Ecuador Week 3

We say goodbye to Quito and head off on a 6 hour bus journey to the coast and our digs at the dry forest. It was a slight change from Quito with no electricity and howler monkeys swinging past our rooms at all hours. After a couple of days adjusting to the new surroundings we grew to like the place. This week is when the real work began, and that means machetes...and more machetes, which appear to be used for everything imaginable in rural Ecuador. After a week of conservation our group splits into two and head to the beaches of Canoa and Puerto Lopez for the weekend. Living in the forest offers opportunities to see some of the coolest animals on the planet, including snakes, butterflies and various arachnids that were frequently pointed out by our indigenous tour guide Maximo. Adam was even offered the opportunity to handle a wild snake after Maximo tracked one, an offer which he sensibly declined.

Ecuador Week 2

Seven days in and we are now comfortable with the city and possibly a little too comfortable with each other. The highlight of this week was climbing the live volcano Cotapaxi. Several hours and numerous falls later, particularly by Jess, and we reach the peak flanked by Germans, Belgians and every other nationality imaginable. The cycle ride down was exhilarating and this being Quito the day certainly did not end there. Only 2 of us came out completely unscathed and thus decided to go for a swift drink. In Quito the party rarely ends quietly and we proceeded to return at 7 in the morning.

The next day we go to watch the famous Liga De Quito at the estadio Olympico, home of National football club. South American football is renowned for its exciting and free flowing approach, and this match did not disappoint with 5 goals and a win for top of the table Liga. As the week went on we were able to further practice our newly acquired Spanish with trips to Quito Market and were introduced to our ‘crazy’ team leader Frankie, and our group is finally complete. Quito and a fear of heights are not a great mix as I was to find out, but this did not spoil my trip up the Teleferiqo cable car which offers spectacular views and a concentrated hit of oxygen if one is interested. The week is rounded off with a trip to the beautiful cloud forest Mindo. You are surrounded by natural beauty including humming birds and endless waterfalls. Despite this the best thing about Mindo is the extreme zip lining which seems more like bungee jumping. It’s a great rush and it also offers the best view of the forest. Come night and we had, according to Katie, the ‘greatest pizza in the world’ and of course we partied (again) until the early hours.

Ecuador Week 1

It’s almost 3am and everyone has finally arrived and extremely tired, 3 hours of sleep later and we commence a city tour. Welcome to Ecuador. After a lovely Ecuadorian breakfast we take a very crowded bus to the old town of Quito. We begin by looking at some Churches and learn the odd fact that by being too ‘delicioso’ you are likely to go to hell. Little did we know it would get a lot stranger than this. Throughout our first week in Quito we discover that the nightlife is not something to miss, however on day 2 we realise that singing is not one its stronger points after visiting a local karaoke bar. We round off week one by visiting the Equator line. A few interesting facts about this place are that you cannot walk along the equator line properly and it is strangely easy to balance an egg on a nail.

FIji Update Weeks 7-8

Fiji:

Two weeks on in camp, that’s 14 more days of porridge and island life is in full swing. We were saddened to see the departure of three volunteers but our tears were soon dispelled by the return of our Mighty medics Bex and Joe. After this joyous reunion, we were then invited to the annual rugby sevens tournament in Nawara to support our village of Navatu. Nawara is a bustling metropolis (by Fijian

standards) that is supposedly a mere thirty minutes away by boat....Thirty minutes if your steering doesn't break causing volunteers to need to dunk whole limbs in the water to create enough drag to turn us around the river bends! After finally finding a place to moor the boat we decided to walk to the rugby which was now only fifteen minutes away but once again..."supposedly" (The Fijians have a very queer concept of distance versus time!) Half an hour later we were fortunate enough to be picked up by a local bus and on climbing aboard we recognised many a face from the surrounding villages. Upon finally arriving at the rugby, a great day was had by all, and though Navatu didn't win the volunteers got fresh beef which was a greatly received treat.

The week got better from there as our mighty medics brought us back a rare and delightful treasure from their travels, CHEESE!!!! We used this valuable commodity to make ourselves pizzas in the make shift pizza oven (an oil drum covered in cement).

Diving has been top notch over the last few days and one dive we saw seven sharks, two Bumphead Parrotfish and an intimidating large shoal of Great Barracuda. Not only is the aquatic life thriving but terrestrial animals are doing well to! Buru, our camps puppy, has started walking and after a de-flea by means of a tea-tree oil bath is now ridiculously cuddle able!

See you in 14 days! Lucy xxx

Fiji Update: Phase 22 Weeks 4 to 6 Blog update By Lizzie Wedderburn

Unfortunately the compressor broke last week, but our expedition leader Steve went to the capital, Suva, to get it fixed. It did mean that we couldn’t dive for a week which meant we had to come up with different ways to entertain ourselves. These included taking a walk up the hill to see the most amazing view ever, an inter Bure volleyball tournament and snorkelling trips. The less adventurous of us spent long afternoons at the sand spit, which is about a half hour walk from camp but well worth the journey.

As well as relaxing we caught up with our science training by going on many an educational snorkel. As soon as we were diving again we did our in water fish tests and cracked on with our size estimation skills. On Sunday the 15^th we went to our local village Navatu where we spent a beautiful sunny day with our adoptive families. After lunch everyone headed up to the hammock to soak up the view and then dispersed again to have multiple plates of cake and cups tea and not forgetting the kava!

We have started spotting whales out in the passage but unfortunately none of them have been close enough to identify them but apparently its humpback season. As well as whales we have seen a lot of White Bellied Long Nosed Spinner Dolphins which love to play in front of our boat, Up and Under. We saw a pod of about thirty of them including a few babies which were SOOOO cute!!! They’re not the only babies on camp though as one of the camp dogs, Alice, has given birth to an adorable puppy which we have named Beru.

It has been very hot recently which is great for the sunbathers amongst us but not so good for our fresh water supply so we are al hoping for rain some time soon, which makes a change from being home in the UK! It’s got to the stage in the phase were people go a bit nuts and in keeping with this a number of people on camp have shaved their heads to varying degrees, including me... This Thursday A level results came out so we all waited nervously whilst people got their results but thankfully everyone got into Uni. Some of the staff went on a ration run on Thursday as well so we all got our post and packages which made us a bit homesick but also brought us good things such as BBQ sauce, Milka chocolate and Sudokus!

This Sunday we went to another local village, Raviravi. This was awesome as the village is lovely, plus they had FLUSHING TOILETS!!!!! This was a very welcome change from carrying buckets of water up the hill to the toilet :D The food was amazing and the villagers were really welcoming and we all had a really nice day and were very sad to leave.

Today, Monday 23^rd August, was a sad day as three of our number left. We had a group photo on the beach and then waved them off with a few tears. None of us can quite believe that we have spent six weeks here already, it feels like just yesterday that we met each other at the airport looking very pale and quite tired as opposed to now when we are all very brown but still quite tired!

Anyways I’m off to be social so it’s goodnight from Nukubulavu camp!