Photos for Updates.

Ahhh. Yes. Pictures. I DO have some of these, though teh rate of picture takng has dropped dramatically since January.
Nonetheless, here are some from the past...oh, 2 months.
TIKAL! Tikal was beautiful and majestic and hidden and jungle-ous and simply wonderful. Hot and muggy, but wonderful. Pictures seemed like a lame way to capture this place, but we tried. It was HUGE.
For a few weeks, Sarah and I found our blond counter parts, Justine and Liz, who we managed to find or drag to 3 different countries. Here we are playing banana plantations unsuccessfully looking for the beach.

Like Sarah said...there seems to be no way to capture Bocas del Toro and Mondo Taitu, but this was Sarah and me promoting for the upside down, inside out and backwards party, hence the shoes on the head.

80s power hour at Mondo. Few other places can you go to where this is acceptable dress.

this week we had the pleasure of sharign our time in Central America with Jessica and Meredith!! While their time here was short, and I have to keep looking at my pics to ensure that it was reality, it was such a blessing to have them here and SOOOO fun. We bussed to remote national parks and walked to waterfalls, and swam in the Pacific, and bronzed ourselves, while being happy to be together.

As our time comes to a close, i am feeling ready, but simultaneously wishing i could stay longer. Am trying to soak in these last fwe days of sun and rain forest before flying back to the good ole US of A.

PURA VIDA.

do we really have a blog??

heyyyy everyone!
so we know its been a while, and that kaia joye is coming home sooner than either of us would like to imagine, but we know by now that a blog update is probably way overdue...
Today finds us in Dominical on the Pacific coast of Costa Rica, basking in the sun/simply appreciating being a real person after being rather sick for a couple of days. BUT sun´s up and so are we and Dominical´s a fun little surf town with lots of Semana Santa-ers and crazy waves and funny surfers. Jessica and Meredith just left an hour ago... crazy how fast their time went by!! We spent a few nights in Uvita (BEAUTIFUl coast town just south of here... "costa rica before the booming building orgy") and then a few days here in Dominical. Pretty laid back ¨spring break¨ for all... we were super excited for them to be here and had a great time.
Bocas was a little too much to describe in a blog entry-- let´s just say it was crazy, we met lots of really fun people, the owners of Mondo Taitu are amazing people, the vibe was great, the beaches were beautiful, and we had enough good times to last us for a while. There´s a chance one or two of us might end up back there for a spell.. but I guess we´ll have to wait and see.
For now we´re just enjoying Costa Rica while it lasts... only about a week left here for the two of us together!! Its hard to believe that two and a half months is nearing its end... we´ve done so much and seen so many things and met so many people... I don´t want it to end! But soon enough you´ll be able to talk to Kaia Joye as a real person in real life or on real telephones and that will be wonderful. As for me April is an open book so we´ll just see what happens!!
Coming right up.... get excited(!) for some sweet pics, courtesy of KJ--

icing on the cake

If it's even possible to top the excitement of our latest adventures... to put some icing on the cake that was our last few days....somehow it has happened:
For the first two weeks of March, Kaia Joye and I will be working at a hostel in Panama!!!\
Us, working! At a hostel! In Panama!
What do we mean by 'work'? you ask... well, we plan parties, stay for free, eat for free, drink for free, or maybe even get cash for free.
And what do we mean by 'plan parties'? you say next... well, we have no idea.
But one thing is for certain: PANAMONIUM!!
get excited.

we LOVE today.

Everyday seems better than the last causing us to run up and down the streets yelling "I LOVE TODAY!"

The lack of posting can really only be blamed on three things: constant movement, $6/ hr internet, and perhaps laziness. But here we are, out of Guatemala, through Honduras for a week or two, and now in Nicaragua at El Zopilote, a permaculture farm on Isla de Ometepe. Being a permaculture farm, there is always work to be done, so for 4 hours of work, you get 20% off your stay, be it a camp site, hammock, what have you. We are paying $2 a person, so the 40 cents is really important to us...
ANyway. Ysterday we worked, the manual labor feeling good compared to the lazy days of the Bay Islands where we sat and walked and sat and sunned and went diving and drank some brews... We carried some cement, picked beans, shelled cocoa, ground cocoa into chocolate, and shelled beans. At 1 fresh bread, cookies, and muffins appeared bringing joy to all those who were near (a spread of fresh baked goods, marmelades, and rums are produced daily) making us hard workers feel like our blood, sweat, and tears were justly rewarded. A late afternoon walk through a fairytale land banana plantation with small baby animals at every turn illuminated by that perfect 4:00 light that makes things appear more magical than you could imagine, finished our afternoon. And by finished, I mean it got us ridiculously lost leaving us 4 or 5 miles past our destination and pooped to say the least. Having already walked 4 miles, and it turning to dusk and being lost, I could only hope that a truck full of palm frawns would drive by offering us a bed of leaves to sleep on to drive us back to our farm. Not 5 minutes after having verbalized this to sarah, a plantain truck drives by. We stick out our hands and with the shout of "ARRIBA!" we climbed atop and met Javier, a nice 17 year old boy who loved sarahs blue-green eyes, and made conversation as we dodged tree branches and the possible clotheslining by telephone wires. This is NOT a dream. I LOVE THIS ISLAND.
Today we even managed to find a school to volunteer at, so we walked up and down the streets looking for birds and drawing them, teaching the kids to say "I LOVE TODAY!"

more pics

piñas at the lake. delightful

please note: this picture has been altered in no way. both teachers are also wearing 2-3" heels. We are GIANTS here.

watermelon spitting seed contest

family at the Mountain School

morning sunrise hike.

lago de Atitlán. 360 view like this of mountains and volcanos. BEAUTIFUL.

Market Pics

What continues to surprise me about Guatemala is its topography--its wild. If you get a chance, you should check out a topographical map.
San Francisco Market, where we went with our teachers last week, was appropriately named due to its hills, making the experience, besides overwhelming, tiring. But it was worth it. Check these out.

colors here are awesome. even with trash its still cool. feels like an anthropologie ad, doesnt it?

at the top of the hilly market mess we found ourselves in the animal district. sheep. cows. dogs. chickens. roosters. goats. cats. ducks. you name it...

knives? machetes? tools? anyone?

two great pieces of information

1. the discovery of 3 for Q 10 tacos has changed our lives.
ten quetzals (Q10) is about 1.20.

2. the piece of glass lodged in my thumb for the past 2 and half months weasled its way out. great news.