the other side of the lake from san andres.
flores is very colorful and
looks almost european. we
went out to lunch and ended up out at sea, as we didnt
know our meal would be floating away (this sentence doesn’t make sense, but it
was a delicious lunch upon a raft).
this past weekend, we had an incredible experience at tikal. we woke up at 3 in the
morning in order to get there (why so early, we´re
not really sure...). but it was great. the ruins are incredible, and we enjoyed our time climbing
to the highest points and looking out over the amazing selva
(jungle).
we are looking
forward to a day off from school on wednesday. we are planning a camping trip at another set of ruins and
we cant wait to sleep under the stars and cook our own meals together for a
night. which brings us to an important event that some
of us experienced last friday. we
had the opportunity to witness the butchering of a cow (we apologize for the
bluntness) but we definitely all have a better appreciation for beef and will
be eating the $3 tenderloin on our camping trip.
we can´t wait for the rest of our adventures. we promise we will TRY to write as soon as we can. but we think of you all often and miss you and love you
love, dannielle, amelia
and eileen
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
bring it!
hey so guatemala has been great so far. everybody
is doing well in the homestays and the families are
great too. and the food! so
good, you’d have to try it to believe it... luckily for me i
have three more months of trying new dishes throughout central america.
today we continued work on a big hole. more
fun than it sounds, especially since we were able to take a couple breaks in
which the kids turned all the girls hair into a piece of art... consisting of
flowers, flowers, and more flowers. i
regretfully had to lay mine aside when i went to
remove the TONS of dirt (not really tons, but we got really dirty) and now they
are decorating my homestay room, quite nicely i might add.
im really looking forward to the spanish
classes, since thats one of the core events of this
trip, but also i just want to be able to speak better
with the kids i see and the people i meet. you have no idea what its
like when the faces of these little kids light up cause were talking in their
language! but even so, theyre
just as excited to play, which they do, vigorously, and for long periods of
time.
tickle fights are common.
all in all things
are great and I’m really looking forward to meeting more people and learning
more things. but in the meantime i
just plan to enjoy the next 3 months.
clarita (aka clara bowe)
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
All Aboard (and accounted for)
It's been a great evening for most, and
thankfully everyone is through security and headed to the plane, soon-to-be
southbound for Guatemala City! There were a few hiccups from last-minute flight
changes and/or lost baggage, however EVERYONE made it with all
of their luggage to the arms of the group thanks to some good
quarterbacking by the leaders and a special shout to Eileen and Abigail. The
Carpe Diem CAM group is on its way!
Thursday, February 7, 2008
!!!! ONE WEEK to GO!!!!
HOLA from Portland!
We are getting psyched to head off to Central
America and meet all of you. This week we are getting our last details together
and are excited to make phone calls to ya'll later this week. We hope that you
have everything together, and if you have any last minute questions, please
call the office, or we will do our best to answer them when we call you. We
will see you in San Fran on the 12th and make sure you have your passport with
you and not in your checked luggage. May sound dumb, but it happens.
Enjoy your last weekend in the states, and we'll see ya
soon.
Lots of Love,
Heather and Marshall