P Day - 3 and counting

Well that last week went very quickly! It began with the project managers heading off to do their project planning visits, which involved checking out local facilities, meeting the project partners, getting accustomed to the landscape and sorting out contingency plans for any emergencies that could arise. Taking each project in turn...

Project Alpha 1 at Nancite: Ian and Emma S got the bus all the way up to the northwest tip of Costa Rica, and then trekked along the coast to meet the rangers at the project base. The weather was fantastic, and the insects were hungry for Emma's legs. The beach looks absolutely fantastic, but there will still be plenty of work to be done building the path for visiting scientists to reach the migrant turtle population. Especially after the rangers dropped in that maybe the ranger station could do with some work too.



Project Alpha 2 at Volcan Tenorio: Elsa and Piers had a great time wandering around the national park, checking out the waterfall and hot springs. They had a good look at the path building work, which will be a real challenge and also give plenty of opportunity to meet the local wildlife. But there are natural hot springs available to ease aching muscles.



Project Alpha 3 at Salitre: Kiren and Ellie found a common interest in travel sickness as they travelled out to the remote community of La Rosa. They were able to meet most of the people in the community, who were delighted to show them round and keep them stoked with beans, rice and pasta. Ellie wanted to know how to make the excellent local coffee, better than anything she had tasted before - the answer being to take coffee, and add hot water...


Project Alpha 4 at Chirripo: Nimrat, Helen and Emma P had a pretty arduous journey out to the community who are looking forward to their new classroom being built (the picture below shows the current one, which is barely standing). After evading a highly territorial cow, Helen was instructing her comrades in the art of hill walking shortly before sliding bottom-first down the hill. They then built up the confidence of the locals by setting about cooking dinner, strategically positioned beneath a bee-hive.


The logistics team had an exciting recce of the mystery location for the adventure challenge phase - but I can't tell you about that (or I'd have to kill you). Suffice to say the howler monkeys let them know when it was morning in no uncertain terms.

After all this excitement everyone returned to Field Base to write up plans for each project. We then built a lovely row of tents (don't they look nice?) to house the participants for a few days on your arrival.


This was hot work, but we freshened up with a quick rafting trip yesterday which I can report was truly fantastic.




The next couple of days give us space for a few final hours of preparation before the first wave of participants from Costa Rica arrive. Then the remaining participants land on Monday and arrive here on Tuesday. Bring it on!