X-Ray 1: Coast to Coasting

Setting out from Limon in the pouring rain, after dipping our toes in the carribbean sea, X-Ray 1 began their epic Coast to Coast adventure. Following train tracks we started to walk, meeting various locals along the way. Our first night was in a banana plantation where we stayed in a church and were awake up until 8pm! due to the congregation singing and enjoying their evening. We even enjoyed delicious homemade ice cream which was made by a local family. 

 2 beautiful Toucans, does that equal 4 cans?

 Sunrise in stunning Barbilla National Park

The following day was tough as we walked 21km on already blistering feet but finally made it to where we stayed that night in relative luxury. We continued to walk on Day 3, passing waterapple trees and banana plants. Whilst stopping for a break, a local took pity on us and macheted down some seedy bananas for the team. The locals continued to show their hospitality with one man even inviting us into his house and giving us some guanabana fruit and fried plantane crisps. As you can tell food is incredibly important to us! 

 Morning yoga before a big day of trekking into the Barbilla Jungle

 The view over the rolling hills from the community centre X-Ray 1 slept in

Henry with the neatest backpack ever seen on trek

With the daunting, yet exciting prospect of the next 3 days trekking through the jungle, seeing amazing wildlife and stunning views, we are more determined than ever to rise to the challenge set before them of completing trekking from the Caribbean Coast to the Pacific Coast.

X-Ray 1, 4 days down, 15 to go of their epic cross-continental journey

Blog written by X-Ray 1's Comms Officers Izzy Letty and Abi Hayward

The sun shines on Zulu 1

Zulu 1 send messages home from the Coast to Coast Trek.  The sun came out part way through the filming which, although a good thing for our trekkers, did rather mess up our video.  So apologies for the bright light and hope that you can still make everybody out.

In order you'll hear from Clare, Ben, Bo, Patrice, Lilian, Eveline, Henry, Sarah, Paul, Angel, Mela, Ziggy and Claudia.

Zulu 1 - make it out of the jungle

The Zulu 1 warriors started of on the Caribbean coast meeting some amazing locals on the way, before heading off into the jungle.

Claudia & Angel plan ...

...Mela checks

The jungle was full of amazing scenery but also full of mud, steep hills, more mud and rain.  We all slid about, a LOT.  Top tumbler awards go to Patrice and Lilian amassing 15 slips each (at least) - though no harm done except to their pride.

Ben overjoyed wit the thought of a day trekking

After the jungle we headed to St Joaquin and stayed in a church and had an amazing time walking through towns and taking in some Costa Rican culture.

Eveline and Lilian side be side

Just when we thought we were finished with the jungle we had some more hills and stunning views with a spot of camping.  Then lo and behold we were back in the jungle with more mud and steep hills.  But the hills can't bring down the Zulu warriors and as we have arrived at every destination early. 

Bo strides out

This evening we have just arrived at a community centre at Esperanza after conquering two mountains and reaching almost 3,000 metres.  We literally have our heads in the clouds.  We are pretty damn awesome, we don't really need the PMs anymore - but we let them come along for the views.

Patrice, Project Comms officer

Patrice taking a moment to reflect

Which Zulu are you?

And all too soon we have reached the final phase of the 12L expedition.  We've gone from Alpha to Zulu and these are the new group allocations.  Deployment was bright and early on Friday morning with everyone now on their way.

Remember to quote the Zulu name in any messages that you send in via the blog, even though they aren't published on the website we do make sure that they are given to your nearest and dearest as soon as we can.


Zulu 1 - Coast to Coast Trek, Costa Rica
Claudia Fiedler, Claire Skelton, Sarah Crawford,
Henry Anderson, Ziggy Parris, Angel Mejia, Paul Darius, Ben Byers, Mela Piedra, Lilian Keller, Patrice Hollywood, Bo Brand, Eveline Kroese

Zulu 1 - Coast to coast

Zulu 2 - Miratombo Trek, Nicaragua
Sarah Flynn, Jim Howard, Barney Harker
Alex Robertson, Hidde Van Lent, Callum Blues, Jose Quesada, Hester van Marwijk Kooy, Jakeling Escoto Rivera, Frankie Owusu-Brobbey, Yorleny Bermudez, Andrea Grundke, Vinnie Moriarty Barron

Zulu 2 - Miratombo Trek

Zulu 3 - Environmental, starting in Carara National Park, Costa Rica
Jae Quiros, Vic Lapsins
Jonas Koch, Luke Waldock, Jonathan Corrales, Pedro Ocon, Archie Finlayson, Anika Kandola, Anna McManus, Arlene Rodriguez, Sophie LaMarre

Zulu 3 - Environmental

Zulu 4 - Los Loros Water project, Nicaragua
Florian Cross, Charlie Cox, Karen Malone
Marco Mora Jimenez, Diego Molina, Matt Whiteside, Ben Hilton-Delhaye, Omar Ochoa, Carlyn Brown, Puck Van der Vet, Suwen James, Shannon Potter, Claudia Audlie

Zulu 4 - Los Loros

Zulu 5 - Miraflor House building project, Nicaragua
Natalie Metcalfe, Pauline Wright, Nicole Ferris
Ben Persofsky, Jack Moxham, Louis Tindall, Harley Decker, Dave Rosen, Gustavo Granados, Floor van Selms, Vera Juarez, Tiggy Taliadoros, Vic McIrvine, Aishath Green

Zulu 5 - Miraflor

Coming soon... expedition 13A!

Hello All

We are very much looking forward to having you here soon. Preparations are going well and we are working furiously to have everything ready for your arrival. I'm sure you will all have a million questions, but you should find the answers in your welcome pack / emails - if there is anything else you need please do not hesitate to get in touch with David Winterflood at Head Office. Another excellent way to prepare yourself is by having a good look through this blog / watching some of our end of phase slideshows. Undoubtedly, the biggest question you will have will be about the projects you will be doing... so here they are, the projects for Expedition 13A…. See you soon!

First of all, the community projects:

Achuapa, Nicaragua - Water Project
Close to the town of Achuapa, in one of the poorest most remote areas of Nicaragua, Raleigh will be working on a gravity-feed water project to bring clean and safe drinking water to 20 families. At present the local people get their water from the river which often dries up in summer or comes from polluted water sources. This project is a multi-stakeholder partnership with the local community, the Cooperativa Juan Francisco Paz Silva and Raleigh. The group will be working with the local population to dam small streams, build tanks to collect the water from where it can run through pipes to all the local houses. The benefits of clean water will be felt by many generations to come. The participants will be living directly with families in the village and will help out with their day-to-day tasks.

 

Conte Burika Indigenous Territory – Health Post Build
Deep in Costa Rica’s tropical south, the Punta Burika peninsula runs along the Panamanian border and is home to the Ngobe – an independent, indigenous people who live by subsistence farming in this beautiful but remote area. While their day-to-day life is seemingly simple and peaceful, the Guaymi face many complicated issues ranging from losing land to more assertive farmers across the border, to having little or no access to health and education. At the request of the community of la Carona, Raleigh will build a health post in order to provide health care for a wide area and dispersed population. Tricky access means that materials will mostly came from the surrounding forest – a highly skilled indigenous sierrista (chainsaw operator) will carefully selected trees from the reserve for the team to dry, saw, plane and sand before they construct a stilted wooden building.

And the treks...

The Coast to Coast Trek - Costa Rica
This trek starts at the Caribbean Sea and ends on the Pacific Coast. It starts out close to the port of Limon, heading along railway tracks and through small communities to Barbilla National Park. From here the groups walk through Chirripó Indigenous Territory to Bajo Pacuare. They then head to the beautiful Pejibaye river and over to Tapanti National Park. The groups ascend to nearly 3000m through the park before descending down to the Pacific Ocean via the Cerro Dragon peak. The trek ends at the beautiful Playa Palo Seco, where the groups make a final dash into sea having walked an amazing 270km, with each trekker having crossed not only a country but a continent also.

Miratombo Volcanoes Trek - Nicaragua
In the far north of Nicaragua, close to the border with Honduras, this Raleigh group will walk along a mountain ridge through the pine forests above Esteli. From here you will head along a ridge that passes by the Estanzuela waterfall and protected areas going through remote communities. The trek heads towards the Momotombo Volcano from which the trek takes its name before climbing up Volcan El Hoyo with fabulous views over Lake Managua. The trek finishes at the crater lake of Asososca – a beautiful crystal clear lake that was once a volcanic crater.

...not forgetting the environmental projects.

Carara National Park – National Park Infrastructure
Carara is one of the oldest national parks in the country and an extremely important one. It holds large areas of primary tropical rainforest with high densities of mammal and bird life – as such it is one of the most visited national parks in Costa Rica. The Lago Meandrica trail is one of the most visited trails in the park as there are great possibilities for seeing mammals and abundant birdlife, however currently the trail is closed as there is no proper control at the entrance and the first half of the trail often gets flooded in the rainy season. So the national park approached Raleigh with the task of building a new trail out to the lake which starts at the visitor centre and avoids flooded areas. This important project will re-open up the park to thousands of visitors each year upon which the local economy depends. You will be continuing the good work of expedition 12 who were based in the park from September to December

Alpha 1 - tired but happy!

Alpha Uno on the final stretch

Hola everyone!  This is Alpha Uno again, checking in approximately 101kms from when we chatted last.  Over the last 9 days we've wandered through the wilderness of the Costa Rican jungle, hiked up to the highest point of our trek and finally ended up on some semi-flat land.

Alpha one - a well deserved sit down

Our 3 day stint in the jungle was an experience in itself.  Often we found ourselves slipping and sliding in mud up to the tops of our boots whilst our cries for help were drowned out by the laughter of everyone else watching us flail around uselessly.  Although the majority of the slopes we climbed resembled towering walls rather than forgiving inclines, we somehow managed to drag ourselves, and our team mates, into the light of day to stay in some of the most amazing places any of us had ever seen.  The breathtaking views we woke up to every morning more than made up for the soggy boots and caked on mud we endured the previous day.

Candle lit dinners on trek

After leaving the jungle behind we continued our ascent up massive hills, everyday coming closer to our highest altitude of 2842m above sea level.  What an incredible achievement to have walked more than 100kms, but also nearly 3kms above our starting point on the shore of the Caribbean Sea.  Many a hug was shared atop that mountain.  It was a moment all of us will remember with pride whilst recounting our trekking tales in the years to come.

Filling up on pasta

However something to be kept in mind whilst climbing such heights: although technically closer to the sun, one must always pack a fleece and at least on pair of warm and dry socks.  This was unfortunately forgotten by many on Alpha Uno, we have instead resorted to cuddling to share body heat, eating as many meals as possible in our sleeping bags, as well as consuming copious amounts of tea and coffee.  So far this seems to be working.

Keeping warm

As we enter the final chunk of our trek we welcome flat land with open arms.  It is a much needed break for our aching knees and feet.  Although we tend to begin and end these days shrouded in a fine mist, we easily breeze through 20kms days on this less hilly terrain.  This does, however, require many an early start.

Sophie signing off

On that note, Alpha Uno signs out and into the home stretch of our journey.  See you on the other side.

from Sophie, Project Comms Officer

Alpha 1, Coasting along.........

Alpha 1 

Here is a taster of life on the coast to coast expedition as written by our Project Comms Officer Sophie.

Hey there, outside world! This is Alpha Uno reporting 8 days and approximately 102 kms into our first phase of this expedition.  So far, we've seen a large variety of the weather Costa Rica has to offer, from the scalding sun during our first day at the Caribbean Sea to the evening rain we set up camp in last night, we've survived it all! We've also covered a lot of distance over a wide range of terrain, and are feeling rather accomplished!  The map sheet we've just moved off of had roads, rivers and railways and the map we've just began is essentially only contour lines.

A little breakdown of what our days look like: a typical rooster-call wake-up, courtesy of venturer Chama, is around 4 am, followed by a quick breakfast of porridge.  Our early wake-ups allow us to (for the most part) avoid the full heat of the Central American sun.  Lunch consists mainly of crackers, re-fried beans, and if we're lucky meat!  Although we already seem to have misplaced half of a salami.....! Our afternoons contain slightly longer breaks and water refills kindly supplied by locals. This generosity never ceases to amaze us.  All of us have tried some new fruits and had a dry building (community centres) to sleep in with an occasional shower provided to us by strangers.  It's incredible and humbling to experience this great kindness, and all of us are very grateful.

Every day on this trek is a new experience for each of us. As one of the venturers put it "every breath is a new beginning".  We're all learning to be present in the moment, and to appreciate every aspect of this amazing experience that we're so lucky to be a part of.

They may have been sparkly new boots on arrival  but have certainly now seem some action since  Alpha 1 emerged from several days trekking in the jungle!

Early starts and fond farewells...

Today is deployment day - the day when all Alpha groups head out to their projects.  It starts early with alarm calls at 3.30 am, that's right I said 3.30 AM!  And there was no avoiding it as Martina drove a Land rover around the campsite with both the horn and radio blaring - nice one Martina.

Ben and Sophie and a big sandwich

There was time to make a big sandwich for breakfast and another one for lunch and then belongings and tools had to be loaded on the buses.

Yorleny, Tigi and Patrice - watching over a lot of heavy rucksacks

Bonds have been formed over the past few days so there were fond farewells, best wishes and hugs as new friends said "Adios" for 19 days.  And a few venturers had a special goodbye for Splatches, the resident Fieldbase dog, who is keen to be everyones best friend.

Henry, Matt and Lilian say goodbye to Splatches

As the sun came up the buses headed off in different directions - to Playa Hermosa, Carara National Park, Nicaragua and the start of the Coast to Coast Trek.  Some will be travelling for a couple of hours and some for a couple of days, before they arrive at their destination and the work begins. 

On their way

Remember to leave your messages here and we will make sure that they are received by you loved ones whilst they are away at their projects - your kind wishes mean a lot to everyone.

Alpha group allocations - then off to jungle camp

An important day today, the venturers were told which projects they will be doing through the first phase of expedition.  The project managers took to the stage and performed project based skits - hence the kilts, mutant turtle masks, monkeys and shell suits that appear in the photographic record.

So here is the running order...

Alpha 1 - Coast to Coast Trek

Left to Right: Pedro Ocon, Florentine E van Selms, Jonathan Gerardo Corrales Marenco,Vera Juarez Vargas, Aisha Green, Sophie LaMarre, Benjamin Avern, Natalie Metcalfe, Matthew Wilkinson, Benjamin Hilton-Delhaye, Nicole Ferris, Rory Thompson, Dave Myer

Alpha 2 - Miratombo Trek (Nicaragua)

Left to Right: Claudia Fiedler, Diego Molina Rodriguez, Arlenne Rodriguez Leandro, Puck van der Vet, Archie Finlayson, Benjamin Persofsky, David Rosam, Suwen James, Harley Decker, Shannon Potter, David Agombar (Omar Antonio Amaya Ochoa will join in Nicaragua)

Alpha 3 - Playa Hermosa/Carara National Park

Left to Right: Henry Anderson, Tracy Heyburn, Callum Blues, Angel Roberto Mejia Quintero, Marco Mora Jimenez, Eveline Kroese, Rahim Hassanali, Laura Perry, Jim Howard, Lilian Keller, Clare Skelton, Lydia Auty, Matt Whiteside (Max Smith arrived today to join the group and Andrea Grundke will join shortly.)
  
Alpha 4 - Carara National Park/Playa Hermosa

Left to Right: Hidde Van Lent, Ben Byers, Victoria McIrvine, Carlos Lugo, Patrice Hollywood, Gustavo Granados Bolanos, Zahir Parri, Yorleny Bermudez Murillo, Paul Darius, Antigone Taliadoros, Jae Quiroz, Sarah Crawford, Charlie Cox, Pauline Wright

Alpha 5 - Water project, Achuapa (Nicaragua)

Left to Right: Florian Cross,  Jose David Quesada Murillo, Sarah Flynn, Vic Lapsins, Jonas Koch, Hester Van Marwijk Kooy, Anika Kandola, Melania Piedra Castillo, Nicholas Masters, Alexander Robertson, Anna McManus, Luke Waldock (Jakeling Escoto Rivera will join us in Nicaragua.)

Now that the Alpha groups are formed each will head out to learn campcraft and navigation skills, bonding over basha beds and trangias.  Bags packed they headed off to spend the night at jungle camp.