Alpha 3 - Carara update

Since the last update Alpha 3 have had another great week in Carara National Park. We had a fun time entertaining fieldbase and celebrating Louisa’s 19th birthday last weekend. Our rock collecting may have been interrupted but our brains were certainly put into action as we all deliberated over stick, triangle and music box games. We all enjoyed a quiz evening fuelled by Julian’s extensive knowledge and an incredible energy bomb birthday cake.

On Monday Alpha 3 was buzzing with excitement for what was to be our day off at Playa Hermosa (a beach about an hour away). Thanks to our PMs, Jon and Adri, we had an amazing day. Fortunately the bus did stop for us despite us not being at a bus stop and the sun shined as we spent most of the day in the sea – playing chicken much to Jon’s expense. On our journey back everyone was very refreshed, happy and glowing. We thought our day could not get any better ... but it did when we discovered a man on the bus who was more than delighted as we all whipped out our refried bean packets to trade with him for salted plantains.

Since then we have continued with our work. Thanks to Jemma the mural is completed and looks great. The main focus has continued to be reconstructing the dilapidated pathways in Carara. We hope to finish the circuit we have been working on by Thursday. We have continued to see lots of wildlife while we have been working, including a snake, an anteater, a jungle chicken and of course plenty of Scarlet Macaws.

Back at jungle camp we have enjoyed another quiz night, this time with a jungle theme dress code. And a couple of nights ago we were introduced to the cup game. We are still holding out for a venturer to beat Adri. All in all we are having a really good time. Even our first drop of rain on Saturday was greeted with smiling faces... that is until Ollie tried to sleep in his basher bed.
Over our last few days we are hoping to complete the pathway reconstruction in the area we have been concentrating on, enjoy our second day off possibly exploring the jungle and take down our jungle camp as part of our big clean up operation at the casa verde! Then we will be heading back to fieldbase early on Thursday morning for changeover. Time has flown by so fast, it is hard to believe we only have a few more days on phase one as Alpha 3.

Raleigh CR&N Videos

It's not long now until we have our groups back from their phase 1 projects and then we will finally have some photos for you. I know many of you are missing your loved ones, so to keep you going until they get back here are a few slidesows from the induction period. There are three slideshows - the Advance Volunteer Manager Induction, the Project Manager Induction and the Venturer Induction - all put together by our amazing photographer, Ale. We'll be adding more and more videos to our youtube channel over the next couple of months - 'RaleighCRN'.

Trekking - Alpha 1 stylee!

Alpha 1 have passed the halfway point of the Turrisantos trek! Yey! Though it hasn’t been easy. Day 5 was an epic 28 km journey that left us all blistered and bruised, but our pain gave rise to the funniest line of the trek so far: “Alpha 1, where the heck are you?!!” cried an exasperated Tim, inadvertently making us all burst into laughter.

The rough conditions of day 5 however led to a very welcome lie-in the next day, which was followed by an excellent and efficient foot clinic run by PM Dr Katie. Seven years of medical training to be treating blisters! Despite the late start, we got to our campsite in good time, and desperate for a wash, we all took a dip in the nearby river. We were enjoying a refreshing swim when the most unusual thing floated by - a rather dead chicken. Needless to say, we all got out of the water pretty quickly after that.

Days 5, 6 and 7 were extra special for Alpha 1 as we had a special guest from Fieldbase – finance manager Holly. Her cheerfulness and motivation were most welcome, although I think her most useful skill was her great expertise in putting tents up! Day 7 saw an early finish for Alpha 1, so we spent the afternoon relaxing on a football pitch and playing with the local children. Although I don’t think they appreciated it when their football rolled over and Hanko had his penknife out!

Day7 also brought possibly our best sleeping location so far – the storeroom behind the shop. The shopkeeper was absolutely lovely and insisted that we all bought something, so we had an afternoon feast of churros, crisps and ice cream. A food drop was much appreciated on day 7 especially as it brought Claire, Caroline and Alfredo to visit us from Fieldbase, and they spent the night with us in our cosy storeroom.

Unfortunately on day 8, Rosh came down with a stomach bug, so she had to head back to Fieldbase with Katie. The rest of Alpha 1 powered on up some very steep terrain. It was tough at times, kudos to Louis who was physically pushing me up the mountain at points, but we eventually got to our campsite, which was an electricity pylon. After carefully constructing our tents around the pylon we settled down to dinner around a lovely campfire built by Hanko. The altitude meant it was really quite chilly, so the warmth from the fire was much appreciated. We all fell asleep to the sweet sound of electricity humming...

Day 9 was one of the milestones for Alpha 1. After an arduous climb, we reached the highest point of the whole trek, 2852 meters. It was an amazing feeling and not at all ruined by Allegra pondering: “Is this a hill or a mountain?” Quickly followed by: “It can’t be a mountain, it doesn’t have snow on top.” – this from someone about to study geography at university. Day 9 also brought the halfway point of the trek. Round of applause for PM Roeland who helped us celebrate in style by buying tuna and jalapeno peppers to jazz up our dinner of pasta and sauce. The community centre we stayed in that night even had a table and some chairs, so we sat down to a wonderful formal halfway dinner.

We covered a lot of ground on day 10 due to the Pan American highway. This tarmac, perfectly flat road was (by some) very welcome after 9 days of jungle and rocky tracks. Another plus of the highway was the numerous service stations, so we were able to pick up some tasty snacks at each trekking break.

All in all, we are continuing to make good progress, and Playa Hermosa feels that little bit closer. Pura Vida!