Farm Pets and Work

Sue and Goma eyeing each other.
Sue.
Gito.
Goma.
Not really a pet, but really cool.
The sofa moves in!
New countertop.
Fixing holes in the roof.
Professor down the well.

Visitors!

A big LO SIENTO to all that had gotten used to regular updates on this blog... I´ve fallen prey (happily) to a steady stream of visitors through our neck of the woods that shows no signs of letting up. While getting to the internet and sitting down long enough to type or post a blog and pictures is difficult while living in Tabuga even during the most tranquil of times, doing so when also trying to entertain is often physically impossible.

I write currently from the Hotel Quito, where I am whiling away a couple of hours before my step-mom Linda and step-brothers Chris and Kevin (plus a friend) fly in tonight. Just this morning, bright and early, I said goodbye to my mom, who was here for three weeks (with an 8 day Galapagos romp in the middle of it). The last two nights Andrea and I spent in Pappallacta, at a resort named Termas that has built incredible cabanas around natural hot springs.

Wow this is really choppy and non-flowy, sorry about that. While mom was in the Galapagos, enjoying all that those volcanic islands had to offer, we hosted a pair of ex-Peace Corps volunteers who started a project called the GROW initiative. Donny and Brooke were great and very happily added Jason-Andrea-Ryan's farm to their list of organic farms they've visited over the last year and a half of traveling. Check them out at http://www.growinitiative.org/environmentalconservation.

Lo and behold, right after they left we got a surprise visit from our friend Danny and his gf Polly, up from Guayaquil. Great to have everyone, and we put them all to work transplanting and macheting on the farm!

Anyhoo, Linda, Chris and Kevin get in shortly, so I'm off to pick them up and take them to Mindo and then back to Tabuga. Next up on the visitors wheel after they're gone is the world-famous Mike Morrell, followed by Jason's mom Sandy.

Oh, in addition to showing folks around I've picked up a really cool side project--or main project, or whatever you'd like to call it. Inspired by the Great Walks of New Zealand, I'm putting together a 3 night, 4 day hike through the local dry tropical forest where we live in Manabi. The land owners and reserves are already on board (the reserves being Lalo Loor and Jama-Coaque), so now its just figuring out the best route, doing a bunch of trail building and then advertising! Any thoughts or questions on this, give me a holler.

Much love to all, photos someday.

J

All Good Here!

Just want to let all blog family and friends know that Andrea and I are completely unscathed and untouched by the Chile earthquake and following tsunami. We were on the beach when there was a tsunami warning (in Canoa), but it passed at 10am before we had made up our minds to flee, so all's well that ends well! As for the quake, there was a 5 second quake in our neck of the woods yesterday morning, but not even hard enough to knock anything off the wall (or the house off the stilts) so everything good there as well.

So don't worry about us! Send money to Haiti or Chile!

Talk soon gang,

AJ