YO HO HO!

Wednesday was a pretty awesome fun day.  We were at Los Lagos hotel and they have 7 hot tubs, a huge waterslide, crocodiles, a butterfly house and A FREAKIN VOLCANO AT THE FRONT DOOR!!  We were right at the base of Arenal Volcano so if it would have blown, we’d never have known because we’d have died instantly, that’s how close we were.  Good thing it isn’t an active volcano……wrong, the thing spews lava all the time but thankfully it’s the other side of the volcano that gets the lava flow.  So we had a great time seeing how many people we could put down the water slide at once without someone dying, the number was 12 in case you were wondering.  We could probably have pushed that number a bit but we ran out of volunteers.  The scenery in Costa Rica is beautiful and the hotel was a little up the hill so you could see the valley below, it was a great site.  So we spent almost the entire day in the pools.  Of course we had to try them all but the one with the waterslide was the best.  I think everyone enjoyed themselves Wednesday, I know I had a blast and the volcano never did spewed any lava :(.

Thursday we headed back to San Jose.  We left the hotel at 12:30 and stopped in La Fortuna for lunch.  We then headed onto San Jose stopping a souvenir shop so the group could shop for a few things to take back to the states.  We even stopped at Walmart, like not a walmart satellite store but an actual supercenter which is a rare site in Central America.  We then went to the hotel in San Jose where those flying back to the States got rooms for the night and those that were taking a bus to Choluteca, Honduras waited in the lobby until it was time to go.  The best part about that was that I got to see this guy you may have heard of, Lebron, win his second straight championship, woot woot.  The sad part was that we had to say goodbye to those heading home.  We had a great time for the 10 days we spent in Costa Rica.  The team worked incredibly well together with everyone doing what they were assigned.  No one seemed to complain too much and we really just didn’t have any problems except for that one bus ride.  I met some amazing people and made some new friends.  It was really great.

We left the hotel about 1:15 Friday morning and headed to the bus station.  If you have never been in the middle of San Jose at night, I suggest you don’t try it.  It’s not a very safe place at night as we found out a couple of years ago.  So of course the bus station had to be in the middle of the ghetto.  It was a pretty rough area so we had to be on our guard basically until we loaded the bus.  The bus ride wasn’t actually that bad other than it lasted 15 hours.  We left at 3 am and only had to stand in one line when we left Costa Rica.  Entering and leaving Nicaragua as well as entering Honduras were easy because the bus people took up our passports and went through the lines for us.  All we had to do was wake up and play a little game called off the bus, on the bus, off the bus, on the bus.  You have to get off the bus as you leave the country so your bags can be checked out and the bus can be looked over.  Then you get on the bus, cross the border and immediately stop to get off the bus so your bags can be checked and the bus can be checked by the people in the country you’re entering.  After that you get back on the bus to take off to wherever you’re going.  So we had to do that leaving Costa Rica, entering Nicaragua, leaving Nicaragua and entering Honduras.  It’s not bad, just more inconvenient than anything.  Thankfully there wasn’t anyone trying to take my backpack this time.  We made it to the hotel, hotel Gualiqueme, around 6.  That’s when I found out about the next grand adventure.

Thursday Leah Wright, one of the interns, had gotten in touch with her old soccer coach who is in Choluteca for the summer and working with Mission Lazarus.  He said that since we had an off day, Saturday we had nothing to do until the team of 70 arrived around 6, that we could go with him and his team to work.  He said that they would be working with a village on the Pacific coast installing latrines and water pumps in their wells.  It sounded like it would be a good thing to go do so four of the interns, Leah, Jose, Andrew and I, decided to go.  But it gets better.  He sends us an email saying that they will be working with an island community on an island, duh, out in the Pacific.  So then I’m like heck yea I’m in.  So we go and get into this canoe looking boat which was awesome and start heading out into the open seas……ok maybe not the open seas, more like the open bay.  We get to this island and I visited my second movie set of the trip.  The first was from Taken and this one was from Pirates of the Caribbean.  It was this perfect little pirate island with a village of about 80 homes.  Jose asked if it would be ok to move there and be a Christian and a pirate.  I’m pretty sure they used this sandbar there for the scene when Davy Jones is standing in a bucket with Will and the British captain guy and Jack, Elizabeth and Barbosa come walking up, I think that’s right.  Well we were there, at least it looked like that place.  We dug a 15 ft long, 4 ft wide, 4 ft deep hole for the latrines and then played in the ocean with the kids.  It was a pretty awesome day.  Hopefully I’ll get some pictures up on facebook tomorrow.  We had a blast.  They asked us to stay the night with them and sleep in tents and go to Church with them this morning which would have been awesome.  We called back to our group and they said absolutely not.  I’m still a little bitter about it, not really, but ok maybe a little….. or a lot. It would’ve been crazy awesome to have spent a night out there with the locals but maybe another time.  So we came back to the hotel and met up with the other interns who spent the day by the swimming pool and reading (they thought their day was great but they didn’t have a clue).  The group of 70 got here about 6 and we got them unloaded and to their rooms and then to dinner and then to devo and then to bed.  So quite a few people had a long day of flights and a bus ride, a few had a nice relaxing day by the pool and four of us had a grand adventure to a pirate island where we dug a big stinkin hole and swam with awesome local kids and some interns from Mission Lazarus in the Pacific.  I think we had the best day of all. 

Sunday, Today, we were up and off to Church about 8:30.  We went to Agua Agria. Tart Water, which is the village we will be working in for the next few days.  We went to their Church service and afterwards went out to eat and to the store to get some lunch materials.  Then we headed back to the hotel to sort the supplies that were brought from Tegucigalpa on Saturday.  We sorted tons of medicine and clothes and also worked on our VBS a little bit.  For the next 3 days we will be having VBS from 9am to 3pm…..Yea that’s a solid 6 hours!!  So we had to come up with a plan to turn our 2 hr VBS into a 6 hr VBS.  So we’ll see how it goes tomorrow.  After that it’s been sort of a relaxed night.  Tomorrow we will start a women’s Bible class, a medical clinic, a VBS and start construction of 2 houses and a classroom.  It should be a pretty great day even if it is blazing hot here.  In Panama if you spent 5 minutes outside in the shade you would start dripping sweat.  Here if you spend 5 minutes in the shade you don’t sweat.  Why? Because the sun will find a way to penetrate everything you are under and soak all the moisture out of your skin before you have a chance to sweat.  I think I said earlier that Panama City was hot…..uhhh no Choluteca is HOT! BLAZING HOT!  At 9 tonight the weather channel said it felt like it was 95 here.  Remember the sun sets early here because there is no daylight savings.  It’s hot.  But like I said, hopefully I’ll get a few more pictures posted in the next day or two on facebook.  Adios.