Hello friends and families! This is Matt and Rachael, your OEs, writing our final semester blog post from the tropical paradise of Roatan, Honduras. What a 3 months this has been! The time flew by and sometimes crawled. It feels like we have known each other forever and also like we were meeting in LAX yesterday. It is going to be strange breaking up this little family at the airport… Read More

Written By Rosalie As I’m writing this, we are heading into our final week together as a group after nearly three months of travel. Tomorrow, we leave Costa Rica, and I have to say that our last week here has been one of the most impactful, at least for me. Despite the many giant spiders I encountered and then willfully tried and failed to ignore (they remain seared into the… Read More

Hiya everyone!! Its Sydney Lou Who here, writing with the unsolicited help of Rachael and Hayden. Last week we spent 5 days working at the turtle project in the Nicoya Peninsula with Eduardo and Mancho and a host of others that included a group of German volunteers and Brazilian volunteers, so we took the opportunity to make lots of friends and annoy more people than just Matt and Rachael. We… Read More

After our six week adventure in Guatemala, we were finally able to make it to our first week in Costa Rica. Our first stop in this small Central American country starts in a small city called Turriabla. Smack dot in the middle of Costa Rica, Turrialba offers a whole variety of fun things for the gang to do. For the past few days the group has been obsessed with eating… Read More

Written By Lucia Hello! Lucia here with what we’ve been doing for the past two weeks. First we spent a week in El Paredon where we worked with La Choza Chula, a sustainable development organization dedicated to improving the community of El Paredon. They funded a school and they provide employment to many people in the community by offering tours around different parts of El Paredon. La Choza Chula gave… Read More

Officially one month in! We left Chico Mendez last week for our three day trek to the lake. It was a challenging trip but everyone worked really hard and it was also lots of fun. It was so rewarding to look up at a mountain knowing we had just climbed it that day! On the last day, we got to see an amazing view of the sunrise over the lake.… Read More

Hola everyone, Hayden here, writing about our time in Quetzaltenango! (If you can’t quite say that you can call it Xela instead) We’ve spent the last week there, in the second-largest city in Guatemala and the home of the biggest parades and parties in the whole country (according to the locals). The focus of the week was practicing Spanish one-on-one with the great teachers at PLQ, but we also had… Read More

Hi everyone! This is Molly and Rachel signing in. We spent this past week at La Escuela de la Montana, a spanish immersion school in a rural village in the mountains of Guatemala. The group was split into two groups, one with classes from 8am to 12pm and the other with classes from 1pm to 5pm. The classes were one on one and we ate our meals with host families,… Read More

We have all arrived in Guatemala, staying at the beautiful Earth Lodge near Antigua. We have been spending a lot of time getting to know each other, playing games, and learning more about the program. yesterday we went on a short hike and got to see an amazing view of the mountains and volcanos. Some of us got up early to see lava coming out of Fuego, one of the… Read More

Hola Team Maya! This is the first post on the blog we will take turns writing for throughout the semester. The blog is a way to let friends and family know about our adventures, share experiences, opinions, and some photos. This is Rachael and Matt writing from Portland. We are in the midst of training and prepping for our trip. We spent last week camping, doing team building activities with… Read More

By Rachel and Sarah First week in Costa Rica! We had a pleasant early morning flight last Sunday and a short bus ride to the city of Turrialba. Meeting our host families created some anxiety as always but has greatly paid off this week. We feel we have made great connections with this group of people! We began our last week of Spanish school on Monday and we feel our… Read More

By Sarah and Madeleine Howdy from your southern belles, Sarah and Madeleine! We arrived in Flores Wednesday and met our contact Deiter who gave us some introductory information about Flores and the week ahead, then had free time. Some of us swam across the lake while others enjoyed immersing themselves in local culture by eating at Pollo Campero. On Thursday we toured the Yaxha ruins and camped overnight in tents.… Read More

Walking up through the jungle to the site. Climbing one of the steep pyramids. We made it to the top! Learning from our guide Dieter about the history of the site. Taking a closer look at how the temples were built. The Mayans would add one staircase on top of the other to add height to their structures. Watching the sunset from the top of one of the pyramids. The … Read More

By Nico & Sophie Hey everyone! We just finished up a beautiful week on the beach in the small village of El Paredon. We spent our time with an organization called La Choza Chula, a social enterprise focused on providing educational resources to the people of El Paredon. Throughout our time there, we participated in a variety of workshops based on the UN Global Goals for Sustainable Development. This included… Read More

By Asia and Ethan Asia and Ethan checking in after this very busy week! It started out with a bumpy ride to Cerro De Oro where we experienced a yoga and meditation retreat led by our zen OEs. We tried out acro yoga, yin yoga, and mastered our sun salutations. This was a great time to relax and have time for self-reflection. During the day we had a lot of… Read More

Work at G22. Group shot inside the new family home. Mangrove Tour in El Paredon. Acatenango hikers at the trailhead. Turtle releasing on the beach in El Paredon.… Read More

By Camille and Kaylee Camille and Kaylee here to refresh you on the adventures of the Carpe Diem Maya group. This week we were happy to return to Xela to continue our language classes at the sister school of Escuela de la Montana, PLQ. The group was paired off and put into homestays with some of the lovely locals that lie around town. On a typical day, we wake up… Read More

By Sailor and Daniel Hola! This Sunday we arrived at the mountain school in Fatima and Nuevo San Jose. Fatima is a community of ex-finca (plantation) workers, who were displaced by the unfair treatment of the finca owners. The people of Fatima lie on 20×20 meter plots of land, in houses composed mainly of cinderblock, wood, and sheet metal. We have been eating three meals a day with our homestay… Read More

Sophie and Sarah practicing their communication skills calling Brian & Ellen from a pay phone. Camile, Asia, Dan, and Nico in the central square in Xela. Rachel, Kaylee, and Asia enjoying a local treat. A group in front of the libreria in Xela during the scavenger hunt. A view of Xela from from the central square with all the food booths set up for Idependence Day.… Read More

By Rachel, Madeleine, and Harrison Hola! Aqui en Xela! We are happily cruising around in the Independence Day celebrations. Last night we walked around in the city square and watched fireworks! The city of Xela is very busy and people are happy to greet us as we walk by. We have had many good meals, mostly Asian food and we are eating at an Asian cafe. Lucky for us this… Read More