News from the Charlies

The Bravo 4 roadies arrived back this morning from a brief visit to our Charlie groups 2 and 3! When we arrived they were putting some serious elbow grease into their project work; digging, shoveling, cementing and painting there buildings to life in the sweltering Costa Rican sunshine. Still, the girls were enjoying themselves, smiling brightly and passionately singing there way through the day!

Charlie 3 had a mammoth day of work on the 5th August, rushing to get the project finished before it’s time to leave. The pig pens are well on their way to being finished and the pits are were being finalized with a few finishing touches when we arrived. It’s hard work to say the least but these girls are doing an incredible job. A couple of days ago some local women from the community came to visit the group with some fresh fruit. They got chatting and explained how impressed they were with their work. The locals commented on the fact that they are not used to seeing girls doing such hard and heavy labor, and how impressed they were with they strength and courage. Quite right. In response to this Charlie 3 invited to them to share some dinner with them that evening, to which the locals graciously accepted.

Teaching English at the local school!

Charlie 2 are also on good form. We left them earlier this morning, head to toe in blue paint, as they made the final touches to their kindergarten. Later on today they intend to mark there stamp on the walls with a muriel of the world with footstep going from the UK to Costa Rica and there names printed around it! As well as the hard work, the group have been soaking up the beautiful scenery around them, washing and swimming in the gorgeous river just a five minute walk down from the building site, and yesterday went to support the local boys lose at a game of football. Hmm, perhaps they were distracted. One of the highlights of the expedition for the girls so far has been the opportunity to sit in on the classes at the local school. Yesterday they attended Biology and Math's lessons, which was then followed up by a salsa class with the pupils and teachers - sounds like a fun day at school! Last night we all enjoyed a fairly intense, home-made game of Taboo. Unfortunately the road trip team were beaten by the girls as they raced there way to a whopping 14 points last minute! We only had 7… a poor show from us but fun all the same.

After chatting to the groups it seems that the guys are really enjoying working on the projects and being surrounded by new cultures. As the work comes to an end the final product is starting to take shape and the groups are gaining a real sense of achievement now that they can clearly see what all the hard work is for. Vicky Foden commented “It’s been the hardest two weeks of my life, but so rewarding. Even more so when we get to meet the people that it’s going to benefit.”

Charlie 1 have come to the end of their expedition and we said goodbye to them at the airport this morning. Our Charlie 2 and 3 groups finish their builds on Monday and will continue on to part two of their expedition, the adventure challenge - fun times ahead! Pura vida.

*Blog written by Dawn Tennant and photo's by Polly Baldwin