Romeo 6: A great sense of achievement and respect

Andrew Kirby looks back on Romeo 6's adventures in Rio Arriba:

We spent our final phase in one of the most beautiful places in the world with some amazing local families who welcomed us into their homes and their hearts. Our mission was to provide them with clean, reliable water directly to their homes. We were finishing Alpha 5's work started in Phase 1 of the expedition.

We arrived in Rio Arriba to a great welcome and were assigned families, we then started settling into new lives for the next couple of weeks. On the first day we were taken on  tour of the village, the work site and the water source before starting work building a tank to connect the source and the village.

After this we were building trenches down from the tank to the main houses in the village, fitting pipes and then covering them up. We worked until midday most days, with a few exceptions when we had good weather in the afternoon.

Most afternoons we met down at the river for a wash and swim after a hot day's work and then went to the main house to teach the children some English. They caught on quickly and did the lessons with enthusiasm and we played some games of Deal as well.

We managed to finish the project and brought clean water to 20 houses, a school and church through our hard work and determination. On our last day in the village we turned on the first lot of taps. We were all excited and happy that we were able to give this gift that we take for granted in the UK with tons of help from the locals who truly become our families in Nicaragua.

We sang songs for them on the last day in the village including Jingle Bells, Rattling Bog and If You're Happy and You Know It, even getting the kids involved. Then they sang some local songs for us.

We moved to another community called La Guarama for the last couple days where we started work on a water project which will be completed by another expedition. Again we welcomed into their homes with amazing hospitality and massive portions of amazing food.

On the last night of phase, the Coopertiva and the locals threw us a party including amazing food and a piñata which we all had a go smashing - some of us almost smashing the nearby house and the crowd at the same time. Some of locals from Rio Arriba came to say goodbyes as well and we took pictures with our families and the Coopertiva staff.

We left Nicaragua in love with the country and its people and a great sense of achievement and of respect.