SAM - (Peru and Ecuador)

Coleman and Megan kicking ass at the partido de busca

2011-09-16T09:05:00.001-07:00

Buenos dias amigos :) Coleman and Megan are kicking ass at the scavenger hunt in Bahia de Caraquez -- nbd...

It did take us a while to type an @ sign, though...

HASTA LUEGO TENEMOS MAS COSAS PARA HACER

We're Baaack!

2011-05-11T12:54:00.000-07:00

And missing all of you.

It was a long few flights back home with Jefe and Sarita and then we said our goodbyes, and then there were 2. We are back in Portland now going through photos and budget (it never ennnnnddds...) and can't believe that its all over.

So many good memories, laughs, long meetings, card championships, oreos, band practice, rice, headstands, bread, and looooove.
Thank you all for an unforgettable 3 months. Can't wait for the reunion, if anyone ever plans it. For those of you who are still down in SAM land, hope you're not getting into too much trouble. Send our love to Pachamama.

Long live SAM.I.AM.

Week 12: The Last Hoorah of Sam I Am

2011-05-06T14:30:00.001-07:00

Hey everyone,

It's a little weird for me to write this blog now, considering that I'm now securely back in Colorado, EEUU. This is my first chance to catch up on blogging since our final, busy week ended! I have been totally overwhelmed in the last day by the abundance of cereal varieties in my family's pantry and the large quantities of free toilet paper. What is this strange foreign land?

After we got back from the jungle, we had almost 3 full days in Cusco to "acclimatize" to the altitude. This time was spent relaxing, eating out (some of us discovered a couple really cheap and delicious vegetarian restaurants that we visited more than a few times!) taking long hot showers, doing some last minute shopping for friends and family, watching the NBA playoffs, etc.

Last Friday morning we were painfully dragged out of bed at 2:55 a.m. for a 3 hour car ride to begin our Maccu Picchu trek! We had an early morning breakfast, and by around 8 we began our hike! The first day was definitely the hardest. We started at an elevation of 3800m, climbed to a maximum height of 4600m (difficult to breath up there for sure) and then descended back down again to the place we camped. The scenery was beautiful and ever-changing as the miles went on. We reached camp around nightfall where horses were waiting with our things and our guides made us popcorn, hot chocolate, and eventually dinner. By the time we got to go to bed most of us could barely keep our eyes open!

The next morning we were kindly woken up by our guides at 5:30 to eat breakfast and begin another day of trekking. This day's walking was through the "eyebrow of the jungle," though I don't think any of us ever quite figured out what that meant. It was another beautiful walk. The place we stayed that night was pretty bizarre- there was 80's workout music blasting, strange white chickens with Afros running around everywhere, and a cow being slaughtered right next door.

Our third day we opted to go ziplining in the morning. It was awesome... one of the best ways to see good views that I've done! That afternoon, after an excessively large lunch, we walked about 3 hours along some railroad tracks to arrive in the touristy town of Aguas Calientes. We spent the night in a lodge there and woke up at 4:30 a.m. to catch the bus up to the ancient Incan ruins of Maccu Picchu. They were incredible and it was easy to spend hours exploring. We had a guided tour first, although our guide, Saulo, wasn't the most accurately informed person I've ever met. (Ex: he told us bananas come from Europe...) After that some of us went on a hike to get some good views and photos, while others continued to wander around and expore. When we went back into Aguas calientes that afternoon for lunch and hanging out, I couldn't help but imagining that in 600 or so years, tourists might just flock in large numbers to see the ancient ruins of a strange town called Aguas Calientes!

That night we took a train then a bus to return back to Cusco. The following day was our last day of the trip. It's crazy to think that it's over, but when I think back to all the incredible and different things that we did, I realize that it has been 3 months after all! Thanks to everyone who made this trip possible for us- it was an amazing and unique experience. I will miss all of you... Simone, Ari, Miguel, Joseph, Campos, Nick, Erin and Daniella. Thanks for making this trip great and being a part of my life for the last 3 months.

Miguel, Simone, Ari and I had a long but smooth day of traveling back to LAX... and everyone else stayed back in Cusco to continue their travels. Good luck everyone- it's going to be a blast.

Well, that's all for now. It's been quite the three months!

Carpe Diem,

Sarah

Amazonian fun

2011-04-26T09:56:00.000-07:00

To start off our week in the amazon we met at the port of the tambopata river to take a 4 and a half hour boat ride up river to see where we will be working for the next week. when we arrived at Camino Verde we met Don Goyo who would be our cook for the next week, his food was absolutely amazing. Robin wnded up being a wealth of information on most things in the jungle, like one tree whos sap tastes like milk and is good for asthma, and a tree called Dragons Blood whos sap is a deep red and it speeds up the healing process of cuts. We spent out week in the jungle clearing trails with machetes and axes. Our last day of work was more laid back because we had finished clearing the trails and in the moring we spread a cover crop and watered some plants and we spent the afternoon swimming in the river and listening to stories that Robin told us. Sunday we took the boat back to Puerto Maldonado where we resupplied on snacks and water and then headed out to lake Sandoval, a 45 minute boat ride and a 45 minute hike and another 30 minute canoe ride to the lodge. Later that night we wnet out on a caiman hunt on a canoe with our headlamps to spot them. After seeing 11 of them and catching 2 small ones we headed back for a great dinner and a terantula hund and some well needed rest. after a 5:30 wake up call weheaded back out on the lake in search of some giant river otters, or lobos del rio. We found a small family of them hunting fis by the shore and we watched them as they dove back and forth through the water. Then after a tasty breakfast we were back on the lake headed to the other side for a short hike. After a delicious 2 course lunch we had a nice rest and then started out travel back to Puerto Maldonado.

The Continuing Saga of Sam I Am: Week Nine

2011-04-16T14:38:00.001-07:00

After a couple weeks of living in a very full homestay and passing our days with Spanish classes, salsa lessons, and some slightly chaotic construction work we were all ready for some serious rest and relaxation. Lucky for us, Sunday brought the beginning of our highly-anticipated yoga retreat just thirty minutes outside of Cusco in the stunning Sacred Valley. It certainly turned out to be restful and relaxing, but more so on a spiritual than physical level as we started off our mornings at seven with an hour of meditation followed by two hours of yoga in addition to a second two hour yoga class in the evenings. Our classes definitely erred on the side of more advanced which led to many sore muscles but also had the majority of the group doing handstands and exploring a few acro-yoga moves by the end of our retreat. The morning meditation sessions ensured we were challenging ourselves on a mental level as well. Throughout the retreat we had the opportunity to experience the unique benefits of mantra, breath, and chakra meditations. If I do say so myself, the intense reverberations and power of our collective 'oms' were downright otherworldly by the time our final classes rolled around.

When we weren't busy quieting our minds or "twisting ourselves up like pretzels" as Sarah would say we were busy participating in other activities aimed towards personal growth. For starters, we had an hour long morning seva. A seva meant doing chores around the retreat center including sweeping, dusting, weeding, helping with cooking, or anything that could help beautify or improve our living space all with the intention of showing appreciation for the incredible place we were sharing together. We were also able to participate in art workshops aimed at personal introspection, attend classes about vedic astrology and the seven principle chakras, and even had the opportunity to delve into the history and practice of reiki massage with a local master. Fortunately, amidst all our spiritual growth we managed to stay true to classic Sam I Am form in eating a lot of very good food, this time of the delicious vegetarian variety! Every meal presented a plethora of fresh fruits a veggies in the form of pastas, soups, salads, juices, cookies, and pizzas proving that healthy, delicious, and environmentally friendly can very easily go hand in hand.

Just so we didn't get too relaxed while soaking in the gorgeous sunny weather and towering green mountains, Michael C. orchestrated our second group game of Assassin. For those of you who are not familiar with the game here's a quick rundown: each person is assigned a "victim" that they have to kill during our day to day activities by getting them to do, or refuse, a certain task or action. It has to be rather sly though as to not alert your victim or others present to your ulterior motives. In this round Nick was assigned the near impossible task of getting our loving Simone to refuse a hug. In the end he had to resort to the not-so-sly measures of walking out of the kitchen open armed after having coated his chest in honey and a few other remnants of breakfast in order to finally commit his "murder".

Wednesday brought the end of our retreat. We were all instructed to write down habits we wanted to leave behind in addition to something we wanted to take away from our four days there. We then proceeded to sing, chant, and share around a small fire before dropping our papers into the flames to burn physically so they could then manifest in our lives. Our final and greatest triumph of the week came about thirty minutes after we should have left the retreat center in the form of a five-person, three-story, downward facing dog pyramid. Hopefully, technical difficulties will not prevent me sharing the epic photo evidence with all of you.

We then proceeded to make our way into Cusco and bummed about the city for the evening before taking off on an overnight bus to visit Lake Titicaca. We stumbled off the bus at the lakeside city of Puno at 5:30 in the morning and proceeded to our travel office. After a very early and sleepy breakfast, we all climbed into our tour boat for a quick ride to the famous floating islands of Titicaca. The islands are made of reeds and anchored to the lake floors with rope, the same reeds provide building material and food for the islanders as well. While it was an incredible experience, it was definitely the most touristy situation we have found ourselves in as of yet. We had an hour to explore the islands and be pumped for as many soles as could be extracted from us before taking off on another boat ride. The second ride allowed a few of us three glorious hours to nap on the sun-drenched rooftop above luxurious blue waters before arriving on the stunning island Amantani. We then spent the afternoon recuperating from our bus-ride. However, Sarah and Michael C. opted to jump into the freezing cold waters of Titicaca instead of take a nap as their form of rejuvation. It certainly looked invigorating and luckily no one suffered from hypothermia post-swim. We then reconvened to hike up to the second-highest mountain peak on Amantani in order to watch the sunset and soak in the full glories of Lake Titicaca. From there we could see the snow-capped mountains of Bolivia and even soak in the intense sights of a far off lightning storm on another side of the coastline. The view was certainly one to remember, but even our brief hike at the 14,000 foot elevation winded us enough to make us all a little curious about how this four-day trek up to Machu Picchu is going to treat us...

The evening brought some dancing and singing with the local Quechua poeple of the island and then very sound sleep for all after a long day. The next morning we were up bright and early to catch a boat to Taquile, another island about an hours ride away. Simone had to dig into our med-kit and rustle up some motion sickness pills for a few folks for this particlar ride as it was certainly a rocky one! After arriving we then had a couple hours to explore Taquile and enjoy a yummy trout lunch before loading up for our final three hour boat ride back to Puno. We all ventured off into the city to acquire dinner and kill time before our second overnight bus ride in three days. We arrived in Cusco bright and early this morning and ventured to our hostel to drop off our luggage before all going abouts our various explorations and activities around the city for our free day. Simone is teaching a yoga class this afternoon at The Healing House, a local living space and learning center that collaborates with the yoga studio we worked with this week. I am looking forward to attending the class if I don't find myself in need of a nap after last nights bus ride.

This week has certainly been an eventful one. The yoga retreat was an excellent opportunity to cement and further explore all we have learned on this trip, and take a closer look at what we may want for ourselves in the future. We're reaching the last leg of our adventures together, with only the rainforest and Machu Picchu ahead of us but I'm sure those will provide a bounty of incredible experiences and memories as well.

Lots of love and good energy headed to all our friends and family back home,

Daniella

2011-04-12T16:02:00.000-07:00

After a rigorous week in Cusco spent Salsa-ing, getting massages,
putting on puppet shows, and other draining tasks (such as playing on
slides), we are reading to head to the Sacred Valley and finally be
able to relax.

This past week has been filled with a wide variety of super sweet
activities. We started out the week, Sunday, by attending the local
soccer team´s home game, but only have of the group really Carpe
Diem´ed things by staying the whole time, despite the torrential rain.
I never really understand what kind of person would leave when a game
is tied 2-2, despite the weather, but I learned this past weekend.
Unfortunately, our ´´seizing the day´´ mentality didn´t particularly
help us, given that the game ended in a tie, and there is no overtime
or shootout. Whatever.

During the week, we continued our daily 2 hours of grammar lessons
mixed with a further 2 of practical Spanish. It seems as though
everyone has enjoyed the school here more than anywhere else, and we
all have improved our Spanish. We also supplemented our work with the
task of building a theater for a poor school, and putting on a play.
The finished piece was colorful and crackerjack aesthetically pleasing
(thesaurus.com says ´´crackerjack is another word for super´´), thanks
to the beautiful artwork and well-crafted architecture. The audience
of the play described it as ´´bonito´´ and ´´wow´´, but then again, we
didn´t expect much more from 4 years olds. One critic noted,
´´Extraordinary theatre, extraordinarily powerful, impeccably
performed and produced. A night of theatre to remember´´, after
viewing Kafka´s ´´Metamorphosis´´ performed.

After the play was finished, we spent a couple of hours playing with
the kids at the local ´´Pigeon Park´´, feature precariously moving
attractions and dangerously high slides for the average 4/5 year olds.
One highlight was when Nick went into the spinning ball thing. Another
was when two kids threw up inside of it.

Later in the day, the entire Spanish school took an overly-packed bus
to a nearby, maximum-security prison for women, where we spend about
20 minutes looking at their sewn, knit, and crafted goods, and talking
to a few of them about how they ended up there in the first place.
Although we weren´t allowed to go inside because of some shenanigans
supposedly going down, we had a good opportunity to learn from the
experiences of two women who were caught trying to smuggle drugs and
cake mix. Or something like that.

This morning, we moved out of our homestay and into a nearby hostel,
and we´ve happily spent the day being able to do whatever we needed to
get done before we head to our yoga retreat.
We´ll all be zen and stuff next week.
Peace!
Miguelito de los Campos

Photos from week 1 in Cusco

2011-04-05T09:40:00.001-07:00

Cusco: Week 1

2011-04-04T16:26:00.001-07:00

This was our first week in Cusco. We arrived here last Sunday on a plane from Lima. We are all staying as one big family in one house, which we share with the old couple who lives there. We're studying at a Spanish school called FairPlay. FairPlay helps reduce poverty by providing jobs and training to single mothers who may have been involved in abusive relationships. Every afternoon we have 4 hours of one-on-one Spanish classes, which are usually exhausting but very effective. Half of the time is spent learning grammar in a classroom, and half of the time is spent practicing what we've learned, out in Cusco. We're also building a puppet theatre, and 12 tables for a local school. In our free time we've been visiting markets, getting massages, eating food, and playing spades (in our own tournament). Myself excluded (not a dancer), we've been taking salsa lessons. Everyone seems to be learning a lot and having a great time. On Saturday night, we went to a salsa club. On Sunday, we went to a soccer game, which ended in a tie (2-2) and a torrential downpour which thoroughly soaked us all. Today, Nick and Erin bought two ducklings, (for 5 soles each (2 dollars each)) which they named Sampson and Deleila. After we leave Cusco, they'll leave them with their Spanish teachers. As our comfort zones and fun-limits are being pushed, we all miss our families very much and hope everything is heavenly at home.

Michael L.

P.S. I will be posting photos on the blog either tomorrow or the next day.

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sup dudes

2011-03-26T17:57:00.001-07:00

Free travel couldn't have gone by any faster. Though at first we were somewhat nostalgic of the times we had in Agualongo, it was any easy adjustment to life around Trujillo. The sandy shores of Huanchaco graced us with their beauty and hospitality giving us the perfect opportunity to unwind and relax. We filled our days shredding the gnar, eating, and getting our golden tans. Our nights being spend putting on our poker faces and having show downs in talking spades. The world championships of spades are beginning to look like a run away. With all our pride and self respect on the line, Ari and Mike L are getting spanked by Mike C and I, 2 sets to zero. I hope they feel terrible about themselves if they get sweeped. We were able to get a van ride out to the shore known for having longest pipeline in the world. Although it wasn't at its 2km record fashion we were able to get some of the best gnar sessions of our lives while indulging in the tranquility of a traditional low key beach town.

Yesterday marks the last day of beach life for the rest of this trip, but we are all anxiously awaiting time in Cusco, the Amazon, and Manchu. We have a home stay awaiting us in Cusco, one casa housing the nine of us, for the next two weeks where we will be able to resume our Spanish course and get cozy with each other. Missing you all back home but not really, we having a ball and will completely forget about you guys once we get another frisbee. There´s supposed to be a superhero party tonight and I have an insider telling me Spiderman and Superman will be making appearances.

With love, hugs, and kisses,

Nick Cash Kessler

Fwd:

2011-03-26T06:30:00.001-07:00

Week 6 in Equador brought many things for some of us it brought important lessons, like don´t put paint thinner in sprite bottles because some of us, Ari, will drink random open sprite bottles. It also brought a slew of sicknesses to our group, taking me out for the better part of the week. While I was out for the count the rest of the group continued on with the healthcare work and teaching at the school. In the classroom Nick and Erin excelled at teaching english to the 8th and 9th graders by introducing Jepordy and entertained the third grade by repeatedly singing "Head, shoulders, knees, and toes" faster and faster and teaching them the english version of one of their favorite games, "Que Hora es Sr. Lobo". While Campos, Daniela, and Ari took a different swing on it and taught the older kids to sing along to "Hey Jude" and played games with the younger kids. Out in the field it was cool to see how the communities really appreciated the healthcare work that was being done, it was also awesome that Nick got the opportunity to play dentist and not only pull a tooth but also administer the local anesthetic. Our last night in Agualongo was spent in the near by town of Quichinche at a festival which included a parade which most of the group danced in. Simone, Daniela, Sarah, and Erin looked stunning in the traditional dress and Nick really pulled off the early westernesque traditional attire of a cowboy hat, a red bandana, a leather vest, and very furry chaps. While Ari tried to fit in with black pinstripe overalls, and a traditional shirt (because his costume was infested with scabies after both he and Miguel got it). Nearer to the end of the night we migrated to the carnavalish area complete with a swinging dragon ride, haunted house, and assorted other games. I think I speak for everyone who whent both on the dragon ride and in the haunted house that it was worth the dollar it cost to obtain a state of freefalll for a few moments on each peak of the dragon or get scared better than some of the haunted in the states can. Our last day in Agualongo was bitter-sweet because we were saying good bye to the families and community which had taken us under its wing for the past two weeks, and slightly sweet because we now only had a short bus ride between us and hot showers and proper beds. After a wonderful meal and a parting song performed by SamIAm we gathered our gear for a final ride down the hill in the back of Guevarra's truck to the bus stop, where after a mad dash for some last minute pie we boarded the 2 hour bus to Quito.
Out.
-Joseph "Maverick" Sariego
SamIAm

2011-03-15T11:33:00.001-07:00

Sam I Am kicked off our fourth week rounding out an eleven hour bus ride. We rolled into Otavalo at 6:30 in the morning for a free day to enjoy the city. From the bus terminal we groggily stumbled the eight or so blocks to our hostel. Luckily, we found it to be equipped with hammocks, delicious breakfasts, and the best damn showers we have encountered in Ecuador thus far.

After a lazy morning of snacking and Spades we decided to make our way to the Peguche waterfall. We have been informed that on a normal day at Peguche you can enjoy the beautiful sights in peace and even whisper your secrets to the falls and be cleansed. However, last Sunday we were still in the heart of Carnaval so we had a different experience entirely that included crowds, an excess of foam, water fights, and the occasional explosion of colored flour. Our superheroes once again made an appearance and were kind enough to provide the public with photo-ops upon request. The rest of our day was spent roaming the world-famous Otavalan market, Plaza de los Ponchos, and indulging in more good food.

Monday morning brought the start of two weeks of homestays in Agualongo and our work with the Tandana Foundation, an organization devoted to building relationships and providing support for the towns of indigenous Ecuadorians around Otavalo. Anna, the founder of Tandana along with a few other volunteers met us at our hostel for orientation. We had a quick crash-course on life in Agualongo and our schedule for the next two weeks including a brief lesson in Kichwa, the native language of Ecuador that our homestay families speak in addition to Spanish. From there we made our way to Agualongo. We were each dropped off at our homes to meet our families and then promptly made our way to the community center for a welcoming ceremony followed by a slightly chaotic game of soccer. Unsurprisingly, us gringos did not come out ahead.

Immediately after our day took a turn in a quite different direction and we headed to Las Palmeras Hotel where a small gathering for volunteers and visiting donors was being held. The party was hosted at the hotel owner, Nik´s, home. Nik is a rather eccentric older Englishman who splits his time between Manhattan and Otavalo. He got to know Tandana through volunteers staying at his hotel and included the construction of a medical storage facility for the foundation when he built his new home.

Tuesday we participated in a local minga, which meant the nine of us spent the morning picking up trash around Agualongo along with the other young people of the town. A minga is an alternative to taxes that most of the indigenous villages use around Ecuador. A project is selected and planned that every family must contribute to, whether that be sending a member to help work or providing refreshments for the volunteers. Our afternoon was spent taking inventory of the medical storage facility at Las Palmeras in preparation for our health clinic work for this upcoming week.

Wednesday morning was spent weeding and planting seedlings at Muyo, a tree nursery dedicated to the rehabilitation and reforestation of indigenous plants in the area. From there we spent a long afternoon in a cooking class hosted by Claudia, a former scholarship student of Anna´s who is now opening a cooking school with her family. We made llapingachos (fried cheese potatoe dumplings), carne colorada (steak curry), rice and pea empanadas, and quimbolita (an angel food cake made by steaming heaps of batter wrapped in giant leaves). It took us about five hours to make dinner for twenty people and the results were certainly worth it.

Thursday and Friday were converting the old kitchen into a new library at the local school. Some group members sanded and painted the room while the rest meticulously covered books with contact paper to ensure they would have a long life span in the library. There was a lot of book covering. We had a quite pleasant afternoon on Friday harvesting Frigole (beans) at the house of Campos´ homestay family. We spent about twenty minutes filling our bagswith beans before plopping ourselves down in a potatoe patch in the middle of the corn fields and eating as much choclos (raw corn on the cob) and caña (the sugar-cane like substance in the center of corn stalks). We were joined by a few young children of Agualongo who put us to shame with our swiss army knives by peeling the caña with their teeth and chowing down on about five full cornstalks a piece. Luckily, our brief bean-harvesting work still provided Campos´ family with enough beans for the rest of the year!

Saturday morning brought another minga. The project was tiling the community center floors, however, the level of organization involved was minimal and after scrubbing away at the cement ground and soaking a few tiles we ran out of ways to contribute. Then we had a free afternoon to enjoy some timein Otavalo. Saturday is the biggest day for the outdoor market so many of us returned home with a new accessory or article of clothing. In Nick´s case, a full new outfit of traditional Ecuadorian attire in the form of red-striped overalls and a bright green fedora. We´re all seriously considering following suit. It could be a good look for Sam I Am.

Our week has been very busy, but very enjoyable. Our familes have all been very kind and welcoming and each day we have plenty of opportunities to practice both our Spanish and Kichwa.

Hope all is well where you are, much love to our friends and family.

Your blogger for the week,
Daniella

Second week in Cuenca

2011-03-06T14:55:00.001-08:00

Dear readers of SAM blog,

We started our second week in Cuenca off with an amazing hike through a national park in Cajas. We continued our Spanish classes, which took place in our classrooms and out in the city, where we visited markets, museums, a zoo, etc. After searching for the past week or so we were finally able to acquire a frisbee, which got a lot of use in the park. Cuenca was an awesome place to be during the Ecuadorian ¨Carnaval¨ celebration, because there´s a tradition that invites everyone to throw water-balloons and spray foam at pedestrians on the streets. We went through multiple 100-packs of water-balloons, some of us going out with backpacks full of them at a time. Campos, Nick, and I bought superhero costumes (Spiderman, Superman, and Batman, respectively) which further enlivened the Carnaval experience for us. On Saturday, we all packed our bags, said goodbye to our host families and Cuenca, and left on an overnight bus (12 hours long) to Otavalo. We´re all having an amazing trip so far and miss everyone back at home.

Michael L.

¡Hola from Cuenca!

2011-03-01T12:50:00.001-08:00

Well, here we are in cuenca, Ecuador! After travelling from Canoa on an overnight bus on Saturday, we were all rushed away from the bus station by our respective host families on Sunday morning. I have my own family due to the odd number of poeple in our group, but most are living with partners. We´ve all been having a really good experience with it so far. My host dad, Oscar, is Columbian and very funny. He is always telling me to ¨tranquila" (relax) and that his casa es mi casa. He claims to be a member of the Mafia, but he is kidding... I think... Ha. Anyway, we´re glad with the way things worked out there! People here seem to eat much smaller meals than we´re used to, so that has been an adjustment!

Monday through Friday, we have Spanish class from 8-12. The school is beautiful, comfortable, and has a constant suppy of teas, coffee, and hot chocolate to keep us going- that much Spanish can get exhausting! However, I for one can definitely say that my Spanish has improved in just the three weeks that we´ve been in this beautiful country. The school has also supplemented our lessons with cooking classes, city tours, and salsa dancing lessons (involving many laughs and stepped-on feet!)

We have spent our afternoons and evenings exploring the markets, shopping, playing ultimate frisbee in the parks, spending time with our host families, eating (local cuisine, along with KFC for a few of us!) . There continues to be at least one deck of cards in play during every free moment. This weekend, we checked out a local discoteca for some cultual experience! An experience it certainly was, although personally I could have done with a few less local chicos pursuing me for being a gringa, and a few more of those free cotton candies!

On Sunday we took a bus to El Cajas National Park for some hiking and picnics (definite emphasis on the latter)! It was a great day and awesome to relax and explore such a beautiful place! What could beat hiking, eating, sunbathing, Lord-of-the-Rings photo shoots, and watching Simone continue her streak of accidentally stepping into deep mud pits?

As I sit here writing this update in my bedroom at my host family´s house, ¨Don´t Stop Believing¨ is blasting loudly outside the window. So begins another week in Cuenca, and who knows what adventures it might bring!

I think I speak for everyone when I say that we miss our families and friends a lot, but we´re also very thankful to be right here where we are in such a unique part of the world. We hope you all are well and can´t wait to share even more memories and experiences with you!

Que te vayas bien,

Love,

Sarah and the rest of the SAM I AM crew

Rio Mu¨Manchas¨

2011-02-22T13:48:00.001-08:00

Hola Amigos y Familia!

I (we) are writing you this update from the small town of Canoa, located on the Northern coast of Ecuador. Currently I am lounging in a hammock at our beach front hostal after being woken up by a pan flute enthusiast who decided to raom the streets at 7:15 this morning, not that I´m complaining. Thus, I now get to sit and reflect on this past week (thanks to my duty as ¨blogger¨) so that the rest of you can live vicariously through our experiences.

We spent our time up in hills by this coastal town at the lovely organic farm of Rio Muchacho. The surroundings were green and lucious (especially considering the season); the buildings were glorified wooden cabins that were dripping in hammocks, bugs, and pen air window-walls; and the food was primarily fresh from the finca (farm) - organic, vegetarian, and full of flavor. The lack of meat certainly started to wear on a few individuals as the week went on, most likely a withdrawl from the westernized diet, but no long term damage seems to have been done.
In short this place is a perfect representation of sustainability, so much so, that they didnt even have trash. All food waste was either composted or fed to the pigs, all humand and animal waste was turned into fertilizer to be used on the farm or sold, and natural rain water catchements, as well as, water conservation and treatment processes were used for drinking, cleaning, and irrigation. The garden itself was then planted in a way that emphasized biodiversity (in plants, animals, and bugs), seasonality, lunar cycles, and the local ecosystem. Nicola and Dario, our hosts, have been improving their practices for the past 20 years, more or less, developing new projects that encompus sustainable agriculture and livelihoods. This includes their environmental school (the only school in their region), indroducing new crops that will thrive in the coastal ecuadorian climate, and buliding their popular ecotourism/volunteer lodge that supports the many locals and traveling individules who are interested in this type of work. But what might we (the volunteers) do you might ask?
Well each day they provided a new lesson on either organic framing principles, the concerns with conventional farming, the ¨how to¨ on being sustainable at home, composting, and the influences of lunar cycles on farming and life in general. Speaking for all of us, I would say we learned a lot, especially considering the work it takes to run a place like this.....
Each morning we started our day at 6- 6:30 with daily ¨chores¨ before breakfast. This meant cutting grass-hay with a machete for the horses, collecting vegetables from the garden, feeding the chickens/pigs, helping in the kitchen, and for the lack of a better term - shoveling shit. I think we can all agree that Simone can atest to the wonders of shit shoveling seeing as she lost her boot and nearly her whole leg to a 4 ft deep pool of pig cacca during a terrential down pour.
The rest of our days were then spent in the previously mentioned lessons, touring the farm, making handicrafts our of seeds and mate (goard like fruit) , eating, siesta, lounging in hammocks, making Nick and Michael L do the dishes for sleeping through morning chores, playing with Manchas (the 3 month old dalmatian puppy.... so cute), participating in ¨band practice¨, änd doing farm activities.¨¨Farm Activities¨ is code for weeding, heavy lifting, shoveling shit, squating in mud, planting seeds, and pretending to understand spanish.

Our last day we took off back to Canoa and found this beach side hostel thanks to Sarah... our ¨cribs¨for the week. Luckiliy we got the last rooms! And friday night we spent a better part of our time salsa dancing - pretending to salsa dance at a local spot right on the beach, my personal favorite. Jealous yet?

That about covers our past week, and now we are off on our next adventure - the language school in Cuenca with our homestays (which are so far amazing... but more on that later.)

please direct all questions and concerns to personal emails.

Ciao!

Erin & SAM I AM (our band... we are unbelieveably talented so stay tuned for recordings and CD artwork)

photos: valentines gifts homemade, SAM I AM album cover, seedlings, manchas, the lodge-cabin, and the beach at canoa.

2011-02-12T12:13:00.001-08:00

Hola! I have arrived safely for all those who were worried. I have 4 limbs, my passport, sanity, and a water bottle so we are in the clear. Yesterday was our first real day on the ground after 24 hours of traveling and no problems. Currently we are staying at a beautiful retreat center in Bahia Ecuador called Siananda. To sum it up its a place with a plethera of animals (peacocks, chickens, bunnies, horses, quail, goats, dogs, cats...), great food, right on the coast filled with delicious cerviche. Yesterday afternoon we boated over to Isle del sol (island of the sun... sounds lovely right?). It was an island made of knee deep mud... so refreshing and good for the skin. We basked in a mud bath, played with crabs-small mud fish, and practiced some mud slides straight into the water..... photos coming soon. For the ride back home I and a few others insisted on swimming across the river back to Siananda :). So for a good mile/hour and to the amazement of the locals: Ari, Nick, Joeseph, and myself cruised through the tasteful warm brown aqua as athletic prep for the machu pichu hike. I found an orange half way across which proved useful for mid-river catch until Ari speared it with his thumb. Our night then concluded with a jam sesh with SAM I AM - an up and coming new band with a phenomenal album cover....

The people, food, and scenery are amazing.

Ciao for now.

- Erin

2011-02-12T12:11:00.000-08:00

Hey everybody its Joseph.

I´m just dropping by to say that everything is going great and I am having a wonderful time here in Equador.

2011-02-12T12:09:00.001-08:00

hola from ecuador!

everything has been great so far! we played on an island made of mud, had a group jam session that involved guitars, tamborines, a drum, and tibetan singing bowls. This is a beautiful area of the world and I am very excited to experience it with such a great group of people.

paz!

sarah

Ceviche

2011-02-12T11:33:00.001-08:00

Dear blog,

The trip has been great so far. I don,t know what has already been written on here but I,ll update it with the most recent thing we,ve done. Miguel Campos, Erin, Joseph, Sarah and I just ate ceviche at a little restaurant in Bahia. I,m having a great time. The place we.ve been staying at is awesome and I want to live there.

-Michael

2011-02-12T11:10:00.001-08:00

Hello to friends and family of the SAM Spring 2011 group (now better known by our spontaneous jam-band name, Sam I Am.... hopefully we´ll get some recordings up soon)

Three days in Ecuador and every moment has been amazing.

Hope everything is well wherever you may be.

Paz,

Daniella

!

2011-02-12T11:08:00.001-08:00

ecuador is awesome

2011-02-10T17:03:00.000-08:00

This is Amy from headquarters and I'm happy to report the South America group has arrived safely in Guayaquil! Ari and Simone phoned the office today to say they had landed, all accounted for and all were healthy and happy. (Albeit, a little jet-lagged.)

The group is currently on a bus heading for the coastal town of Bahia de Caraquez where they will begin their orientation to each other and the semester. You should be hearing from them very soon after they get some much needed rest!

Check back here often and journey with them through Ecuador and Peru!

Headquarters, once again, signing off...

The group is found!

2011-02-09T22:29:00.000-08:00

Well, it's a little past 10pm and the group, its leaders, and loads of enthusiasm have united what promises to be an excellent journey. Stay tuned to this page for more blogs everyone, and for tonight, rest assured that everyone have boarded their flight and will be heading South ... waaaay South, soon enough!

Yours truly,

Ethan

No podemos esperar!

2011-02-04T16:05:00.001-08:00

Hola, from your very enthusiastic trip leaders, Simone and Ari!!

This blog is a place for you to post photos, tell stories and share your experiences with friends and family back home. Send your loved ones this link so they can see and read about the places that your adventurous spirit is taking you.

Throughout our semester, each of you will have the opportunity to post to this blog, documenting our journey for the world to see. Blogger is one of seven roles that each of you will fill as the semester progresses. There are six other roles, and you'll have at least one turn in each. They are:

Hot Wheels – arranging transportation
Cribs – organizing our housing
Bleeding Heart – who reports on social issues
Librarian – who will carry and care after our books
Culture, History & Headlines - who reports on the local culture, and finally...
El Capitan – the person who pulls it all together and MC's group meetings

Sharing the responsibility for success will help our group build a tight-knit community, and help each of you develop great travel skills.

Reminder: We are meeting at the Tom Bradley Terminal in LAX, at the eatery tables on the second floor. Just look for some goofy looking people with giant backpacks. We'll gather there at 9:30 pm and reconvene at that spot every hour until our entire group is together.

We're looking forward to an educational journey with you, full of adventure, smells, toil, sights and laughs. Hopefully you've already had a chance to read through the itinerary. For now, eat the foods you love, hug your families and pets, and pick up those last minute travel-essentials. Next stop, Ecuador!

Paz,
Simone and Ari

Greetings from CT

2011-01-17T11:25:00.001-08:00

Better late than never, right? I miss you all so much!

This is me in my room with my dog Jake.
It has been snowing a lot here. This is me and my dog Romeo in front of our house.

Just to keep you all updated, Natalie and I are leaving for India on January 31st. Also, I'm going to Greece for 3 months starting on March 7th. I hope all of you will visit me.

Portland, OR. EEUU

2010-12-20T21:02:00.000-08:00

Whats up everybody! I miss you all like crazy. I'm saying we start talking about the reunion in Hawaii... This is me in my room on my sleeping bed.

Meet my puppy Toby!

he's an angel.

HOME IS COLD

2010-12-15T15:04:00.000-08:00

This is my new puppy Oakley!

We rescued him from Georgia, at a puppy adoption day!

My pack is still on the floor.. missing you all and

Merry Christmas!

Love Natals

meeeeehh room

2010-12-14T07:56:00.000-08:00

HEY EVERYONE

i would just like to say that im glad to be home, heres a picture of my messy room. its not a great picture of my face but hey the picture below explains why i feel that way.

great to be home and sledding, but that still dosnt make 5 degrees any warmer!

miss you guys! happy holidays!

-mia

WHEW!

2010-12-13T13:45:00.000-08:00

Last Blog...
We've come to the end of the road and it's been quite a journey! Hopefully you all are catching some much needed rest and relaxation. We hope the transition into USA proper is going smoothly and gently. Go easy on yourself and take the occasional nap!
It looks like this:

May you live what you've learned and learn to live! You all have impressed so many people, including Andy and I, along this journey with your strength, maturity, zest for all parts of the program, and desire for something better, deeper, and lovelier than has been imagined ever before.
Blessings! Happy Holidays!
Jessica and Andy

Missing you!!

2010-12-13T10:28:00.000-08:00

we love carpe diem, post your room pictures!

Last Batch of photos...

2010-12-13T08:55:00.000-08:00

So you want to scroll from the bottom up... We last left off with photos from Lake Titicaca to the end of the road.

Last Group Photo at the airport in Cusco, love you all!

Ah the glories of no-shave November!

Coming Down!

Flying high!

The Nut...

Cave adventures with Emma and Anna!

The Condor from Huanapichu

Andy Bemis!

We made it!!! Beautiful, magical Machu Piccu!

Great View looking at Machu Piccu from another mountain

Beautiful orchids lined the path.

Huge rains flooded the trail the next day...

Our very supportive staff and willing hikers...

Ah, beautiful!

Taking the horse...

High pass was no problem with our experience in Huaraz

Yoga quarterly...

Lake Titicacca in the traditional dress of the people of Llachon

Sunset on Lake Titicaca

I don't know what this sign says...

The Austins take control

2010-12-01T15:07:00.000-08:00

Namaste Bros,

We have just finished a four day yoga and meditation retreat in the Sacred Valley. We started every day bright and early with a nice relaxing meditation, followed by an hour and a half of broga (also known as "yoga" to all you normal people). After a dank breakfast of dank foods, including homemade yoghurt, quinua, and fresh fruit, we did our 45 minutes of daily seva (chores done with love <3), which was usually followed by a lesson or workshop. We learned sick things such as Reiki (energy healing), Pranayama (life breathing techniques), Vedic Astrology (it was a shock to find out we weren´t all the sign we had always though we were!), Chakras (the seven main energy points in the body), Yoga Philosophy, Mantra Meditation, and many more of life enhancing lessons. After these two hour lessons or workshops it was usually time for lunch, one of the best times of day. The food was all vegetarian and all delicious. Even us boys didn´t have a single longing for meat the whole time!!!!!! After a well-needed rest, we resumed work-shopping and yogaing, with another two hour class before dinner. We were lucky enough to be staying at the beautiful retreat with a wonderful family who was always willing to share their wisdom. Saranagati, the wife, is from New Mexico, so it was nice to have another American spirit around. Chaitanya, her husband, is a native Peruana, and the two of then combined taught us a shit load about yoga, meditation, homeopathy, and lots of other cool stuff. Despite being really sore, we all had an amazing time, learned a ton, can all do shoulder stands, warrior 1 and 2, bridge pose, and many more cool poses. We also learned that it is possible to sit in silence for a whole hour! Now we´re back in Cuzco for a few hours of sleep before we set off on our Machu Picchu trek at 4 am. We will see you all soon!

Namaste,
Austin squared

We're back!

2010-11-27T17:26:00.000-08:00

Greetings family and friends,
We're now back in Cuzco until tomorrow morning, after 4 wonderful/interesting days at Lake Titicaca. The 24th, we left Cuzco by way of a private van, 13 smiling, healthy (note: healthy is a crucial word here) gringos and one native driver off to see the highest navigable lake in el mundo. As the hours in the van turned into extreme hunger, our driver, who led us to believe he was our friend, suggested a stop for some delicious roadside baby sheep n' taters. Unfortunately, for one member of the group, (Jim doesn't want to name names, for some reason [because it was him]), a tainted potatoe found its way into his plastic bag of baby sheep n' taters. The ambush on Jim's health was well under way by the time he suspected foul play. The drive to Lake Titicaca was otherwise uneventful, and we arrived at this gorgeous lake in the late afternoon. The group lay down to rest that seemingly fine evening, when all hell broke loose. When the group congregated for breakfast on the fine Day of Thanks (AKA Thanksgiving), three soldiers were found wounded. The sickness had struck. In any case, the group still managed a fantastic day of exploring near Llachon, our homestay community, including nearby island Taquile. Although soldiers were falling by the minute, the group came together to cook a dank Thanksgiving dinner of salad, guacamole, fruit salad, chicken with pear sauce (thanks mom), sweet potato with marshmallow, mashed potatoes, and apple pie crumble. Although it was strange for a lot of people to be away from home on Thanksgiving, we had a great time sharing our appreciations and delicious foods.

The next day, Friday, we travelled by boat and kayak to a floating island, Uros Titino Manco Capac. It was an amazing cultural experience, to see several families living on a floating island somewhere in the vicinity of 30 by 30 feet. After learning about the island and their culture and perusing handmade crafts, we departed for Llachon once more. Back at the community, we tried on local clothing and shared many wonderful memories. After another night, we said our goodbyes, met our "friend", the driver, and made way for Cuzco. After a solid 8 hours, we made it back here. This blog would have been way better if we weren't exhausted...lo siento mucho, amigos. Pictures tomorrow maybe?

Hasta luego,
The Mainahs

Everybody Loves Photos! (More cowbell!!!)

2010-11-23T15:56:00.000-08:00

FairPlay Spanish School in Cusco, Peru

Payaya TIME! In the Jungle at Robin´s Farm!!!

Jungle Walk around Camino Verde protected forest.

Your friendly neighborhood white caiman.

Salt Lick by ¨The Gator¨

Hiking out of the jungle was mighty hard work! Pina break!

Riding around in Puerto Maldonado...

Lake Sandoval

Ma and Pa Kettle

The ¨80 meter¨Black Caiman!!

Lobos del Rio!!!

Playing Dress up at llanchon, Lago Titicaca

Maine Boys Check-In

2010-11-22T14:18:00.000-08:00

Hello folks,

We are currently in Puerto Maldonado awaiting our departure flight back to Cuzco in the morning. We have spent the last ten (mas o menos) days in the heart (mas o menos) of the Amazon. We were in a small community called Baltimore, off the Tambopata River, helping reforest with a righteous broski named Robin (who has a ton of land, knowledge, and rusties [ask your child if you want to know more]). We stayed in an eco-tourism lodge named El Gato (which we understood to mean "The Gator"). Our parents (you may think of them as leaders), Jessicandy, stayed with Uncle Rob at his farm across the river. Needless to say, it got WILD (no supervision and "The Gator" sold us cookies ALL night long!). Don't tell the office, please. The mornings that we weren't entirely taxed from the sugar highs, we awoke before 6 for breakfast and the early morning boatride to the meet the family at Uncle Rob's pad (which was off the hook and purchased for 10,000 soles in 2005, please check the conversion on that steal!) We worked early to try to beat the unforgiving jungle sun (there was no way to beat the bastard jungle mosquitoes, they were relentless in their ambushes). No thermometer, but Austin and I clearly agree that the minimum temperature was (mas o menos) 160 degrees farenheit (this is real life). All said and done, it was a remarkable experience.

Oh, we almost forgot, the family that ran "The Gator" was very nearly as badass as Robin (keywords: very nearly). The son, Dani, one day walked up to our father (Andy, for those that have yet to comprehend the family bonds) and asked if he wanted to see a caiman. Of course, Andy retorted with "Why yes, young fellow, I would thoroughly enjoy laying my eyes on a beast of that nature." Entonces ("So" for those virgin to the ancient language of the Amazon), Dani reacted to this polite and charming response by lifting a caiman of large proportion (my fellow blogger Austin and I estimate its length to be in the ballpark of 75 and 80 meters, we are currently looking at the photographs, given our rudimentary length measuring device thingys, it is only, and we REALLY mean only, a rough estimate). It was wicked awesome (and a tad bit frightening).

Then we saw a cool lake named Lake Sandoval with cool river otters and cool black caimans and cool trees and cool birds and cool mariposas (flying butters in the Amazonian tongue) and cool people and cool other wicked cool stuff.

Pictures coming soon to a computer near you (in fact, the computer you will be using to check the blog)!

We are running out of time to blog, but stay posted because we are here to blog all week long ;)

Roger roger, over and out-the Mainahs (Austin and Jim)

Aldea Yanapay School

2010-11-10T09:41:00.000-08:00

Dearest parientes y amigos,

This week we started volunteering with an awesome and inspiring organization called Aldea Yanapay. The organization was started by a man named Yuri and has been successfully surviving for at least half a decade. Its purpose is to act as a social project for the children without opportunities of Cuzco. It was created for the kids and as Yuri says, the kids are always and forever the most important part.

We love Yuri.

Yuri´s dream is so unbelieveably altruistic that we immediately threw our all into helping the kids our very first day, Monday. Monday was chaotic as we adjusted to the kids and being ¨professors,¨ or as the kids called us - ¨¡Profe!¨ We loved the term of endearment; it gave us fuel to continue even when class was going rough and multiple kids were misbehaving or even bleeding.

We were figures to look up to and we took our responsibility very seriously. We did art projects with the kids (including but not limited to making a tree made out of paper mache and creating juggling balls out of balloons), read with them, helped them with their homework, played both educational and recreational games with them, and tutored them. This went from three until five, when the Circle of Expression time comenced. This was a time when all the kids (ages 5 - 13) came together to discuss issues of cultural importance or simply Pokemon - it depends on the day. After circle time, we split into our families (groups of kids of similar ages) to learn about Incan legends (for this week anyway).

These groups were often chaotic to say the least, but we´ll miss their adorable faces. They progressed well on their projects and we wish we could be there tomorrow to see them perform or explain their drawings. We would have been willing to spend more time at the school; there is so much we could do. Sure we passed out flyers to get people to eat at the restaurant (Aldea Yanapay Restaurant) but we still want to do more. Thus we post links and encourage everybody to spread the word about the really cool Aldea Yanapay School. Anything you can do will help them out in their time of need. They are currently looking for a new building and every little bit helps! So if you are ever in Cuzco, look them up. You could anything from volunteering in the school to eating at the restaurant to staying at the associated hostel (Aldea Yanapay Hostel).

We wish we had more time to hang out with the people we´ve met at Yanapay. All the volunteers are cool people from all over the world that it´s a shame to not know better. Actually, there are hard goodbyes all around this week as we leave Cuzco. We had our last classes this morning with our fabulous professors from FairPlay. We´ve learned a lot and there is still so much more to learn - not just about Spanish, but Cuzco as well. Cuzco is rich in history. We could live here for months! Unfortunately, it is time to say goodbye again - it always comes too soon...

So, love to all at Yanapay, FairPlay, and home as we move into the Amazon rainforest. We aren´t expecting to have internet connection in the village of Infierno (literal translation: Hell), but we are expecting to have a lot of fun! So sorry if there are no updates for awhile, Hell doesn´t have good internet connection.

Love,

Catherine and Emma

P.S. Camera difficulties again... Shoot!

Lasting Relations

2010-11-09T10:30:00.000-08:00

As Carpe Diem is an ongoing program, it is very important to us to maintain the friendships we make along the way. While we may be done with our volunteer work at the end of our stay, every one of the volunteer groups we help labors on in their efforts to make this world a better place. For this reason we would like to revisit a couple of these wonderful foundations.

Anna Taft and the Tandana foundation have already breached the post-depature silence by sending us all emails. Included in these emails were links we wish to share to you. So if you´re interested in keeping up to date with what Tandana is doing, or if you just want to see another album of our lovely faces in the clinic, check out these links:

Tanadana Foundation Facebook Page

Tandana Photo Album

Jampinkapa Shamuni Song

Our Farewell Rap

(lyrics for our rap below)

The Aqualongo Despedida Rap

(Joe) Jim wussup doc. Oh nah? That´s cool.
Just hand me the prescription lemme see what I can do.
Run it out to Beau yeah he fills it real quick,
then tosses me the bag, we shake hands, then I split.
GOTTA get these pills to Jim.
GOTTA GOTTA get ém there,
GOTTA get these pills to Jim, Joaquin get back in your chair!

Now I´m sitting down in mine remove my bookmark,
The door swings open shining light into the dark.
The smile upon her face brings warmth into my heart
Another patient helped, yup, that´s a check onto the chart.
Yo Tandana Anna you´re a modern Joan of Arc
This foundation´s now aflame and to think you were the spark.

Just had to show some love to this land that really grew me
Eatin´chewy rico cuy got these rhymes rawer than sushi.
Now I´m feelin kinda fooly
Thanks for bumping to this boogie.
Agualongo. I will never forget thee.

CHORUS

(Everybody) Tandana´s a foundation
Helping people of this nation
Learning one thing, it´s all about communication
We knew that coming here wouldn´t be no vacation
But no one really knew it would be so life changin´

(Austin) Providing health care to help the welfare,
´cause life´s cards aren´t always dealt fair
Helpin´ out rural areas, they don´t have malaria,
And Anna´s here, no need for hysteria
A foundation so strong it could never be impeded,
Tandana is found wherever help is needed,
We came here without a clue what a person could do,
Before the age of 32.
I know I´ll come back, I hope it´s not much longer,
And when I do I´m sure I´ll find that bonds are even stronger
And I gotta throw love out to you volunteers, you could be anywhere else, you´re all here.
I know in my heart that what you´re doing is right
Ali tutta to all and to all a good night.

CHORUS

(Jim) Damn Anna, how´d you do it?
How´d you start Tandana?
Porque, Usted es solo una persona
But you do it all
You´re completely spherical
It´s a miracle
With just two vehicles, supplies, and some friends
You provide help that never ends
And when someone needs advice
I swear you have an extreme device
To save lives all across the globe
Ecuador to Africa swapping time zones
Real quick, but before I split
I got a legit question
What´s it like to come from immaculate conception?

CHORUS

(Andy) A nuestra Querida Puebla de Agualongo
Agradecemos mucho con todo
Corazon, amistad y sentimiento
Por todo lo que han compartid??
Sus casas, comida, y cariño

Tugamos Niños y Padres de familia
Comiendo rica riquisima comida
Aprendemos la cultura y la Kichwa

Ali chishi, shu Iskay, Kçkinsa
Nukanchi charinchi Alco astawa Altalpa
Mushu Ayllu y Nueva familia
Dios le page Mama, Taita y los wawas

Pasamos dos increíbles semanas
Compartiendo esta bella Pachamama
No le olvidamos nunca jamas

No qieremos salir, pero ya nos foca ir
Seguiendo la honda le nos llama

Pues, Que pasea todo bien, hasta vernos otra vez,
Mil gracias y Hasta Kashkama

CHORUS x 2

Palabra Arriba

Special thanks goes out to Jim, Joe, Austin boy, and Andy for writing their lyrics.

We would also like to give another shout out to Peter and the other inspiring people in Intag. Before we left we were able to hear a woman from the local newspaper speak about it. She brought it to our attention how important Periodico INTAG was to the local community. When asked how we could help, she told us to spread the word via betterplace.org. So please, check out the following link:

BetterPlace.org: Periodico INTAG

This is one last thank you to ALL the awe-inspiring people we have worked with on this trip, and we wish you support in all your volunteering endeavors.

Love,

Your Bloggers - Catherine and Emma

Weekend in the Sacred Valley

2010-11-09T10:02:00.000-08:00

Hey friends and family!

This weekend we got the awesome opportunity to visit the ancient Sacred Valley. The place is brimming with visual history in the form of ruins.

We left in a private bus around 9 in the morning on Saturday. Our first Incan destination was Moray. Moray consists of circular terrace ruins with a mystery surrounding their purpose. Some suppose that it was used as a lab to test out terrace-growing techniques because while they resemble the agricultural terraces found across the Incan empire, they are much more concentrated. Each terrace is its own climate and has its own set of crops - hence the thought that it might have been a lab. Who knows?

We plunged down the tall Incan-style floating stairs to the bottom - no easy task. However, some still had energy to ponder other possible uses for the circles. The most popular explanation, backed by ¨empirical¨ evidence, was that it was a Roman style amphitheater used for gladiator battles with an Incan twist. Since the suggestion received a lot of support, the believers decided to create a reenactment. From there, support dwindled and we made our made up the floating stairs (and we thought going down was hard).

After reaching the top, we piled back in the bus and set off for Ollataytambo. The small city consists of many of the same streets from back in the time of the Incas. We started our afternoon out (after lunch at Heart´s Cafe, really good cause and equally good food, check it out: www.heartscafe.org) with a tour of the town. This is the best place to see Incan city planning in all of Peru. We got to see a square that has been preserved in its original form from Incan times. There is only one entrance into the block and many houses around the perimeter. The house that we toured had skulls of ancestors in them as reminders of morality and a crap ton of cuyes.

Our tour of the city didn´t take long, so before too long we went to the ruins proper of Ollataytambo. The ruins were of a hilltop fortress where an important Incan victory took place in 1536. Masters of irrigation, the Incas defeated their foes by intentionally flooding the plain below. The rocks of which the fortress was constructed were also products of irrigation techniques as they were retrieved from the other side of the nearby river, Urubamba. The rocks were too heavy to be taken across (they were HUGE, the size of a large cow) so the Incas diverted the river around the rocks. Insane!

Even today you can see working canals in the city of Ollataytambo. Part of the group cleaned trash out of one of these canals. Others were too fascinated by the aesthetics of the narrow streets to help. These cobbled streets also date back to the Incan empire so it is understandable.

After a night in a nice hostel, we set off early for Pisac and its famous market. The market was very large and overwhelming. We thought it went on forever... until we popped out the end. We couldn´t see it coming, or maybe we were too busy ogling the brightly colored stalls filled with everything from panpipes to hand-painted plates to ancient money. Before we knew it, it was time to return to Cuzco.

Cuzco, beloved base of operations for both us and the Incas long ago.

Hasta luego,

Emma y Catherine

The City of the Incas

2010-11-05T13:38:00.000-07:00

Hey Friends and Family,

Unfortunately, we´ve been having trouble putting up pictures of our recent endeavors, which truly pains us because we´ve wanted to share our trek with you. As an alternative, we asked everyone to tell us their most beautiful moment on the trek to try and paint as clear of a picture for ya´ll as we can. After we got everyone´s responses, we figured out the blog. Enjoy!

From Andy, this novel that he was kind enough to type himself:

A story...so last week I found myself trekking in the Cordillera Blanca outside of Huaráz, Anchash, Perú. In the midst of one of the most beautiful ranges I have had the pleasure to traverse. surrounded by jagged snow-capped peaks. glaciated cliffs. majestic waterfalls. mirror lakes. surreal clouds. massive boulder fields. subtle flowers and crystalline rivers. Yet, despite the natural beauty and the high altitude, I was feeling down. disconnected from my spiritual self. my goals. my practice. tired. drained. discouraged. and so, before closing my eyes for sleep on the last night of our trek. I determined that I would arise early in the morn and plug into the flow. follow what feels right in an effort to tune-up. tap-in. turn-on :) So I arise with the sun. go for a walk and meditate on top of a rock. situated between the sunrise and Taulliraju I sit for some minutes before returning for breakfast. When I arrive I find a little five year old boy in our camp peeking out from behind some boulders. while we eat he comes closer and we laugh as he freestyle walks all around our camp. jumping off rocks doing 360-heel grabs. so full of smiley playful energy just bouncing all over the place. I suppose I should not be surprised when during our morning handstand/cartwheel time he jumps right in and plays along. In fact, he jumps right into our circle and starts break-dancing! somersaults. headstands. handstands! (5 years old!) crazy-rolls and butt-drops in one of the most creative displays of movement and body control I have seen...let alone in a five year old! I am urged to battle him by the Carpe Crew, so I jump in and do some breaking of my own and like this we take turns stepping it up until we are both so out of breath (13,000ft) that we flop on the ground together. Feeling really kindred with this boy...I lean over and say...¨oye, bailas super bien. ¿como te llamas amiguito?¨... to which he replies...¨Andy.¨...and my heart melts. Tocayo I say, and he jumps up and leads me on a follow-the-leader freestyle tour of our camp. again exhausted, we flop to the floor. and I invite him to fly. with full trust and joy he lets me fly him all over the place. on my feet. head. shoulders. hands...we have a blast! When the time comes to head on I say goodbye...by tossing him up in the sky...and spend the rest of the day...synchronicity abounding...blissfully high.

From Anna:

There were so many beautiful moments of the trek so it´s difficult to decide. One of the most magical moments for me was finally reaching the highest altitude. I reached the top of a difficult climb, couldn´t breathe and then caught sight of the most amazing glacier. Trekking was an incredible experience. Also, I really like all my pictures - that look fake...

From Austin L:

Hi guys, I´m Austin Maine.

Looking back at the gorgeous valley that we´d just hiked up from the top of Punta Union was one of the most amazing things I´ve ever seen. It felt incredible to see what we´d just done, and there were amazing views in every direction. The pictures that I took can´t capture how beautiful it was - that image is gonna stick with me. Holla.

From Austin N:

My most beautiful moment of the trek was when we were all dying from altitude after climbing for four hours and we came to the archway at the summit. Coming through the arch, we could see the entire valley in front of us and the snowy glaciers behind us. Nothing was more satisfying than standing on top of the 15,500 ft peak and all screaming together at the top of our lungs.

From Catherine:

Mom, Dad, you know that color I´ve been always wanting to paint my room? That bright cyan blue? From the highest peak on our trek there was the most breathtaking lake that was that color. I believe I could spend my entire life in rooms of that hue.

From Claire:

My most memorable moment during the hike was one day when we ate an amazing lunch of chicken and sweet potatoes while to the left of us were amazing snow-capped peaks and to the right was a massive lake with water so clear you could see the bottom from 50 feet away.

From Emma:

My moment was on the fourth day when I´d been walking for four days. It was a really great feeling to just be walking and loving it! I haven´t walked just to walk in awhile and I found out that I miss it. Plus the views that day were of amazing waterfalls and wild horses. It all inspired great, deep thought.

From Jessica:

My best and most memorable moment on the hike were the incredible views!!! And made all the more enjoyable by good health and minimal affects from the altitude!!! (Have you seen the pictures?!? Doesn´t do it justice... and I feel special to have had the opportunity to observe and absorb its immensity and beauty!)

From Jim:

The most beautiful part about the trek was (obviously) Terrance. But the second most beautiful part was the sincerity of our guides: Epi, Javier, Miguel, Walter and Emerson.

From Joe:

Good day everyone,

I am the tall lanky skinny white guy with glasses in all the pictures! The one without the sweet ginger beard. I´m so glad that our group was able to come together as one and decide on doing this super amazing trek of the Cordillera Blanca. Every little aspect of the trip collectively made it an incredible experience. We walked amongst giant snow-capped peaks that towered over us in every direction. We walked through open valleys full of wild horses and the occasional crystal blue glacial lake. From a 360 degree panorama at the top of the ridge on Punta Union (4,750 meters) my eyes witnessed the most spectacular scene. On that clear day you could see just about every mountain throughout the range. My second biggest highlight of the trip was when I would sit down to tea with Terrance in the evenings. Terrance was the strongest and bravest of the mules on our trek and I will miss him dearly. Hi mom and dad!

From Megan:

My most memorable moment during our trek was the moment we sat at our very highest peak at 4,800 meters looking out at all the massive peaks surrounding us. Being able to have a 360 degree view of the Cordillera Blanca pulled the soul from my chest. I felt on top of the world and very much at peace. Although we were all out of breath and had to take each step at a time, I felt more alive than I have this entire trip.

From Mia:

The trek as a whole was really beautiful, but my favorite part of it was when we all hiked up to the summit. We were like 4,700 meters or so high, and we could see all the peaks. The whole group hiked upto a vantage point for a group pic and there were just lots of shenanigans. It also marked the end of the hardest uphill hiking - which I was very glad about. I just can´t even explain the view but hopefully we can get some pics up on the blog. We were so high we all had headaches!

From Natalie:

Of the many incredible views we experienced on our trek, one of my favorites was the glacier we camped beneath on our first night. Waking up to such a sight (once the fog cleared) was unlike anything I have ever seen. The trek was awesome, and - Mom and Dad - my knee didn´t even swell up!

After our fourth day of trekking we returned back to Huaraz to pick up the rest of our stuff. We stayed one last night nearby the beautiful mountains. The next morning we hopped on a bus back to Lima. After eight hours on a bus, we arrived in the biggest city in Peru. We stayed in a true backpackers hostal filled with people from all over the globe. Twas a noisy hostal, but not noisy enough to keep us from sleep.

The morning after, we woke up at the crack of dawn to catch our Halloween flight to Cuzco, Peru. We arrived without problems, despite the uneasiness brought about by watching our pilot manuver between two collosal hills on the outskirts of the valley of Cuzco. We were picked up from the airport by our lovely Spanish teachers from FairPlay, our super cool Spanish school. We were taken to our two homestays and introduced to our host famz for the next two weeks. The thought of being separated into two groups for two whole weeks is a sad, sad thought for all. Really the only times during the week that we have been seeing each other are during passing periods in classes. We are all looking forward to this weekend that we will share together so we can reconnect once again.

After moving in that first day, we went to the school for a Halloween party that was put on by our teachers of both Spanish and salsa. We got to experience some of the local customs. Including a ceremony which involved baptising a baby made of bread, celebrating through dance and then slicing it up for consumption by all. Afterwards, our salsa teachers put on a little show for us. They were fabulous dancers and got us all excited for lessons the following week.

Going into the week, we had to get back on a standard school schedule - we haven´t missed it! The structure of our school includes two hours of grammar and two hours of practical. Grammar is taught typical classroom style. One teacher, two students, one white board. Our teachers really know their stuff and know how to make the classroom fun and interesting. Practical is sort of like taking a field trip around Cuzco for two hours everyday. We really enjoy this! So far we´ve gone to the marketplaces, Plaza de Armas (the main plaza), visited the 12 sided rock (see below), museums, el Cristo Blanco, the laundromat and places with great views of the city. Our teachers are easy to converse with and are great city guides. Both types of classes are very helpful and entertaining.

After mornings spent learning, we get a break to eat and relax at our respective households before returning to FairPlay for spicy salsa lessons. Salsa is also taught with one teacher per two students. This enables us to learn more quicklyer. Writing this now, we are not taking salsa classes anymore. It is fair to say that we are all going to miss our teachers and classes very much. This make us feel like this: :´( but we are equally stoked to begin volunteering with Aldea Yanapay (http://www.aldeayanapay.org/) next week.

Friday we had our orientation at a restaurant that supports the Aldea Yanapay project, where we were able to meet the founder and soul that built Aldea Yanapay from ground up when he was 17; his name is Yuri. We got invited to a party to celebrate at 8 that night, key point: BUFFET! After our final salsa class we had just enough time to get home and change before heading back to the restaurant for a tasty mexican-peruvian fusion style buffet yumyumyumyumyum. Unfortunately, we were only able to stay an hour.

From the restaurant we headed to the discotec where we were able to show off what we had learned the past week in salsa class, as well as watch our teachers blow our minds with many spectacular salsa performances. We got to learn some more moves group style and try those on for size because when in Rome... We were in the club until one in the morning (or twelve for the sleepy slumbersons).

This weekend we are planning an exciting tour of the Sacred Valley and its many Incan ruins. We are oh so very excited to walk the same paths as the Incas did many moons ago.

Mucho Amor,

Jose y Emma

A Picture is Worth a Thousands Words

2010-10-29T16:11:00.000-07:00

Hello all!

This past week we did a 4 day trek through Huascaran National Park in Peru. The highest altitute we reached was 15,500 feet. Although we had some cases of altitude sickness, we all had a great time. The pictures we took can describe how incredible it was better than we ever could with words. We spent the night in Huaraz and caught a bus to Lima in the morning. We spent one night in Lima before catching a plane to Cuzco for 2 weeks of spanish school and homestay family excitement.

We´ve been having some technical difficulties so this is the only picture we can get to load right now. Stay tuned!

Anna and Mia

Last Week in Ecuador

2010-10-23T15:56:00.000-07:00

Hi Everybody,

We last left off in Otavalo and so much has happened since then. Last time we blogged we were about to go to Cuicoche (thats how you actually spell it) a crater lake right outside of Otavalo. To hike around the whole thing it takes a number of hours so we only hiked a portion of it to get spectacular views. After hiking for an hour or so we had delicious sandwiches and jumped back into the bus to go to hotsprings. Though the water made everybody´s bug bites super itchy and also caused many people´s skin to peel it was very relaxing.

That night we celebrated Claire´s 21st birthday. We went to a pizzeria and suprised her with a cake and some cinnamon. The cake was delicious and although it was hard to not be home for her birthday we all had fun together. Sunday was her actual birthday so we suprised her in the morning with handcrafted journal paper birthday cards. Its the thought that counts.

After a delicious breakfast at the hostal we left Otavalo for Intag where we spent the last week. We lived again with families in San Antonio de Pucara, a village within the region of Intag. The community greeted us with a number of song and dance presentations and also forced us to participate in some embarassing games. It was a great way to start our time there. We also met Peter who led our reforestation projects with an organization called Canopy Co. He is originally from the US but lives in Pucara working to help the community. We were all split into pairs for our homestays (the three boys were together) and all of our families were incredibly nice. The homestays weren´t as luxurious as Cuenca but they weren´t quite as rural as Agualongo.

Monday we participated in a minga with the community. A minga is a community project. Generally they pick one day when everybody works together on a certain project. We worked with many members of the community to plant a thousand trees to help reforest land in their region that had previously been used for pasture. We didn´t really know what we were getting into but we all packed our backpacks with little baby trees and hiked forty minutes aka an hour and a half up in the forest. It was hard work but very important. We didn´t reach our goal of a thousand but we planted around six hundred trees.

Tuesday we woke up early to hike down to the river. We borrowed canastas (woven basket backpacks) from our families and collected plants. After we had collected enough plants we took them all back to Peter´s farm to bag them for later use in reforestation projects. Later in the afternoon we participated in a soccer game with some of the kids from the community and practiced our acroyoga and handstands. Then we got to spend some quality time with our homestay families.

On Wednesday we went to Peter´s farm again to finish bagging and planting some trees. A portion of our group slaved away on the side of a mountain for hours digging holes, avoiding giant poisonous spiders and planting trees. Although it was very difficult, the trees we planted offset the carbon that we used to fly from LA to Quito and back. That afternoon we ate another wonderful lunch at Peter´s house with a group of highschool students visiting from Atlanta. We also got a tour of Peter´s farm and learned about Permaculture and organic farming. That evening we had a despedida (farewell) with the community with more singing and dancing. We even prepared a song to the tune of ¨Wonderwall¨ by Oasis.

Thursday we left Pucara early in the morning. We couldn´t believe how quickly our time had passed and we were all very sad to leave our host families. Peter took us on some tours of local farms and we learned all about fair trade coffee. After lunch we hiked down the face of the Inca it was a really steep trail and many of us fell multiple times. It is called the face of the Inca because when you look at it from the opposite side you can see a face in the mountainside. That night we stayed in a hostal near some hotsprings.

Friday morning we took a tour of a forest reserve and got our last views of the Ecuadorian country before heading back to Otavalo to catch our bus to Quito. We spent last night in Quito and we got a taste of the city today. In the morning we went to Shungoloma which means heart of the earth in Kichwa. It was a small museum that represented many facets that make up the orientation and importance of Ecuador in the world including the mountain ranges as the heart of the world and the rainforest as the lungs. After that we headed the the old part of the city and visited an amazing basilica along with other important sites. We had a delicious lunch for $1.50 and also stopped at an amazing ice cream place. In the afternoon many of us went to the Guayasamin museum.

The next moring we had to leave our hostal at 5AM to catch a flight to Lima, Peru. After landing in Peru we took an eight hour bus ride to Huaraz where we will begin our week of free travel. The group has organized a four day trek. We are all so excited to be in Peru and we will update you when we finish the trek!

Thanks for Everything Agualongo!

2010-10-16T07:32:00.000-07:00

Hi Everybody,

Greetings from your new bloggers, Mia and Anna. Be prepared for the best blogs ever.

Our second week in Agualongo was easier and went by so quickly. We all became more comfortable with our families and grew to love the community. The groups switched and everybody had new roles in the clinic and spanish classes.

Our weekend in Agualongo was very interesting. There was a wedding in the community so there was lots of celebrating. We all attended the wedding fiesta on Sunday and many of the girls got to dress in indigenous clothing. We learned about local wedding traditions including a face washing ceremony. The bride a groom and several other family members partake in a face washing with flower and stinging nettle water. At the end they threw the water at the crowds watching- one poor little girl got soaked. There was a lot of eating and some dancing which most everybody enjoyed. Some of us were even brave enough to try cuy- a local delicacy also known as guinea pig.

One of our afternoons was spent at a Tandana volunteer´s host family´s house. Lauren´s host dad is a shaman and we got to learn all about some plants he uses and what he does. He taught us that being a shaman is something you inherit from your family and is a life long learning process. He also told us about the responsibilities of being a shaman. There are some people who abuse the knowledge of the powers of the plants. Even though there is more money in the evil, he stressed the importance of using his knowledge to heal and help. We got to see his healing den and it was incredible.

Another afternoon was spent visiting Master Weaver Miguel Andrango. He taught us the process of turning sheep´s wool into thread and showed us the natural dyes he uses. He demonstrated the backstrap loom weaving that is common in the Andes. He told us that the piece he was working on would take him a minimum of three weeks working seven hour days. Needless to say, his work was amazing. We looked around a shop and he ended up gifting us a few of his treasures. Fun fact: his wife was on the cover of the 1989 edition of the Lonely Planet Guide to Ecuador.

On Thursday afternoon we went to Jessica´s host family´s house in Agualongo and made bread. We had to mix HUGE buckets of dough and had fun making bread of many different shapes. We discovered that some shapes worked much better than others. We have never seen that much bread in one place in my life. We cooked the bread in the new oven they made for the community. It was made out of bricks and mud. After everybody had filled up on bread, we went to Mia´s host family´s house for a goodbye dinner of corn soup with cuy and mote (not mota which was a typo in an earlier blog, do not worry we were not eating bowls of mota).

For our goodbye on Friday the community had a despedida. We had a big lunch (more cuy) and then put on a long performance to thank the community. We wrote a rap for them- lyrics to be posted at a later date. We also wrote them a short speech, sang them ¨The General¨ by Dispatch accompanied by Austin (boy) on the guitar and the health song in Kichwa. They really appreciated us coming and made some speeches themselves. Vicente, Tandana´s local coordinater, played the harmonica and guitar for everybody. It was really sad to say goodbye but we all got so much out of the experience and formed amazing relationships with the community. We´ll never forget it!

As sad as it was to say goodbye we´re looking forward to our next adventure. We spent last night in Otavalo and today we are going on a hike at Cuichoa a crater lake followed by a trip to the hotsprings which we´re all looking forward to. Next week we´re heading to Intag to live with families and do some reforestation work. We won´t have much internet access but we´ll update you as soon as we do!

Your new favorite bloggers,

Mia and Anna

First Week in Agualongo

2010-10-09T12:00:00.000-07:00

Hola Todos,

We have been in a small Andean, rural community for the past week, each in our own homestay families. Living conditions have been intense but varied. We´ve all learned to appreciate comfort and convenience which we experience at home. However, it is an incredible experience regardless-there is no better way to learn about a language and culture than living with the families and in their reality.Our living conditions have been unlike anything we have ever experienced before. We are sleeping on woven mats with an alpaca blanket on the dirt or cemenet floors of our families houses. The nights can get quite chilly, so it has definitly taken some getting used to. The concept of privacy is also much different here. Most of us are sleeping in a room with the rest of our family members, so needless to say, we are all quite bonded for better or worst.

For the two weeks we are here we are split into two groups for the days activities. Lucky for you, your two bloggers can represent both of these groups...Firstly, I, Megan, have been a part of the volunteer medical clinic group which is run through an amazing organization called the Tandana Foundation (http://www.tandanafoundation.org/). This has been a great, hands on way to help the local people of the Andes access healthcare...which actually travels to them rather than forcing them to get to a city for attention. Each member of the clinic group has had a job this week including: doctor´s assistant (Joe and Anna), dentist´s assistant (yours truly), vitals takers (Natalie and Austin L) and pharmacy (Catherine).

This can be quite the task when you are getting questions in spanish from all sides. Our days begin around 9-930 and end between 1-3 depending on the need of the community. We usually see about 25-40 patients and help them to the best of our ability and our resources. It has also been a treat to work closely with Anna, the founder of Tandana, who is inspiring in her work in Ecuador as well as her ability to work with many different cultures. Now i´ll pass the torch to Austin (girl)...

¡Hola! After another week of intense spanish lessons, I think we are all feeling much more confident and capable of communicating with our host families. Monday through Friday Emma, Mia, Claire, Jim, Jessica, and I (Austin) spent four hours every morning paired with one other student and our spanish tutor. The teachers were great and were even nice enough to travel from the city for us. It was also an experience to be taking classes in the local daycare center. We were constantly amused by the children´s antics, although we were ocasionally scared for their and our safety. After a week of witnessing children excaping over the fence, playing with machetes and flaming sticks, and torturing puppies (all done without pants), we all have a new found respect for the daycare ladies.

Afternoons were either spent with the group playing games and reconnecting or doing activites with Tandana. At 4 PM each day it was always nice to reunite with our other half. One evening we spent (again split) half in a Kichwa lesson and the other half in an Ecuadorian cooking class, which led to a wonderous feast. We consumed diligently seasoned steak, potato balls with cheese, mota (look it up), tomato salad, chamomile tea and a delicious raisin cake wrapped and steamed in a palm leaf. It was nice to spend sometime with the other Tandana volunteers by the fire as well. Kichwa is the locally spoken idiom here and most of our host parents learn spanish as a second language, so they really appreciate our effort to learn their native tongue. Here´s a taste...to say thank you in kichwa you can either say ¨dios le pague¨(god pays you) shortened to ¨pagui¨ or just ¨pai¨. Another afternoon some of the group members participated in a futbol game with the local children near the community center, which was heated to say the least. Many of the kids playing were members of our host families.

We drafted new group agreements:

1) No exclusive (especially sexual) relationships in the next two weeks.
2) Be on time, and that means ready to go!
3) No cliques: Carpe oppurtunities to connect one-on-one with everyone (turkey burger time).
4) Thou shalt check thyself prior to wrecking thyself: if you can´t say it to their face, don´t say it at all.
5) Participate to your honest, full potential.
6) Carpe present; stay diem

BE KIND, SHOW APPRECIATION!

In the beginning of the trip we drafted group agreements, and this is our revised version for the coming weeks.

After this week, we´ll spend the weekend in Otavalo and possibly do some hiking in the Andes. Sunday, we are off to the valley, cloud forest of Intag. We will update you more on what is in store there later on.

Hasta Luego,

much love,

Austin girl and Megan

Arrival in Otovalo

2010-10-03T08:04:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,

Quick update. After an 11 hour bus ride, we have arrived safely in Otovalo. We are about 1 hour north of the capital, Quito. We arrived at about 6:30 and had an hour to kill before breakfast at a friendly hostel called La Valle de Amanecer (Valley of the Dawn). We then took a little walk around a local artisans market, which had plentiful amounts of alpaca goods. It was difficult not to buy everything we got our hands on.

We are meeting a representative from Tandana Foundation at 11 AM for orientation and then we´ll be off to meet our individual host families for the next two weeks. We´ve been told this homestay will be very rural and the most rugged we´ve experienced thus far. We´ll be spending these next two weeks split into two groups in the morning, one at spanish school and the other volunteering with a community health project. In the afternoons the group will be together for various activities.

Although Cuenca will be missed, it is exciting to be in new scenery and be immersed in a different Ecuadorian culture. Hopefully we will have computer access again soon to let you know how our homestays are going.

Much love,

Megan and Austin girl

Cuenca

2010-10-01T15:40:00.000-07:00

Hola Los Extranejeros

We have been in Cuenca, a colonial city in the south of the Ecuadorian Andes, for 5 days and have learned absurd amounts of glorious Español. Our mornings have consisted of 5 hours of one-on-one Spanish study with afternoons of various group activies including but not limited to: a city tour, Salsa lessons, a guided visit through a museum with a historical and present representation of different regions and peoples of Ecuador, a cancelled cooking class due to the strikes (more on that later) and getting to know the history-rich Cuenca.

Us girls have been paired up in homestays around Cuenca while the boys have been in their own. This has been a great oppurtunity to speak spanish and experience the lives of local Cuencans. Lunches are the heaviest meal here with at least two courses. Dinners are much lighter and sometimes do not occur at all. It´s okay though, we´re strong (besides Joe who gets spoiled for his endless stomach capacity).

In other news...As you all have heard, during our time here in Cuenca, there was a bit of unrest. During our morning snack break yesterday, we got the news that the police of Ecuador were going on strike due to a cut in their bonuses by President Correa. We were assured that strikes are a common occurance here; however, this is the first occasion that the police have done this. In Quito, things were violent. Here it only consisted of police and their families driving around the city with sirens causing things to go a bit slower than usual (as they tend to be slow already). Today it seems to have completely calmed down in Cuenca besides the military suits paroling the streets with unnecessary riot gear.

Today we travelled into the Cajas National Park. This park is incredibly beautiful partly because of the 235 lakes within it. We think this must be one of the most high density lake populations in the world in one area in the world. We were accompanied by our trusty guide, Pablo, who rightfully explained the beauties which surrounded us. We went for a 2 hour+ hike through these beautiful mountains of the Andes. The 13,000 foot altitude started affecting us slightly, all our hearts were racing, but we took slow. We got back to the city just in time for lunch with our host families and then finally an afternoon to explore the city for all its extravagence.

Tonight we are getting together to put our new-found salsa skillz to the test at a local salsa club...wish us luck!

Tomorrow we have a full day of rock climbing followed by an overnight bus to Otovalo in the north (back the northern hemisphere for two weeks!) It´s 13 hours so hopefully we´ll make it fun, as we always do. Hope you all are doing fabulously back in the US of A and not missing us too much but know we miss you!

besos y brazos a todos

chau,

Yo fav bloggers

Megan y Austin girl

Updates from South America

2010-10-01T11:48:00.001-07:00

Dear family and friends,

Another update from the Carpe home office - we've been in touch with the group and wanted to let you all know their plans over the next few days. The situation on the ground in Cuenca has been calm. While the group has been taking precautions, they haven't felt at all unsafe where they are. They are planning on doing some hiking on Friday in Cajas National Park, going rock climbing on Saturday morning, and then packing up and heading north on Saturday night. They have been in touch with numerous people in Quito and all our contacts there have confirmed that roads are open and safe. While the group will be passing through Quito on their way up to Otavalo, they will only be stopping there to switch buses. Our contacts have assured us that buses are still running on schedule and all the bus terminals are open. Know that the group is well and they are looking forward to moving up to Otavalo for the next couple weeks of volunteering and language school. Once they arrive and settle in to Otavalo, they will post a blog with their updates.

All the best,

Heather Diamond

Carpe Diem Latitudes Director

Dear parents

2010-09-30T21:43:00.000-07:00

This blog is coming to you from the Carpe Diem Home Office. We want to assure you that we are monitoring closely the 'coup' situation that is taking place currently in the northern capital city of Quito. The group is well where they are in Cuenca, which is far away from any trouble and Cuenca hasn't, in fact, felt or experienced any of the consequences from Quito.

This type of civil unrest is sadly par for the course and in the developing world has a way of - quickly and without malice - settling back to the norm. Of course, it's our protocol to have an open line of communication with the leaders just to stay aware of circumstances, but for now we're going to listen to the media and determine how long to wait until this particular storm passes.

Again, I want to emphasize that the 'coup' is, according to most news sources, not a nationwide issue. In fact, most news sources are downplaying any safety issues and the fact that State Department Notices have referred to these events as a "strike by police units and some military" clearly lead me to believe this is a fairly transitory civil issue but one we'll nonetheless continue to diligently monitor.

Stay tuned for more,

Ethan Knight,

Exec. Director

Rio Muchacho- First week

2010-09-25T09:15:00.000-07:00

Hey family and friends,
It´s your bloggers for the week, Claire and Natalie. We are here in Canoa, after a busy week at the organic farm Rio Muchacho. All week we woke up for farm activities at 5:30 am! We fed horses, pigs, chickens, and guinea pigs, watered plants, flowers and vegetables, cleaned up animal manure...and helped make breakfast with the senoras in the kitchen! Some of our other afternoon chores included dishes, weeding, irrigation trench digging and filling, planting, watering, etc. Although we had our hands full at the farm, we had an amazing time. Other than work, we learned about organic farming, composting, and living sustainably. Everything on the farm is 100% organic and renewable. There is no trash, and even our poop was composted to feed the plants around us, crazy we know, but its amazing how little a foot print we can make on the earth by living this way. We left with a ton of new knowledge and life lessons, not to forget how AMAZING the food was and how incredible it was to see it from in the soil to on our plates! Thank you so much to Nicole and Dario for having us and sharing with us their beautiful way of life.

Other afternoon activies on the farm included:
A visit to the local school funded by the farm,
Horseback riding,
Arts and Crafts,
Tours of the farm,
Classes on sustainability and organic farming,

Climbing and hiking,

Natural mud face masks,
Chocolate and cheese making,
Camp fire sing-a-long,
and enjoying the beautiful wildlife.

As part of our thank you and farewell to Rio Muchacho, we wrote our own lyrics to "Ain´t No Moutain High Enough":

"We remember the day, not too long ago
When we first arrived at Rio Muchacho
From that day on, we made a vow
It would only be organic someway somehow

Cause baby there aint no weed thats strong enough
ain´t no ditch thats deep enough
ain´t no chanchos that stinks enough
to keep me from growing organic

Oh no darlin
No wind, no rain,
no winter storm can stop me baby
oh no babyyyy

Cause if your plants are in trouble, check the moon on the double
just send for benjamin

the seed is alive, way down in the soil
and juanita´s got that soup on boil

if you ever need a helping hand,
we´ll be there on the double,
JUST CALL CARPE DIEM!!

cause baby there".....repeat chorus

pictures

2010-09-18T13:57:00.000-07:00

we are also working on getting some pictures up. we are encountering some difficulties, but eventually (hopefully) they will be up at http://photobucket.com/samcarpediem

Team JAM checking in

2010-09-18T13:09:00.001-07:00

Hey everyone! We made it to the blog WAHOO! Carpediem is da bomb. Scavenger hunt is going well, we only have a few more things to complete and we are done! Tomorrow we will leave for Rio Muchacho to stay on the organic farm. WE ARE SUPER PUMPED :D We have been staying at Siandana, a simple farm/resort/hostel/awesome place with lots of animals. There is a box of puppies that are 2 weeks old and literally SO cute, 20 peacocks running around wild (they especially love to jump up and run around on the roofs), 1 albino peacock and 1 albino bunny, 1 very loud donkey, some horses, ahout 100 impossible to see anywhere else rare species of birds , multiple ponds with fish, a pig, some goats, parrots, and our friend Mcgiver the SLOTH that espcially loves to hang out and move VERY SLOWLY around the kitchen area. so pretty much there are a ton of animals and good vibes and smiles :)
xoxo Jim, Austin N, and Megan

A brief session of blogging with Joe and Emma.

2010-09-18T12:22:00.000-07:00

Hello everybody back home!

To get to Bahia de Caraquez (where we are now) we had to ride in a super crowded bus (Claire is to the right of Anna, not pictured) for six hours. It fostered some bonding that is for sure! Especially after the van broke down and our driver Miguel had to bang on it with a rock and somehow made it move again. Magic! Today is our first day in the actual city of Bahia de Caraquez (instead of just on the outskirts at a super nice spa) and we´re just livin it up. We had a delicious lunch right off the beach of Bahia consisting of Shrimp Ceviche, Arroz con pollo, and this interesting cotton candy bubblegum flavored soda. We´ll be leaving back to the resort pretty soon so adios familia y amigos!

Joe y Emma

Anna and Natalie's picture

2010-09-18T12:09:00.000-07:00

We tried to upload this before, but had no luck. This is a picture of our tour of Saianda.

Anna and Natalie´s super post!

2010-09-18T11:22:00.000-07:00

!Hola! We just finished arroz con pollo at a local restaurant in Bahia de Caraquez. We have a long list of items to scavenger. Yesterday we had a lovely tour of Saianda. There were tons of animals to see, especially the loud donkey who lives outside our room. We are enjoying our orientation and getting to know each other. Time to continue our scavenger hunt. Does anyone know why Bahia is considered a "green" city?

Catherine and Austin´s First Post :)

2010-09-18T11:05:00.000-07:00

Hola,

Currently on a scavenger hunt. Already found the banco y hostal y clinico. Awaiting us at the retreat we have many animal friends including puppies, a white peacock, donkey, and a sloth named macgyver.

Having a great time, off to get some food.

Claire y Mia Segura y Feliz en Bahia de Caraquez

2010-09-18T10:58:00.000-07:00

Hola padres y amigos,
Somos en la ciudad de Bahia de Caraquez por este tarde para una scavenger hunt. Somos muy emocionada y feliz de los dos dias pasado y muy emocionada por los meses en el futuro. Nuestro español no es muy buena, pero estamos tratando. Saianda es muy bonita y las personas alli han sido tan bueno. no podemos mostrar nuestras fotos, pero los otros estudiantes mostraran ustedes fotos. hasta luego!
- Claire y Mia

Hasta Pronto--Sud America!

2010-09-15T23:21:00.000-07:00

The entire SAM group has gathered effortlessly, and is now through security and on their way to the earthy realm of Ecuador where they will meet their final group member, Megan, in Bahia de Caraquez. Go Team SAM!

Look for more from the group itself in a couple of days!

Jessica and Andy prepare from Portland!

2010-09-07T14:21:00.000-07:00

Dear Emma, Megan, Austin, Austin, Joe, Jim, Catherine, Claire, Mia, David, Anna, and Natalie!

Saludos! Buenos dias amigos! Esperemos que ustedes esten emocionados por nuestro viaje. Ready to fly with the help of some great leaders and an awesome student group? Either way, we are here to support you.

We have spoken to most of you by now. It was a pleasure to hear your voices, know a little more about you, and answer some of your questions. If you have not talked with us yet, please check your messages and call us on our cell phone as soon as possible! Not only will we go over a check list of details you should know, but also we will give you the meeting time and place at LAX.

This is our travel blog where all of our friends and family back home can keep up with our adventures. Each week one of you will be our official "blogger" and will get to write our travel tales for our dedicated followers around the globe. We encourage you to peruse past blogs to get an idea of what they might look like. Also, please inform your family and friends of this site, so they will know what an amazing and authentic experience we are having.

We hope you have been enjoying your summer. We encourage you to take advantage of your favorite treats from home before starting our South American adventures. (Jessica always misses sus dos gatitos) We are very excited to meet you and thrilled to discover what lessons lay ahead!!!

Ciao!

Andy and Jessica

Our journey comes to a close... except for Claire.

2010-05-16T16:22:00.000-07:00

Holy Salt!

We boarded a night bus bound for Uyuni listo para nuestro horah final. 7pm to 1am was ok, we slept somewhat. However, come one o´clock the lights burst on, blinding us out of our slumbers, for the bus had stopped for a bathroom break. The toilets were worse than usual.... One in particular had a sloaping ceiling that forced Jandro to pee in the upward dog position, while standing. Were talking 45 degree angle... Impressive no? Thank god for the yoga practice. Anyway, emerging victorious we hopped back on the bus, expecting more of the same smooth sailing. We were wrong.... What had been our nice road turned into a hobbling road from hell. It certainly helped that the bus lacked shocks.... We arrived at 6am to a freezing, desolate town apparently called Uyuni, our tour guide nowhere in sight. We wandered, cold and confused for some time. But then, by some miracle, an angel descended down from the heavens and offered her guidance.. ¨Esmeralda tours?¨We are found!!! By 10am we were in our jeep bound for the TRAIN GRAVEYARD, our first stop of the tour. We were joined by three European folk. One Frenchman (living in Mexico?), and two Belgians. It turned out to be quite the group. The TRAIN GRAVEYARD turned into a train playground for Jordi and his fascination with sepia photos (TRAINS!!!!). Alejandro drew, we dont know what Claire was doing. It was glorious.

On we went. The salt flats slowly emerged, like a mirage in the desert. But no, they were real! Claire could not contain herself, excited beyond all recognition, as we pulled up to the first salt mountains, measuring a breath taking 2000 mm. Jordi, the mountain man, was the first ascent. Despite the high altitude, we eventually all summited neighboring mountains, happy to be on top of the world... Delving deeper, the albus sea slowly surrounded us on all sides, as well as the other plethera of gringoes seeking the same wacky photos suitable for facebook.

As amazing and astounding as it was, it was, unfortunately, short lived, as we snapped our last photos and zoomed off into the impending desert. The back seat of the jeep (occupied by Claire and Jordi) was about 2 times worse than our previous bus ride, though this time, it would last for three days straight. Our stomachs felt it. We ended the day running with llamas, and taking llama pictures, and doing llama things. Jordi deftly avoided being spit upon, and resisted the urge to take revenge. Then we fell asleep. It was cold.

DAY 2!!!!! It was cold, it was windy, we saw lots of strange colored lagunas, a 7 colored mountain, and some flamingoes? Questionable....

DAY 3!!! Did not go as planned. We woke up at 5:00am, as we were told, only to find our guide and our jeep MIA. No problem? BIG PROBLEM. 7:00am, still no signs. WTF? We found small comfort in the fact that another group had lost their guide as well. How curious. Then, emerging out of the rising sun, a trail of dust. We are saved! Our rescuers have arrived! Our heroes! They parked, and stumbled out of the car, and headed straight for the bathrooms without a word¨(one of them may have peed his pants). The ones foolish enough to face our questions were like meat on a rotisary, grilled by questions. Glassy eyed, a little unstable, smelling curiously of beer and coca leaves, they gave us their excuse and rolled out a flat tire out of the back seat. We didnt buy it. Our guide offered us a rather astounding deal, he would give us our money back, cancelling our tour, leaving us to die a cold death in the middle of the desert. Or continue on, happy, and not tell the tour agency. We were in a bit of a pickle. He wouldnt let anyone else drive, so we made the only decision we could, and let him drive with all of us watching him like hawks. Our concerns ran wild, missing our bus, missing our plane home, and also just dying a cold death. To all of our surprise, he drove surprisingly well, drifting on snow patches, and dodging geizers. We eventually arrived at our breakfast spot, dropping off the Belgians who were escaping to Chile, leaving us with just the Frenchman, and Franz, our tipsy driver. With the luck of Azlan (ask Claire) on our side, we made it back to Uyuni in one piece with plenty of time to spare. We grabbed some eats, watched Final Destination, and boarded the bus, looking forward to our road of death back to La Paz. As before, we were woke at 1:00am, and after that, we were smooth sailing once again......... Alejandro enjoyed the ride immensly, sleeping with an Australian girl...... to his left. He didnt even say goodbye...

And that takes us to today, a free day in La Paz. We bought some stuff, ate some stuff, and enjoyed some hot showers, except for Claire, who demanded being first, and suffered the cold consequences.

And now we look ahead, the flight, arriving home, remembering it all. As Amanda said, the challenge starts here, upon our return, travelling was the easy part. What a long, strange journey it has been.

Gobble gobble bitch.

Over and out,
your faithful bloggers,

Claire, Alejandro, y Jordi.

-Long live SAM 2010-

The Stragglers Brigade

2010-05-12T11:35:00.001-07:00

And the journey continues... across borders. BOLIVIA!!

But first, we had to attend to our patient, Diegito, a sick young pup. Left pale and skeletal in the airport, the Diego missed his flight with the rest of the group on their departure to the Estatos. It was not a pretty sight, the tears that put Niagra Falls to shame, left us wandering the streets of Cusco like blinded dogs, lost and broken. However after a cookie, we broke out the beers!! Just kidding, but seriously, it was forced down our throats by Amanda. Bitter sweet freedom. Our party continued alongside Diegito´s hospital bed. He had amoebas, and we cheersed to that! Alas, that night was time to say goodbye forrealsies, as we hugged his lifeless corpse one last time. For now. (He´s good btw, no worries).

And with another day free in Cusco, we had to pamper ourselves, just a bit. Full body massage. Nuff said. Complete with oil and naked bodies, kindof. Jordi and Jandro, a room to themselves. Sweet Jesus Levy. Still somehow Jordi managed to injure himself during the massage, he doesn´t want to talk about it. Damn knee. And as Amandita, the wonderful, darling person that we love, promised, we went out for a fine supper at the dopest, sickest, most adorable, cuddly restaurant we had ever seen. Hannah would have loved it. Seriously, there were fairytails on our menu and stuffed animals as our seat companions. Our only complaint was that the chefs cut too many onions, as we were not expecting such a sneak attack, sitting amoungst the rafters in a stuffy room. And so our third bought of tears ensued. At least we could pretend we were crying for the group, right? We miss you guys. We´re more group sick than home sick right now. CARPE CARPE Ca r p.....

BOLIVIA!!!! A goodbye to Amanda and a hello to a 14 hour bus ride straight through the night. Alejandro was cold. The bus provided blankets to everyone except him. They were necessary for survival. It was only a bit colder than when Eli almost froze to death in the waterfall in Bosque Nublados.. And then, the crossing....... There are legends of travellers not making... THE CROSSING, never to be seen or heard from again. We went in with our swords drawn and our stomachs in or throats, the real AMERICAN way for, THE CROSSING. There was a bridge and there was a man with ginourmous earlobes beckoning us into a dark room, we feared the worst. But $135 later, a few smiles, and a few laughs we prevailed, as it really wasnt bad at all. Like at all. A two year old could have done it.... For us, it was back on the bus with our visas secured (just stupid stickers), making the home stretch to LA PAZ.

Upon our arrival, Jordi was not doing so hot, slowly fading into Diego´s shadow. We lay him in bed (hostal Austria, beds suck) equipped with his sleeping bag and some Cipro and hoped for the best... Long story short, Jordi could walk in the morning (progress) as we ventured out into the streets of La Paz, trying to figure out what we were going to do with our time here. No Amazon trip (shitty) , but we looked forward to the Salt flats. Instead, we returned back to Lago Tits (thanks Jordan and Zoe), taking a two day trip out to the cozy, yet gringo infested town of Copacabana. We ate some food (Alejandro´s efforts would make Patricio and Andres proud), climbed some rocks (sketchy), speed dated La Isla del Sol (seriously for 1.5 hours, but still way cool), and found ourselves back in La Paz, where we are now. We spent the night last night enjoying German cuisine, and slept bellies up. Today, we are checking out La Paz before catching another night bus to Uyuni at 7 tonight. SALT FLATS HERE WE COME! Oh yea, Claire is having a good time too.

Miss you guys mucho!

-The Three Muskateers
(Claire, Alejandro, y Jordi)

Ultimito Dia (We still dont know how to spell in Spanish)

2010-05-04T08:27:00.000-07:00

Over the past two weeks we have partaken in many activities. We spent three days at a wonderful yoga retreat eating gourmet vegetarian food, and learning to bend our bodies in questionable ways. We also learned about making energy balls through Reiki, about crazy things called chakras, and Vedic Astrology (your star signs are not what you think they are). Last but not least we spent 5 grueling days hiking through the heart of the Sacred Valley, ending at the Eyebrow of the Jungle (it was not blonde like Elis eyebrow after a battle with peroxide), MACHU PICCHU DUN DUN DUN!!!!!!!!! The food was great, the hiking wasn't too bad, and our asses all look fresh to death. We would tell you a lot more about it, but we figured we wouldn't have enough to talk about with family and friends once we get home (48 hours countdown).You will have to wait for all the crazy Pichu stories. So because we suck at writing and want to spend our final day in the fantastic ciudad of Cusco buying a bunch of swill for the amigos back home, we will let everyones Haikus do the emotional talking (Si we wrote Haikus). Guess whose is whoms (questionable grammar.... we are just really emotional cough Ms J Hollywood cough Ms J Hollywood) So HERRRRRREEEEE WE GOOOO!!!!!

jump for Joy we say
life is a dance, you dancer
thank you for the beat

we subir mountains
we can hablar espanol
we Carpe Diem

I once was afraid
ahora that is not true
Confident I stand

haiku battles end
mos def will cry tomorrow
we are Samtastic

this sucks balls and I
don't want to go back because
changing is a bitch

we eat lots of tasty
yum yum yum yum yum yum yum
emoliente

yeah, Pachu Mama!
your spirit grooves us alive,
warm alpaca hug

Sam te extrano
disfrutamos todo juntos
amar, Suerte, Paz

put your thumb out now
lets hitchhike across amer.
life is beautiful

A journey afar
new amigos new ventures
what a life we live

what a long strange trip
wait I'm definitely not
Jerry Garcia

This has been an amazing journey. We couldn't have asked for a better group or better times. Thank you universe we have no complaints whatsoever. Take care thanks for reading!

Love your ultimito bloggers,
Andres y Elisio

P.S. There will be updates from those continuing on in South America sans group. (Jordi, Claire, Alejandro)

Horses, Biking, Weaving..... Oh My!

2010-04-23T15:04:00.000-07:00

Previously on 24.....

Titikaka, shamans, and a few long bus rides to Cuzco, our story continues.

Snap! Crash! Our first hostel in Cuzco was shotty to say the least. Within 5 minutes of inhabiting our inhabitance, a bed was broken, and brain cells were being killed with wet paint still on the walls. Yet, in the morning, we were still alive and kicking.

Like every other big city, Diegito and Amandita had arranged an adrenaline pumping scavenger hunt for the group. This time however, instead of pairs or triples, we found ourselves with only our own shoulder to lean on, alone in a big city. Fear not followers, no harm came to us, only a few embarrasing stories, some sun burns, an untied shoelace, and a broken camera. Equipped with only directions for our scavenges (all in spanish) and a map, we were off to the races. Participants had to visit Qorikancha (Incan Ruins in the city), La Catedral (one of the first built in South America), a crazy art gallery called The Fractal Dragon, and The Incan Museum. The competition was fierce, often times resulting in blood shed... Just kidding, but seriously. We reconvened sweaty, tired, battered, and bloody at our final meeting point, our answers and maps held above our heads like trophies. As a reward for our efforts, we were treated to a powerful documentary titled ¨Mi Chacra¨ produced by an up and coming American filmmaker named Jason Burlage. Our next adventure took us to the smelly pastures of horses, where we were set to gallop across the lush green plains of Peru. The travels provided beautiful views of the city and of an ancient Incan temple. Semi-sore, we walked back to the city, passing a magnificent massive marble sculpture of Jesus. Our return journey took us through many markets, a couple alleys, and across several plazas, leaving us with enough energy to chow down some din din and pass out on our ridiculously comfortable beds. Seriously, they are magical.

As it turned out, we needed all the rest we could get for our scheduled bike tour, high up in the mountains the next day. The bikes were nice, as promised, they even had helmets and bathero bike gloves! Some bikes were white, some red, others black, yet all with enough gears to cover any terrain. What started off as a leisurly ride over rolling hills soon changed to a battle for the yellow jersey. A photo finish brought us to our first checkpoint, the Moray Ruins, roughly an hour outside of Cuzco. Unlike other ruins, Moray has the appearence of a stadium, with many tiers. Despite its appearence, it was actually used as a mad science lab, of sorts, for the Incans. It was said to have contained 21 micro climates, used to plant different vegetables at different altitudes to see what grew best where. They were clever. Unfortunately, what goes down, must come back up, as our thighs groaned after an intense ride. We huffed, and we puffed, and we made it out, thankfully without blowing down any ruins. Alas, it was time to get back on the bike, for our day had just begun. Out of the blue, our terrain quickly transformed from nice, paved dirt roads passing grassy fields to cliff hugging, rock filled, hair pin turning, stream jumping, steep as hell trails of death. Mind you, our tour agency had assured us that the ride was ¨comfortable,¨ not ride home in an ambulence worthy. However, like always, our group fought through valiently and soon we were snacking on delicious lunches in the shade. After what seemed like 5 minutes of rest, we found ourselves back on our bikes, skidding around dusty corners, and scraping knees. Not a moment too soon, we came to a halt at the Salineras, or the amazing salt mines of Peru. Again, time was short, however, that did not stop us from snapping some great photos and eating some salt. Our last stretch of our treacherous terrain was easily the worst, with tires narrowly dodging enormous boulders, eroded tracks, and failing brakes. Finally, we made it, tallying a 7 hour day of epic proportions. To be precise, we slept well that night.

Going from one extreme to the other, today´s activities brought us to the indoors, where we learned how to weave and spin yarn. Talk about a 180. But, the experience had tremendous value, as we all learned how impressive all of these woven works of art really are. Pacience was definitely put to the test, but left feeling accomplished with our new belts around our waists. Tomorrow, we head for our long awaited yoga retreat, and soon after to Machu Pichu.

So long, and thanks for the fish!

-Abercrombie and J Crew (Patrick and Jordi)

The Bellybutton of Sweet Pacha Mama

2010-04-19T15:37:00.000-07:00

Greetings faithful readers,

¨Jumping for Joy at The Door of Wisdom¨

On our last episode, we had just finished shreding the sandy slopes before heading up to altitude. We got into Puno around 8:01 pm, found some grub, and hit the sack. Sleeping proved a wee bit dificult for some, as Puno sits at about 11,000 ft, especially mixed with the chilly weather. What happened next, we knew not. We crawled out of bed around eight, for we had scheduled a meeting with a shaman named Raul. He stands about 5´7¨. His pony tail extends down to mid back, with a kind face. After the first greeting, he would flash his trademark smile, one worthy of postcards across the globe. An hour van/bus ride later, we arrived at the sacred, or so he said, Pink Mountains. Not too sure of the name choice, the mountains had a pinkish tinge, but nothing flamingo-like. What transpired after this can really not be described adequately with words, for the experience spoke for itself. However, we will do our best to provide a highlight reel for your curious imaginations. It began with an offering of some sweetly scented oils combined with some coca leaves as an effort to please the powers that be. We then trotted (carefully) down the spine of a giant (rock) snake, taking us to a mystical land. It was nothing Narnia-like, but it was pretty bacon (not food, but a synonym for awesomeness). Rocks soon surrounded us, jetting out of the grassy hills. We started to climb, led by our friend Raul, stopping many a time to listen to the tales of the condor, snail, worms, family, caterpillar, and more. For all these animals were personified by rocks and told a grand Incan story. Soon, our travels took us to the Door of Wisdom, where we connected to Pacha Mama on a much deeper scale. It was magical...

Thus, we digress. After a spiritual experience with Raul, the group headed to Lago Tits (a phrase coined by Zoester). Lago Titikaka, as the locals prefer to call it, is an incredible place. We visited the floating islands and then headed to Amantani, the second largest island of the lake, where we all spent the night with indigenous host families. After watching an amazing sunset on a freezing look out point, we attended Prom for Jordan and Eli. Instead of tuxes and fancy gowns men were garbed in ponchos, while the women wore traditional skirts and shawl-like apparatuses. A cold night and a short boat ride later, we found ourselves walking along the beautiful island of Taquil (something like that). We toured around the island, learned a bit about their culture, and later, some of us plunged into the freezing cold waters of the lago. So worth it. A longer boat ride took us back to Puno, where we had a free afternoon to relax and explore the city. 5:45am and it was time to get up to catch our bus to Cuzco. Slightly brutal, but you got to do what you got to do sometimes. The bus rumbled into Cuzco around 3:38, tallying 7 hours (roughly) for our tired group. It was an eventful ride including but not limited to: beautiful scenery passing by, horrible Greek Mythology movies playing on a small tv, card games, reading books, ipod sock making, great conversations with your neighbor, massages, jello eating, and an extremely urgent stop to urinate. All in all, quite the trip.

Well, we have a full week in the Sacred Valley ahead of us with no time to waste. Wish us luck!

Toodles,

PB and J

(Patrick Burkhardt and Jordi).

Holy Sandboarding Batman!

2010-04-15T09:53:00.000-07:00

Hello all!
We have begun our freetravel adventures and are now officially Peruvian vagabonds. On sunday, we made our way to the bus station, leaving Arequipa behind. Unfortuanately, along with the great city, we also left Eli and Amanda behind. Sickness was the decisive element, as our group had to part ways again, if only briefly. Fourteen hours, and a terrible Morgan Freeman movie later, we made it to the town of Pisco. Learning the ways of making plans for ourselves, we had a bit of a scramble finding a place to stay as we squinted in the morning sunlight, blind like bats after the long ride. Once we finally decided on a hostel and asked the taxi cab driver to take us there, he smiled and told us that our first choice had collapsed in the major earthquake three years prior. Luck found us as a nice women, who happened to be at the bus station, heard of our troubles and told us of her hostel that we could stay at for a good price. Zombie-like, we didn´t have too much energy to do anything, so we settled on lounging at the beach in Paracas for the day. Several hours later, early in the morning the next day, Eli and Amanda returned, healthy and good to go. They told us tales of quite the hospital visit, as our sickly companion had immediately made his presence known to everyone in the hospital, rivaling that of Alejandros airport antics. Speeding through water, we made our way to the San Balletas islands, or, ¨The Poor Man´s Galapagos.¨ Dolphins, sea lions, penguins, Peruvian boobies (Patrick´s favorite), cormorans, pelicans, sea otters, and even some starfish were providing a splendid symphony to our ears and a circus for our cameras. An hour and a half later, we left, taking with us some great pictures, smiles, and guano (bird poop) all over Jordi´s life jacket. They say its good luck. An eventful rickshaw ride a day later to the bus stop, we were bound for Ica. Again, fortune found us, as we were greeted at the bus stop and swept away to another place to sleep with, as we soon found, the most comfortable beds of the trip. Ica is hot, really really hot, as our group ventured out on the town only to surrender to the powers of mother nature. The city is suprisingly big for what we thought, full of aggressive drivers, and loud horns. We found sanctuary in the Original Museum of Ica, learning the ancient history of the indigenous. Lucky for us, they specialized in preserving their dead in mummy-like caskets, as they were on full display for us to see. Interesting stuff. We managed to hold our lunch in our stomachs and returned to the hostel. Yesterday was quite the hoot. The group made its way to the Huachachina (spelling?) for some dune buggying and sandboarding, for some, the highlight of the trip thus far. We piled into the buggies and the drivers took off, like mad men with ants in their pants. A rollercoaster on sand still does not give our experience justice, but you get the idea. We came just short of doing several flips on multiple occasions. Sand boarding is quite different from our native snowboarding, but incredible nonetheless. By far, Jordan takes the gold medal with the most intense wipeout, yet still still undeterred from riding more dunes. She showed everyone up, claiming to have had no previous experience of snowboarding, but, clearly that was a blatant lie. Bumpy rides, some star gazing, a shortage of gasoline, we made it back alive and unbelievably in one piece. A twelve hour bus ride and here we are, back in Arequipa on a short layover to Puno. We have to go catch another bus. Over and out.

With lots of love,
Boots and Q-tip.
aka: Patricio and Jordi.

White People in the White City

2010-04-01T13:46:00.000-07:00

Rafting was a success. We flew down the rapids like condors flying through the Ecuadorian sky. All we can really say about it is that it was fun, incredible, and got us really wet. While in Puyo we also explored the local aquarium. We entered through a giant crocodile mouth and explored its innards that were filled with many scary peses including an empty anaconda cage. Where it went, no one knows and no one seemed too nervous about it. We left the bowels of the aquarium to view pools of water, filled with many alleged fish, none of which we could see. It began to pour so some of us decided to take a dip in the strategically located swiming pool (sin fish). We finished out our time in the Amazon by painting a school and completing a soccer field to mas o menos regulation standards. We also saw and swam at an extrmeely intensivo waterfall. Chevere (cool).
So then we vamosed a Quito, a giant, fantastic, wonderful city which was a great place for Jordi to age one year more. Happy birthday Jordi. On this wonderful day, Claire lost her dog, Alex lost all of his photos, and Eli lost his hand-made overalls. Rest in peace all three. To add to this extremely uplifting day, we went to an extremely beautiful museum, the foundacion Guayasamin. If you aren´t familiar with his art, please do look him up. He paints extremely moving and unique paintings about the tragedy that come from many of the wars and genocides in world history. That night we finally ate Cuy (guinea pig) and prepared for our journey to the center of the earth, aka the equator, aka La Mitad Del Mundo. We lounged in both the northern and southern hemispheres, contemplating how it is water changes direction when it flushes. We saw presentations put on by many schools, also known as cheerleaders - they do exist in South America and we now know where to find them. miss j. hollywood and Patricio were star-struck.
Fast forward to the next morning, 4 a.m., we all packed our bags and headed to the airport to make the journey on to the second half of the trip. Alejandro was not feeling so well and promptly upon arrival to the airport graced us and the entire terminal with the contents of his stomach. While he progressed to the bathroom, his scent remained. Despite the illness, we prevailed and continued on to our six hour layover in Lima, thank God we were not late. Finally we arrived in Arequipa, Peru, our final destination for the next two weeks.
We disembarked from the plane into the open air and with it came open hearts, a beautiful volcanic view, and more vomit. The travel day went off without a hitch.
Which brings us to the present. Arequipa is an amazing city. We are all living solo in our different homestays and taking four hours of classes outside in the open air. On Monday, our first day in Arequipa, was Alejandro´s first day of being twenty (or as the locals call it, veinte). He was still feeling a bit sick, so we held off the celebration for the next day, where we also completed the infamous scavanger hunt. Eli and Zoe won with rainbow colors. Also, congrats to Ricky Martin for realizing what we´ve known all along. We don´t have classes this Friday because it is a religious holiday, much similar to the birth of Alejandro - they both have beards and are pretty holy. To those other religions out there, Happy Passover and Happy Easter. We miss the Easter Bunny.

Peace, love, and spanglish,
your blogtastic bloggers and favorite students,
Eli and Claire

p.s. these words came from our minds and sprung forth from Alejandro´s fingers. God willing, there´s no vomit.
p.p.s. Happy April Fools.

Welcome To The Jungle

2010-03-20T11:45:00.000-07:00

GOL!!!!! In the 93rd minute in La Casa Blanca in Quito, the away team put a laser into the upper 90 to tie the game. That was last sunday. Monday took us to the amazon... so, after another extended bus ride, we arrived in Puyo, the capital of this province. From there, one of the volunteers we´re staying with -- Jeremy, a pretty chill guy from Cali whose travels have lead him here -- jumped in our car, literally and lead us into the depths of the jungle. We´ve been staying in a small ¨house¨down a very steep and rocky grade with two amazing dogs, a shotty generator and 6 hammocks. On arrival we were greeted with a bunch of unconstructed beds and no hot meal in sight, but our spirits weren´t dampened. Divide and conquer. We now have 4 bunk beds, with a solo bed for miss J Hollywood, all in one room -- our first time yet (it gets steamy). And for the first time we are cooking for ourselves... which is bitter sweet, literally. Each morning we take our 20-minute hike up the driveway and then wait for the bus (or a passing car) and ride to school. We´ve been volunteering, painting, rock hauling, digging holes, pretending to be horsies for the kids, ya know, the usual. And at home we´ve taken over a small table for ping pòng, tournament results will be expected soon. But the Amazon is amazing, lush, green, and beautiful. Some bird sounds you can´t even imagine, and all types of creepy crawlies, who of course, join us in our newly constructed beds. And rain. Rain! It´s awesome though, the community is great, they´ve also been helping out on the school projects and just yesterday we went down for some good ol´ecuadorian volly! Drew left blood on the court, it was pretty intense, but pretty awesome. We´ve all been really happy and relaxed, both Patricio and Hannah got into their number 1 colleges! And hopefully we´re going white water rafting tomorrow.. crazy! Sort of miss you, but not really, but really really.
With love and shamrocks,
Patricio y Alejandro

2010-03-13T10:49:00.000-08:00

Hey peeps. Hope you´re all doing as fabulously as we are. We once again spent the last we separated. The Blink 182ers headed to the forest to spend a tranquilo week in the Bosque Nublado. Much like the last group we spent the days teaching English in two different schools (with super cute ninos). Once our work was done we were able to take some time to explore the beautiful bosque. We hiked to 3 waterfalls and bathed in the river on many occasions. Each morning we practiced our yoga and each night we morphed into card sharks. Our wonderful chef Carlos taught us a couple cooking tricks (bread, soup, jam) and we loaned him our recipe for the best guacamole on Earth. He also took some time to read our elements. After feeling each of our energies he would tell us which one of four elements (earth, air, water, fire) we were. This of course was super bacon (short for baconsisimo) aka awesome in Espanol. Our week came to a close with a grande bonfire and some sad goodbyes. Luckily we were able to reunite with the rest of the group FOR GOOD.
Back at the ranch (Otavalo) the other half, recently named Ratatat worked on their spanish skills each morning. Some students even learned a new card game, Cuarenta. Similar to the Blink 182ers they took a grand journey to the parque Candor and Lechero. At Parque Condor they were lucky enough to see the bird show where they watched majestic birds such as the Andean Condor (largest bird in the world) and Bald Eagles spread their wings and do special tricks. Much of the time was passed in their individual homestays bonding with the families. Once again being forced to part at the end of the week was extremely sad, but being greeted by long lost friends was well worth it.
Tomorrow we will continue our journey to Quito and plan to eventually end up in the big bad Amazon. QUE BACON! Anywho, we send our love back home and will catch up soon!

Mucho Amor,
The SAMsters.

2010-03-07T08:42:00.000-08:00

Hola parents. We are yet again finishing up another week in beautiful Ecuador. Sadly our group of nine was split in two this last week. One group consisting of Amanda, Andrew, Jordan, Jordi, Hannah and Alejandro, visited the cloud forest outside of Otavalo. They spent their time teaching at two different rural schools. The little ninos were absolutely adorable. We taught them as much English as possible, as well as teaching them songs, how to make bracelets, and how to play Hangman. At lunch we played epic soccer games that lasted almost an hour. We became totally attatched to the children, and it was very hard to leave them. When we weren´t teaching at the school we spent our time eating amazing food, taking siestas, and hiking through the magnificent cloud forest. We visited not one, but three different stunning waterfalls where we practiced different types of meditation and became one with the cloud forest.
The other group (Drew, Eli, Claire, Patrick and Zoe) aka the "Blink 182-ers" spent their time in the wonderful city of Otavalo. Each student was placed in a seperate host family as to perfect their spanish abilities. The majority our days consisted of some spanish lessons in the morning and some adventuring throughout the evening. Drew was kind enough to welcome us into his wonderful world of yoga and teach us a couple tricks of the trade, leaving us very sore yet more in touch with our spiritual beings. The Blink 182ers also practiced their teamwork in a variety of ways such as, a 3 second human knot, and a successful hack in hackisack(sp?). Que Bueno!! One of our fabulous professors Juan (with questionable humor) led us on a hike to 2 gorgeous waterfall where we were able to bath ourselves and even climb through caves...We continued our journey on our own over the river and through the woods (and moiuntains) in order to reach the Condor Park. There we were able to see and learn about some amazing endangered birds as well as view the entire city. We also visit the spiritual tree of Lechero where we chose taroah cards (also super fun).
Finally our group was reunited on Friday. After catching up we took a journey to the Mohando Lakes. We did some crazy things like climbing a 14000 ft mountain and singing ridiculous songs at the summit. Although extremely challenging, our group is hardcore enough to handle such ventures. So to summarize, all is well down south. Everyone back home is dearly missed and we´ll see you back at the blog in about a week.

Que Les Vayan Bien!
Your Bloggers
Andrew and Zoe

¡Language School in Cuenca!

2010-02-26T12:21:00.000-08:00

We are wrapping up another week of this bacancisimo trip and figured it was about time for another blog! Today was our last day of Espanol classes and its been SAMtastic. Each person has been learning and improving at their own pace. We´ve have been spending our mornings from 8 to 12 in class or going on creative field trips to markets, museums, or parques and then later enjoying the lovely city of Cuenca. The group even impressed some locals when we showed off our great dance moves at a salsa dancing class. Drew and Amanda have been joining each student and their homestay family for meals throughout the week. They have been able to visit and really get to know our new families- sorry mom and dad. Tonight we are planning on going to a cooking class and then spending or last night with our families! Each student has really gotten to form special bonds with their homestay´s and it has been really incredible experience.
With the exception of a few hospital visits, altitude sickness, and throwing up due to vegetarians eating meat, everyone has been relatively healthy... don´t worry the medical systems here are great! In addition, most Carpe Sammers contributed to a local tattoo/piercing artist´s bank account, named Sergio-what a nice man. Everyone looks great!

Tomorrow we are continuing on our adventure throughout Ecuador and will be visiting hot springs in Banos on our way to Otavalo. The next two weeks we will sadly be split up and half the group will be volunteering teaching English while the other half continues to accel in their Espanol. You will be getting blog updates with more information next week but, unfortunately with new blogger extroudinares.

¡Signing off! ¨Sloth life¨ and ¨miss_j_hollywood¨

p.s. please feel free to check out Alex´s blog that already has uploaded pictures from throughout the trip: www.alexrlevy.com
p.p.s. floss thursday´s are definitely the new thangg

Rio Muchacho and on to Language School in Cuenca

2010-02-20T08:44:00.000-08:00

¡Hola familia y amigos!
Its been a great past week spent in Rio Muchacho- an organic farm in the transition region of Ecuador. Not only have we spent the past week farming and adjusting to creating zero waste but we have also been learning about the different aspects of organic farming such as composting, the lunar calendar, and problems with most US farms. We have been able to meet incredible people from all over the world including Germany, England, Canada, and Wisconsin! All have been in different parts of their lives but are still searching for the common goal to Carpe Diem and travel abroad. Everyday we took part in different activities on the farm like making jewelry out of nuts as well as chocolate and cheese making. Yesterday we went on a minor "field trip" to the environmental school that was created just 14 years ago. It is truly amazing to see all of the progress and positive impact that Rio Muchacho has made on its community.
On a seperate note, we also celebrated Valentines day with our newest member, Zoe! Her plane was delayed as a result of weather conditions in the East Coast but she adjusted quickly upon her arrival and is now having a blast! For Valentines day we each exchanged gifts with our "secret Valentine" and it was quite funny, there were some interesting gifts exchanged like poems, friendship bracelets, peacock feathers, and of course fake bacon (because we temporarily changed to a vegitarian diet at the farm). Overall though the group dynamics are really great and whenever we are not exchanging funny stories or talking about poop you can pretty much guarantee someone is starting a singalong.
Today is a free day where we can enjoy the beaches of Canoa and possibly laundry. Tomorrow we will be heading out to Cuenca to start a week of homestays and Spanish language study. Hope the States are treatin ya well and we can try to send some of this gorgeous weather your way! Love and miss you! Live, laugh, love, and obviously ¡Carpe Diem! We (Hannah "sloth life" and Jordan "miss_j_hollywood") enjoyed being your blogger extraordinares.

¡Paz!
SAM Carpe Diem

ps everyone really does miss their families and friends and hopes they are all doing well!

Blogtastic

2010-02-14T12:04:00.000-08:00

Our first three days in Ecuador have been incredible! We arrived at our hostel, Hostel Saiananda, in Bahia, Ecuador Thursday after many hours of travel by plane and bus. We arrived early Friday morning, got a couple hours of sleep and awoke to a delicious breakfast of local fruit, eggs, and homemade bread. After some bonding activities, we set out on our first adventure, a scavenger hunt through Bahia. Our leaders, Drew and Amanda, split us up into pairs, gave us a bit of money and sent us out to catch the bus. We all ended up getting off the bus about a mile out of town, which took everyone a little while to figure out, but each group figured their way to the center of town. Our scavenger hunts took us to every corner of town. We had to find out information about local hostels, museums, and transportation for later trips. They also encouraged us to talk to locals about the politics in Ecuador and the daily lives of locals. We reconvened back at the hostel at 6:30 for dinner and discussions about the day.
Our next day was absolutely amazing. We traveled to Isla del Sol, an island made completely of mud and mangrove trees. It didnt take us long to get covered from head to toe in mud. The minerals seeped into our skin while we bathed in the mud and explored through the tangled mangrove trees. Before we headed back to the hostel we made sure to have a rousing game of mud tunnel tag and a few wrestling matches. It was an incredible and spiritual experience for all. We headed out of the hostel right after lunch today, thanking all the people that worked there and the exotic animals that woke us up in the morning.
We are now in Canoa, a town a bit north of Bahia heading to Rio Muchacho, an organic farm for the week. The truck has arrived to take us to the farm, so we must sign off. We are all soaking in the new experiences and cant wait for more to follow.
Love to all,
your bloggers,
Claire and Eli

Bienvenido a Ecuador!

2010-02-11T14:22:00.000-08:00

Nannette here-blogging on behalf of the SAM group:

I've just gotten off the phone with Amanda & Drew-everyone was waiting for a bus in Guayaquil to take them to their orientation site. They are all safe, happy, and incredibly excited to begin their adventure, although they are feeling Zoe's absence.... Alas, only a few more days until the group is truly complete...

Look for further blogs from the group themselves in a few days!

Dear Zoe:

2010-02-11T13:41:00.000-08:00

This video was made by the SAM group who is desperately missing their final student: Zoe Coleman. Zoe... you've been so wonderful through all this weather and your attitude has been very appreciated! The group, likewise, is eager to have you with them and send this out with great love and excitement at your joining them in a few short days.

Video 24
Video Length 1:55
Click here to watch

Let the journey begin!

2010-02-10T23:59:00.001-08:00

Phew. ... after a little longer than we would have liked, everyone that's supposed to be is together and accounted for! Poor Zoe will be joining us a few days later in Ecuador thanks to these incredible East Coast storms, so we'll reserve some extra cheer for you on your arrival.

For now, we're all optimistic and excited as Drew reported it to be a phenomenal group thus far and one that augurs well for a wonderful semester.

Yours in spirit,

Ethan Knight

Executive Director

2010-02-05T21:13:00.000-08:00

Emotion mounts as the days pass quickly toward the 'launch' of our SAM- South America- semester. The subtle reasons why the eleven of us will be coming together on this three-month exploration will reveal themselves gradually over time as we experiment with unique and fresh realities throughout Ecuador and Peru.

As you pack your bag, remember that lighter is always better! We'll be covering a good number of miles along our adventure, and it's to your benefit to not be weighted down.

Be sure to make it to the LACSA check-in counter in the international terminal by 9:30PM on Wednesday, February 10th! If for any reason you do not find the crew, give a call to the Carpe Diem head quarters, their phones will be on all night and can help us out. The office can be reached at 503 285 1800 and 503 285 0748. We'll meet up as a group to move through the check-in process together, so just look for the crowd... and people that resemble the duo in the picture. We look forward to meeting you and sharing in the unforgettable journey. Hasta pronto, amigos...

Hi Again

2009-11-25T19:39:00.000-08:00

Happy thanksgivin! The Sammers celebrated a little early by enjoying a huge feast and playing secret turkey for each other. We all are very well rested after a very amazing and spiritual stay at our yoga retreat. Sunday, a very sunny woman at that, shared her Hindu practices of meditation, astrology, and all the different yoga types and philosophies with us. The courses were intense, we sang, danced, meditated, and most of us are capable of doing headstands now. That is until Keegan farted and everyone had to kneel while he just laughed. The food was wonderful as well. Healthy and tasty. Plus since Sunday is from New Mexico we got a little taste of home in the US. Every part of the yoga retreat was inspiring, especially baby Mira Vie.

Now with full bellies, we are ready to take part in the very anticipated final part of the trip, a 5 day trek to Macchu Picchu. We are all very aware that this is our last week together and hope to make it the best one yet! But we can´t wait to see you soon! Love and kisses,
K&K

Hi

2009-11-21T20:15:00.001-08:00

Floating islands, a place none of us have ever expierenced before. The people create their land from condensed dirt and place piles of yellow reeds on top. The sun light reflects beautifully off of the islands as well as the lake, which creates a gorgeous contrast. Along with the reed monster boats that dock outside their homes. These islands literally float and in order for them to stay in place stakes need to be pressed down, and weights thrown over the side. The communities are very friendly though when in disaggrement, they have been known to pull stakes out of their neighbors part of the island to hopefully have them drift away. The islands that we visited were Uros and Taquiles. It was a very scenic boat ride to get to both islands, although our boat driver fell asleep on the way there time to time. We were graced by double halo rainbows which surrounded the sun throughout our trip. When we got the Taquiles we took a 20 minute walk to the top where we ate lunch. Jeff ended up dying along the way in our current game of lover. Then we returned to the boat with our happy tour guide since we were the happiest group and played chess and cards the whole way back to Puno.

Although Puno was relatively small, we were all able to do many activities in the town, such as the carnivals and coca museum. Alot of us hiked up to the look outs, one having a pointing statue of Manu Chipac, the first born Incan. The other look out had a giant Andean condor statue that provided a much larger and breath taking view of Puno, literally breath taking because of the altitude. One night after dinner, we stumbled upon a professional womens volleyball game, Puno vs. Juliyaca. We all had a roaring time as we acted like 12 year olds yelling ¨JULICACA!¨ although most of the time we thought Puno was playing Cuzco. Keegan also caught a volleyball that was thrown in the crowd during halftime. After having the ball for five minutes, a little sweet kid came to him and asked him for the ball very politely. Bugged eyed and mouth grinning, Keegan shouted ¨¡ES MIO!" and cackled, making the boy run to his mama. After all the insults we threw at JuliCACA, #6 Thunder Strike and #10 Big Mama, led Juliyaca to victory. We left with happy faces knowing we would be in Cuzco soon.

We got a welcome to Cuzco gift by getting some of our stuff robbed on the bus ride there. We put it behind us with all the fun things we did. After all the strenuous research we did at all of the many travel agencies here, we decided to go zip lining and horseback riding. We giddied up and rode em horsies all around the ruins. It was amazing to see the advanced engineering the Incas did to make these ruins, but mainly we were more excited just to ride our horses. Then we strapped into our harnesses and zipped and zipped and zipped. We had a blast riding the 3 zip lines the park provided, but had a crazy time repeling down a 100 meter rock. Kieran seemed like she had the most fun doing that. While Shelby wasnt so fond of taking other peoples advice while repelling. What is special about these zip lines are they are the highest in the world, but only above sea level. It was nice having amazing adventures in Cuzco before we left to volunteer at the House of Miracles.

Well we all crammed into a cozy little van and headed off to House of Miracles, an orphanage in the Sacred Valley. To get there we did the unmanagable and fit all ten of us and our bags into a wee little car. Its a colorful building full of love. The American couple, Marie and Allen, who manage and fund the place are so sweet and genuine. They welcomed us with coca tea and smiles. Charlie, Blue, Rover, and Sid all gave us barks of kindness. We spent most mornings weeding the drive way to help bring down the lease of the property. In the afternoons, we chilled with the homefries playing games and sharing jokes. Jose Luis was the name maker of the group. Will being Chubaka, Kieran being rat..but its only cause she taught them egyption rat screw, Keegan, Princess Leya, Dan as Squished Tomatoe, Jeff was Girrafe, and Andy was the sad clown. One of the days we took a 2 hour hike stright up the mountain an Incan Ruin. After exploring the girls and Milo sat in the wide opened feild and played the the dancing sparkles. We giggled and wondered why we were seeing these white specks and balls of black. At one point all four of us were waving our hands in the air, all with smiling faces. The rest of the boys kept walking and went to the Incan tower. On the last day at the orphanage, we had an indoor bon fire where we all laughed and feasted on smores. In the morning the kids gave us hugs goodbye and we went to Cuzco for just a night. Now we are all excited for the yoga retreat and are savoring the few days we have left.

Until later,
with love,
Kieran and Keegan

Lake Titicaca

2009-11-08T14:49:00.000-08:00

Here we are - it´s free travel time! We are in the tourist haven of Puno right now, super fried after our two weeks of spanish classes in Arequipa.

Colca was incredible, as you could probably tell from the pics.

After a 6 hour bus ride in a double decker, flying on all sides of the ¨road¨ through the most picturesque landscapes of the Peruvian mountains we arrived here with mouth fulls of coca to ease our aching heads - Lake Titicaca is the highest navigable lake in the world. It is beautiful here. This morning, Raul, a very different Shaman than ours from the Amazon, did a ceremony to the Pacchamamma (Mother Earth) with us. He taught us about the pre-Incans´ belief that the three most holy animals are the snake, which connects you to the underworld, your innerself and the knoweledge of the earth, the puma which connects you to the physical world and your drive and inner warrior spirit, and finally the condor which connects you to father sky and the cosmos. All of the Andean philosophies also believe in the concept of duality, creating a balance between opposing forces: the positive and negative, or the masculine and feminine energies in everyone and everything. On our journey to ¨the door of knowledge¨ we first sat at the rock of the puma where four cat foot prints lay embedded into an acient rock, then we traveled across the spine of the snake which was a long ridge leading to the nest of the condors, which was a series of natural rocks in the shape of condors overlooking a cliff. Along the way we participated in two rituals - one where Raul supported us as we leaned out with open arms over a cliff and released the negative parts of our past so that we can better face the future. The second was at the ´door of knowledge,´ where we became one with the earth, entering columns carved into the cliffs by either natural means or the ancestors of humans. We entered one column, felt its energy, and then entered the other, finally ending between the two, literally in the door, where we also felt the energy from the Pacchamamma.

After we all did this ritual, Raul and another Shaman prepared an offering to the Pacchamamma: sweets, coca leaves, wine, and the fetus of the llama. We all offered a handful of coca leaves, expressing our best thoughts for the universe, and then they burned the offering in a fire pit made of cow poo. The poo turned white as it burned, a sign that the Pacchamamma accepted the offering.

Tomorrow we head to the floating islands, and then Tuesday night we will be bound for Cuzco! WE GET TO RIDE A HOT AIR BALLOON OVER THE SACRED VALLEY HAH!

Peace out from Team SAM
Your bloggers, Maddie and Andy

A peek into our weekend...

2009-11-02T12:46:00.000-08:00

More later!!!
Love, Team SAM

Greetings from Arequipa!

2009-10-27T12:45:00.000-07:00

We have emerged from the jungle and now we have arrived in Perú!

Our week in the Amazon was muy interesante. We stayed in a lodge on a ridge above a village on the Puyo-Pongo river, and our project for the week was to build the stairs to get to the lodge! The path was steep and slippery and in need of a lot of maitenance. We perfected our machete skills chopping up trees to make steps and spent hours pounding them into the ground. We also got to trek through the jungle and visit a shaman. Andy got to hang out with a monkey. It was pretty chill.

The shaman visit was fascinating. He began each of our cleansing rituals by smoking a cigarrette and demonstrating how the cigarrette represented each of our bodies. Then he stuck the wrong end of a different cigarrette into his mouth and blew smoke all over us. The stains on the cigarrette were our ´mal aire´or bad energy. To cleanse us, he did a series of rituals like spraying us in the face with sugarcane alcohol, blowing smoke on our heads, and using magical rocks to call spirits from the jungle and cleanse us. We were all given a specific herb to smell six times per day, three times in the morning and three times before bed, for three days. After three days our current sicknesses we supposed to be healed. I think as far as shamanism goes it is nessicary to believe to be able to see, rather than to see to believe. For some of us the experience was more meaningful.

After a dirty ass week in the amazon, we took off for Quito at 6 in the morning with bags full of wet clothes and mud. Upon arriving we chilled in Quito for two days. Some of us got to visit el Mitad del Mundo - the official equator - while others got the chance to have a private tour of the US embassy with Jeff´s friend Mike, the head of security there. The US embassy in Quito is brand new, cost $80 million dollars, and is considered small. Don´t try breaking in, even to use the water-conserving toilets that can actually handle toilet paper (a major novelty in these parts). After a couple of days in Quito we all wke up at 3 in the morning to catch a flight to LIma Peru and then transfer to another flight to Arequipa, our new home...for two weeks.

Arequipa is a cool city - it´s hot and dry during the day and cold and dry at night. It´s actually on the north end of the Atacama desert... or you could just call it Tatooine. We´re living with wonderful families. OUr mornings are spent taking intense Spanish classes. Tomorrow we apparently have to give speeches in front of the entire school, to demonstrate our bomb spanish skills. Andy, Milo and Dawn entered an agreement on Monday: Andy and Milo would quit smoking for five days, and Dawn would fast. Andy and Dawn are holding strong on day THREE, but Milo not as much... and he has paid the price - he TOLD us to pants him if he smoked... and Keegan is not one to let him go back on his word.

We´ve passed the afternoons exploring this new place... we saw the market on Monday - anything you would ever EVER need. Yesterday, we went to the Monastary and explored the seemingly never-ending labrinth of bedrooms, kitchens, and sanctuaries. We´re also in the midst of planning our weekend to Colca Canyon - hopefully we can find a mule (or puma. or condor) for Maddie and her knee to ride down on! Free travel plans are also in the works - Lake Titicaca, here we come!

Peace from the SAMtastic team!

Hasta luego - photos to come!

Your bloggers, Maddie and Andy

Alto Choco

2009-10-18T14:12:00.000-07:00

hello home! que tal? we have some bad news... ecuador lost the world cup qualifying game...we were in quito that weekend and the streets were crazy. we even tryed a little dancing in one of the clubs that night... an interesting experience that some of us enjoyed more than others. then we packed up and headed into the cloud forest of Alto Choco for the week. we were planing on staying there for two weeks but our plans changed and come monday we will be at another reforestation project in the amazon! how great is that!!??!! hopefully no one gets jungle fever...uh ohh. i am personally hoping to see some monmkeys or an andaconda or soemthing very unique and tropical-like. in Alto Choco we planted a lot of trees, helped build walls out of bamboo, cooked, and went nof a very beautiful hike. the mornings were so beautiful- it aint called the cloud forest for nothin. right now we are in a cute little town called banos...we may even go to the natural banos tonight. today we all went rafting...it was a lot of fun. i am planning on posting pictures tonight on our shutterfly so keep checking that if you need to see more. we know that you guys love to live your lives through us. we love you. we miss you. muchos besos.

your blogggers- Shelby and Milo

A Week In Otavalo

2009-10-09T10:23:00.000-07:00

This cloudy friday morning finds us once again happily settled in the mountain town of Otavalo. We´ve spent the week attending spanish school, practicing spanish with our new found ecuadorian families members, hiking liberally around the area, and imitating bird calls in an attempt to tease flight out of Andean Condors. We eagrly await reuniting with our group mates, now lost amongst the forest of clouds. This weekend there is a highly anticipated soccer game and if Ecuador can win and score 3 goals they automatically qualify for the world cup. The tension is palpable, and we look forward to being in Quito this weekend to witness the excitment boil over from the stadium and into the streets. We´re trying to upload pictures but are having complications due to poor internet connection. Hopefully we will have success soon. Till then, we miss you all and hope your time at home is magically delicious.
With much love,
Will, Dan, and the rest of the SAM crew

Hiking a Mountain!

2009-10-03T14:48:00.000-07:00

Today we encountered our first mountainous obstacle as a team...literally. We climbed a mountian. We scaled one of the largest mountains in the area around Otavalo, a mountain by the name of Fuya Fuya. The views were incedible and the acsent steep, but we enjoyed every second of it, relishing in the challenge. At the top the clouds wisped up the mountain and enveloped us like a blanket left out all morning to collect dew. It was one of the most amazing experiences of the trip thus far, especially considering it came right on the heels of the group reunion after a seemingly never ending week of being seperated by many miles of forest. We all had fascinating stories to relate while many a hug was shared. While the other group was staying with their homestays in Otavalo and going through rigorous spanish lessons, myself, Will, Shelby and Milo were spending our week in the Cloud Forest teaching basic english (and sometimes basic spanish) to a fine group of youngsters living in the area. Even though some of the children (especially the young ones) proved to be more of a challenge than was expected, we still had a marvalous time. The other group explored Otavalo and the surrounding areas in the mornings, and perfected their spanish in the afternoons. They also visited many sites around the city like the Cascada de Peguche where our fellow traveler Kieran´s shoe descended the waterfall only to be retrieved by our fearless leader Jeff. More pictures to follow this weeks activities..

Photos!

2009-09-29T05:06:00.000-07:00

Due to complications with Flickr, we created a brand spankin´ new account through shutterfly, which allows all of us to sign in under 1 username. Here´s the link, check us out: http://www.samcarpediem2009.shutterfly.com

greetings from otavaloooooo!

2009-09-26T17:40:00.000-07:00

This dark saturday eve finds us nestled in between mamma and pappa volcanoes in the ever magnificent Otavalo Ecuador. After two weeks spent working the farm at Rio Muchacho, today we were able to satisfy our insatiable American need to consume, storming one of the largest handicraft markets in South America, scouring the streets for gifts, plauging store owners for their unnescesary knick knacks made of alpaca hair. We now set off with misty eyes as our group seperates for the first time. Half bound for the cloud forest to teach the younglings of ecuador, and half to work on our ever improving spanish vocabulary and grammer at a language school in Otavalo. Soon we shall reunite in a joyous embrace, until then its off deep into the forest for Dan and I. Wish us luck, we miss you all at home.
with love, Dan Will and the rest of the Carpe Diem SAM trip

Bueno

2009-09-20T09:02:00.000-07:00

Hi Family! We are having such a great time in Rio Muchacho and want to tell you all about our trip so far! We started out at Saiunanda, a beautiful place just outside of Bahia. Alfredo, the owner, opened our eyes to a new way of living, as we all tried something new and did a singing bowls meditation. Peacocks roomed the land, along with many other birds and animals including iguanas, sloths, horses, parrots, dogs, puppies, cats and much much more. Each meal was delicious, even the sloths tried to sneak into the refrigerator to grab a bite. One of our favorite days was going to the mangroves with Cati. We covered ourselves with mud!! Getting dirty never felt so good. We laughed, were happy, and felt blissful as we connected to the Earth, wildlife and to our new friends. Now at Rio Muchacho, an organic farm, we are eager to get our trip up and rollin! In the day time we experience as much farm work as possible -shoveling poop, making compost, pulling weeds, feeding the animals, and helping in the kitchen. But at night is when we get it poppin! We jam every night -Keegan on the drums, Andy on the guitar, and everyone else joining as they please. Dawn and Dan play shit boots but you better watch out cause Dan will jack you up son! Milo brings a calming wisdom and offers meditation for us all. Maddie likes take small childrens soccer balls and kick them off a cliff (Thanks, Kieran, writes Maddie). Shelby enlightens us with her metal singing skills. Kieran helps keep the bugs away, and is always willing to give a WHOO WHOOOOO! Will is always the person to look at when you need a smile, giving us a lot of insight and laughter. And Jeff has been doing a swell job at providing a monologue that always cheers us up. We have one more week in Rio Muchacho where we will begin our Spanish classes, which we all are super excited for. Hopefully we will vbe able to enter another blog post before we travel to Otavalo for our next adventure!
Bloggers Kieran and Keegan

p.s. we made a flicker account! go to www.flickr.com/samcarpediem2009 to see the pictures

Greetings from Bahia!!!

2009-09-11T12:48:00.000-07:00

We´re here!!! After a verrrrrry long day of travel, we have arrived at our orientation location on the coast.

We´ve been released into the city of Bahia de Caraquez by Jeff and Dawn, who (very lovingly) said to us this morning, `Now leave this beautiful hostel we´re staying in, fend for yourselves, and come back for dinner! No, we won´t be helping you. At all.´

So here we (Will and Maddie) are, having just finished a delicious meal of rice and beans and chicken and beef at a restaurant overlooking the Bay. We will spend the rest of the afternoon seeking out transportation options and other hostels as `foreshadowing´for more responsibilities we will be taking on later in the trip. Woo hoo!

Hasta luego, amigos! Sending good vibes your way.......

Maddie and Will

we´re here!

2009-09-11T11:06:00.000-07:00

hola amigos! we have made it here to ecuador and are in la ciudad de bahia de caraquez! this is our first stop so we havent seen much of the city, but the hostel we are staying at is mucho bien. there is even a sloth that live in the kitchen. we are on a scavenger hunt and are hoping we find some great things. the new culture is sometinhg we enjoy a lot....but our spanish is not as good as we´d like...hopefully we dont get too lost today! xoxo padres we love you

Nosotros Estamos En Ecuador

2009-09-11T10:56:00.000-07:00

Sup guys its Dan and Keegan reporting live from an internet cafe in Bahia, Ecuador!! Being the first ones to post on this blog and to find internet access by ourselves we would to take this time to congradulate ourselves... After a strenuous day of traveling were eager to explore more of this town on foot. Our hostel that we are staying at is luxurious, very peaceful and full of delicious meals. There were many interesting creatures that inhabit our hostel, from terantualas, to sloths! Well, we still have a lot to discover so until next time.. adios.

Let the Journey Begin!

2009-09-09T21:47:00.000-07:00

I've just spoken to Dawn and Jeff and the group happy, together and are heading through LAX airport security as I type this blog. With one slightly delayed student everyone arrived without injury and with all bags present - truly, this promises to be a wonderful and affirming semester!

Please stay tuned for regular blogs from our students on a mostly weekly basis.

Yours in spirit,

Ethan

Let It Begin:)

2009-09-01T10:26:00.000-07:00

Well Hi Thar:)
This is your future co-leader team, Jeff and Dawn, just checking in with you, sending out warm welcomes. We have been spending many days together now, running around Portland doing last minute errands, talking Heaps about our upcoming adventure and how truly excited we are to meet all of you very very soon, and simply learning about each other. We've been going over our itinerary, finalizing a few things as well. Anyhow.
So this is the first of many Blogs to come, which ya'll will eventually be taking over; it is a way to share with friends, family, and loved ones what we are all up to. You may notice that there are previous entries from the last group who were on this trip...we want to keep these old Blogs as an ongoing way for everyone to access past memories and to see what future groups are up to!
We are sooooo very excited to meet you guys, and to have the opportunity to share such amazing and magical moments with you all.
Yippee Kye Aye,
Jeff and Dawn

SAM and beyond

2009-05-22T22:49:00.001-07:00

Well, its been a fantastic journey through America del Sur, and it has now come to an end. To recap:
After we got back from the yoga retreat, we had a successful trek to the famous city of Machu Picchu. Along the way, we met a lot of nice people, saw some amazing scenery, and felt the presence of the ancient Inca in every footstep. For some, it was our first time backpacking, and we all thoroughly enjoyed the experience. Watching the sun rise through the mist as we got our first view of MP on day four of our hike was unforgettable. The only drawback was that Tessa had injured her knee and so her and HEather had their own journey through the sacred valley - on horseback and raft instead of on foot. We had a happy reunion at Machu Picchu, toured the site as a whole group again, and then, tired but happy, hopped on our train back to Cusco. We were sorry to say goodbye, but every good thing comes to an end, and we have many amazing journeys ahead of each of us. We will always keep the memories of the past three months with us as we go forward in the world.
Paz Afuera
Adam, Heather, Jenn, Tessa, Karen, Amanda, Paul and Onyx

Omm Govenda Ommmm.

2009-04-30T13:58:00.000-07:00

We just got back from our Yoga retreat. Wow, what an amazing experience that was.

We got there Sunday night, and started right into a yoga philosopy class. We learned about the begining of yoga. We had our first yoga class that night. That night was really just spent relaxing and getting our yoga on.

We started our next day and everyday after that, with a session of meditation, then went right into our yoga. The mornings were always nice there. It was a very interesting week, we put our bodies to the test of how well could we all really bend. I got laughed at a bit by Jenn, for my non felixble body. We all laughed alot at some of the postions, ¨ ok now everybody, sexy cat.¨ But there were some great partner yoga postions, some of mastered some crazy headstands.

During the morning after breakfast we would do daily ¨selva¨which is service of making things beautiful and doing things that are beautiful. We would work in the kitchen, sweep, and water plants. After our morning selva, we would have a different class, 2 of the days we learned about Chakras, we all learned how to read Chakras as well! So be prepared parents, we will tell you what ones of your Chakras are blocked and the things you need to work on to un-block them! ;) At night we would do more yoga, and just relax before a great vegitarian meal. We were veggies all week, and boy was this food great.

Before we came back yesterday, we did a great ceremony. We all burned things that we wanted to leave at the Yoga center. We all went around and said a quote or a mantra that we wanted to leave as a legacy. It was amazing.

This week was one of the more relaxing weeks we have had, a great way to go into MAchu Picchu tomorrow. We leave around 6am, tomorrow to head off to our trek to find the lost city.

We will write when we get back from our trek.

Ciao, Onyx and Jenn.

Swine Flu - Update from Carpe Diem HQ

2009-04-28T08:58:00.001-07:00

The following is a post recently made to our FAQ page that we wanted to include to all of you who might be reading this blog.

Swine flu has recently been confirmed throughout Mexico and parts of the US. A few other countries have also reported possible infections. While we're in touch with the CDC and monitoring all of the international news we can put our hands on, we also feel we are uniquely placed to handle the situation given that all of our field staff are trained in Wilderness Medicine; two of our office staff are currently Emergency Room nurses; and the other is a Wilderness EMT. We also have contact with a variety of local doctors (including a few with advanced training in international and tropical medicines) that should needs require we can reach out to.

Our spring & fall 2009 programs will continue to run as scheduled although we plan on requiring flu shots for our fall programs as they have been proven (with Avian Flu for instance) to much reduce any severity of infection. We may also choose to outfit our medical kits with extra supplies such as extra hand sanitizer and the like.

Swine Flu is an offshoot of the 1918-19 flu: just as every flu since then has been. In that strain of flu as well as most that have followed including Swine, Pneumonia has been the actual concern and the one we're most on guard for. The good news is that once recognized there are very good treatments for Pneumonia and we are very familiar with good doctors in the areas our students travel. Of course we plan on continuing to take the proactive approach and deal with any medical potentialities quickly and professionally. Since that initial pandemic in 1918, the subsequent strains have historically been more and more benign. The Swine Flu is presenting thankfully as a low-mortality flu (currently, in the US as an example, there have been 50 suspected cases and only one took an overnight in the hospital before being discharged in good health). So, while this particular flu strain is stronger than the typical seasonal flu, we are hopeful that it will continue to be as easily treatable as it has been.

2009-04-25T16:44:00.000-07:00

We left Pilcopata after our almuerzo(lunch), loaded up the 4x4 that would take all of our food to the community, and headed out on foot to Huancaria. Our jungle stroll took us about two hours, hiking on rough muddy roads with just our water bottles. We met our Jeep in the main plaza of the town, picked up all our supplies and walked another ten minutes to the raised and covered platform constructed for visitors of the village. Everybody pitched tents and then was ready to jump in the river.
All the little kids came to our campsite, curious to see us and what things we were bringing with us. The niños found us very funny, playing with Onyx´s hair, saying that it was sheep´s hair and naming me Small Mouth. At the same time we were all suprised to see little girls with nose piercings. The next morning we were woken up by our first rain forest rain. We headed over to the center of town, where the soccer field and the school houses are. We met with the head teacher, a woman from a nearby village named Veronica. We immediately set out cleaning the dirtiest and oldest of the three school buildings, taking out all the desks and school supplies, and giving it all a good scrubbing. Once finished cleaning it was time to paint, a fresh layer of red and yellow. We spent that afternoon playing volleyball with the children befote heading back to camp for the night. Our evenings were spent learning from our guide Andreas about the Machiganga and Machipaya people that inhabitat this community, hearing myths and legends of the native peoples, and hearing incredible stories from our contact Hugo Pepper ranging from the lost city of Paytiti to his time at Woodstock.
The next day we continued our painting of the schools and finished work on the second building. At this point we still had only had contact with the children of the village, who were constantly hanging around and in school during the day. The men of the village had been busy investigating the news that people were in their territory cutting down trees, and so were out protecting the village. That afternoon we spent time making bracelets and necklaces with Nora, the wife of Alberto the world traveling medicine man. We worked with her and her children and then had fun shooting a bow and arrow.
We spent the next day working with men and women from the village out in the fields. We split into two groups, half of us going with Guillermo to clear a field for planting and learned about the village as we talked and waiting for all the wood to burn. Land is communally owned in the village; if you want to work on a certain plot of land you do, and you are the owner of the crops you produce. It is only when you want to cut down trees that you talk with the community to make sure it is ok. The other half of the group worked on a hillside clearin land with machetes. That afternoon we got to meet with Alberto and take a tour of his medicinal plant garden - he laughs like a mad man and knows how the uses of every plant in the jungle.
The following day we left the jungle at 7 in the morning, traveling back to Cusco in one day. We had to hike back to Pilcopata, jump in our bus and ride the bumpy dirty roads of the jungle, and cloud forest, traveling from sea level to 3326m, reaching Cusco at 7pm. Food, and sleeping in beds and no more bug bites! Our jungle expedition came to a close.

Paul

Welcome to the Jungle.

2009-04-25T15:43:00.000-07:00

Hi all! Sorry its been so long- we have just been so so busy!
So last week, after a lovely couple of days in the beautiful city of Cusco, the group set off onto a ten day expedition... to the jungle. It took us a few days to get out there being that it was so far away and we made a few pit stops. We left Cusco on Tuesday, spending Tuesday night, Wednesday and Wednesday night at a beautiful 300 year old hacienda just outside the town of Paucartambo. The house was a big, gorgeous ranch with a big old fireplace to warm up with at night. During the day we worked to clear a field on the farm there that will be used to grow corn.
Thursday morning we hit the road bright and early and drove to a spot on the Madre de Dios river where we hopped in a boat and headed to a tiny lodge in the cloudforest called Atalaya. We spent one night there, and took some really nice hikes in the afternoon to explore the jungle. The next morning we woke up incredibly early to boat down the river to see macaws flying along the river banks. Totally incredible sight. Later that morning we continued on our way, braving landslides and some serious mud along the road, to the town of Pillcopata inside of the Manu National Reserve. We stayed one night in this little, dusty town at the Paradise hotel and finally the next morning we took off for the jungle community we would stay and work in for the next few days... Paul will take it from here to tell you all about the jungle!

xoxo Ciao!
Tessa