Phase three finished!

It with both great excitement and a little bit of sadness that we are preparing for the final time for all the groups to come back to Fieldbase this afternoon. All the groups are safely on their buses now and we're expecing the first group back between midday and one. The terrace has been scrubbed and tables set out, Sandra and Rosie our cooks are back preparing another delicious dinner, and we're ready and waiting to collect all their photos, project summaries and of course, dirty laundry!

The next few days of wash up are going to be absolutely jam packed. When everyone arrives back today they've got to clean and scrub all their group kit so that it's gleaming, and then straight into phase three skits this evening!

Tomorrow there's more kit sorting to be done, and then a big review session in the afternoon when everyone goes back into their phase one alpha groups and looks back over the Raleigh experience and what it has meant to them - I expect this will be quite an emotional session for everyone involved as they look back over their incredible journeys.

Tomorrow night we've got a big UV party, complete with DJ and body paint!

On Thursday some of the venturers are going white water rafting along the mighty Pacuare river (All the Volunteer Managers went in January - it was a lot of fun!) or visiting the Guyabo National Monument, before heading back to Fieldbase and packing up all their kit. In the evening we have a black tie dinner, where the Project Managers will be serving dinner (complete with canapes!) followed by the Golden Mess Tin awards and then the final slideshow- and I don't doubt there'll be more than a few tears for this. And then finally, after many teary goodbyes, everyone will be packed on to their buses in the morning as they head off to the airport, or wherever they are headed to next.

When everyone is back safe and sound and we've managed to trawl our way through all their wonderful pictures, we'll get the final project photos and summaries up, along with news of how wash up is going.

But i'll leave you with this... It has been yet another incredible phase, and in fact an incredbile expedition. Once again I cannot believe how quickly the time has gone by, it really does seem like yesterday that I was standing in the airport waving a clipboard looking for all our tired/nervous/excited venturers. I know the whole team at Fieldbase are bursting with pride at how much the groups have acheived and how wonderful every person here has been over the three phases. You should be very very proud of each and every one of them!

Pura Vida!