Weekend Traveling

And another eventful week has passed.
Between the roaring preparations for our upcoming children's art class, quick sprints to Loz Pozos, cooking Lasagna with the other volunteers, listening to an audio book, and taking long naps because of the heat, it hardly felt like a week passed.

Over the weekend I joined the other volunteers for a reunion in Trinidad, a city in the province Beni, about 10 hours away from Santa Cruz de la Sierra.

There, we wanted to help one of the volunteers with his project - clean up the yard and paint - and at the same time travel to a new part of Bolivia. Nice enough, the coordinator of the "Montero volunteer group" (Montero is a town 2 h away from Santa Cruz and we usually have our reunions with them) organized our bus tickets and stay in the hotel.
We left Santa Cruz on Friday at 9:00 PM in a super comfortable Bus Cama. That means, a bus with seats that are almost as comfy as a bed, with super deep cushions and a lot of space. Sadly, the bus was air conditioned so that it got cold overnight, but that was not too much of a problem.
At about 7:00 AM we arrived in Trinidad, tired and hungry. We had been told that it would be warm in Trinidad, but - surprisingly - it was rather fresh when we got there. To our dismay it also looked like it would rain. We walked to our Hotel to change and eat breakfast; coffee, cheese&ham sandwiches, and "jugo de piña" - pineapple juice.
After breakfast the Trinidad volunteer joined us - a merry reunion because we had last seen him about two months ago.
As we got ready to leave the hotel and head to the project about 15 mins. away from the center, it started to pour cats and mice (is that the right saying?? :D). No. Literally. It wouldn't stop raining. We walked two steps from the hotel to the taxi and were wet to our skin. Luckily it wasn't that cold anymore-it was mildly warm, so that gave us a bit of hope. I didn't mind the rain, I brought my rain boots so that I at least would have dry feet (Or so I thought, because even my feet got wet from all the rain).
The project is, if I understood it right, a sort of homework help center and kindergarten. We helped clean up and paint little pictures on the wall as best as we could. As seen in the first picture below, the garden was completely flooded and it didn't stop raining either, so it was hard to do anything. We tried cutting the grass with mild success. Originally, the idea was to create a path of stones around the house. Sadly, we didn't manage to do that.

After a few hard and, after a while, cold hours of work, we cooked in the project. Yummy! we made the usual rice and chicken, but with a surprise: We also made a salad of red cabbage and potatoes as well as yuca. Yuca is so good I could eat it all day.

In the afternoon we all went back to the hotel to take hot showers. In my room there was no hot water, but it felt good to take a shower nevertheless. After a restful nap, we set out to find dinner for a group of 18 people. We ended up splitting up. I ate a Crepe with chocolate sauce because I was still stuffed from Lunch.
My group also took advantage of the cocktail 2 for 1 offer :D Banana and Strawberry Colada are both very delicious.

Because it had started to rain again, the general mood was rather whiny and not too motivated. We went to a karaoke bar and everyone edged me on to sing a song so I did, but it didn't sound very good. Forgiven and forgotten, we went back to the hotel because, again, it wouldn't stop raining. we cuddled up in one of the rooms to play werewolf, a game that we played each night during the seminar. If you don't know it, check it out. Here are the rules. It's great. The rainy day ended in a fun, merry setting.
When I was too tired to sleep, I went to my room and stretched out in the hammock that hang in every room of the hotel. I slept very well. :)
One check on my bucket list. I've always wanted to sleep in a hammock.
The next morning we woke up bright and early to eat breakfast, this time consisting of empanadas (little fried bread pockets filled with warm cheese) one of my favorite things to eat here, coffee, and mango juice. After packing up our things, I went to the Mercado Campesino (farmer's market) to buy a certain kind of oil that produced only in Beni. It's called Majo oil. I'm not sure what that translates to, but we were told that it is really good for both hair and skin.

The market, in my opinion, was different from the markets in Santa Cruz, and I enjoyed walking around for a while. I bought an avocado which I ate yesterday. I need to learn to be patient because I ate the avocado too early. I just really craved avocado :D We sadly didn't have a lot of time to enjoy the Mercado because the plan was to drive to a lake nearby.

The lake, to me, seemed tiny, Nothing compared to Lake Michigan. But I wasn't expecting that, of course. I enjoyed being near water, went swimming, and took loads of pictures. With three of the other volunteers, I went to explore the surrounding nature of the Laguna. We saw gigantic birds, a butterfly that didn't fly away when we approached it, horses in the middle of a path, and a dead snake. I had a great time.

We were later told that there are vipers and caimanes in the Lake. that scared me a little. but nothing happened, so we're good.

That evening we went to dinner. the weather had cleared up after all and the sun even came out. I really like Trinidad better when it's not raining. the sunset was beautiful.
Now, our trip back to Santa Cruz was not quite as flawless as our journey to Trinidad. We were split up into two groups. I was in the later group, which I didn't mind. We walked to the bus stop to catch the bus. Half of my group got in when the bus suddenly took off without warning and the few of my friends that hadn't gotten on yet had to run after the bus until it stopped on the street in front of the bus terminal. Once in the bus there were complications with our seats. In the end everything was fine but the whole situation was stressful for all of us. Even though the bus was a downgrade from our first bus (which was luxury!!!!) I slept well and was more or less rested when we arrived in Santa Cruz.

I am glad I went to Trinidad. I had a good time and can now concentrate on my work again. We are starting our art classes on the 18th and I can't wait :)

Did I say that I'm taking dancing lessons? Yeahhhh Lena and dancing.....I thought that was an impossible thing but I'm having a great deal of fun even though I stumble over my feet every fourth step. :)

I hope you over on the other side of the world are not too cold, because I'm almost evaporating in this heat :D nooooooo mentira (lie) I'm enjoying the summery heat.

Always look forward,
Lena