Day 222: Laguna Churup

Ahh, to get out and see these mountains! A few of us Ancash volunteers took a Sunday to hike up to Laguna Churup a beautiful glacial lake just a couple of hours hike straight up off the road. Just a moment to breathe the fresh high altitude air. And think of the people we love!

Day 219: Email outage

Hello to all of our faithful blogreaders --

There's some sort of a glitch in our No Falling email, we're working on trying to get it figured out!

Anyways, we got ourselves an email account through google where the username is the first 4 letters of my husband's name, the word 'and', and the first 3 letters of my name. If you can figure this out you should send us an email because we are currently completely without all of our email addresses!

So much love. Sorry for the secretive nature of this blog entry, but I'm trying to avoid the spammers.

Love, Us

Day 213: The World Race (Sharing the love of Christ)

For more information about the US missionaries living in Musho, check out their website: http://www.theworldrace.org/. They have some really cool video footage that will help give you an idea about what it's like to live in Musho and be spreading the word of God in the developing world.

Day 210: Dave has fledged the Blue Nest (our room)

Dave moved to Greenbelt when he was 2 years old. Little did he know that he was in for such an adventurous friendship. Please check out his blog for some great photos of his journey to the base of the highest mountain in the tropics! Dave, you're amazing. Thanks for the Peanut M&Ms. One bag is officially already gone. We love you, Benj and Lib

http://daverothstravels.blogspot.com/

Day 209: World Health Day in Musho Peru

On a cloudy, rainy Monday in Musho, we celebrated World Health Day. World Vision International, an NGO working in the region collaborated with us by providing an integral medical attention service to Musho's youngsters, while the Health Post and Peace Corps lead games on solid waste management, common illnesses, and hygiene, nutrition, and mental health.

Here is Libby leading a big group of kids in a game of Jeopardy that included questions like "What are the symptoms of Yellow Fever?" and "How do you make a re-hydrating liquid in the case of bad diarrhea?" and "What are the names of the Peace Corps Volunteers living in Musho?" and "What is Libby's favorite food?"

At another station, Benjamin led a group of eager youth in a game of "Pin the Solid Waste." In this game, each kid was given a piece of his poster (plastic bottle, tin can, descriptive words, etc) and then asked to put them in the right place on the chain of managing solid waste.


All in all it was a very successful World Health Day. There is so very much to be done and we certainly have our work cut out for us.

Day 207: Hiking in Akillpo for Semana Santa

Our first vacation! We headed up into the gorge above the small town of Honkopampa (seen in the photo below), climbing from 3450 meters above sea level to 4700 meters! The weather was wonderful our first day and became rainier by the moment over the next three days.

In the photo below we are taking a water break in the old growth Polylepus (paper tree) forest. Please take a good look at Benjamin's large rice and potato belly. :)


This is the valley that we hiked up, looking back the way we came! Amazing view!


Keeping to tradition, a couple of handstands by the beautiful Akillpo Lake.


Catching our breath at 4700 meters!


Hardcore, immodest wife of mine dipping in the glacial-melt waters of Akillpo. Yeehaw! Check out her rice and potato thighs.

Day 206: Ode to our friend and mountain guru, David

David thought he was going to Miami... instead, he and his rolling suitcase ended up in an Andean glacial lake.

So, in anticipation of the trip, Dave loaded up on tasty breads.

Here you can see just how snugly the suitcase fits onto his back.


Thanks for your visit Dave! Happy trails on the rest of your round the world journey.
(if any of the rest of you feel like following the journey of the giant and the suitcase, please click on the following link: http://daverothstravels.blogspot.com)

Day 205: Libby and Benjamin as Bakers

We finally took a vacation! Here we are in Huaraz, learning how to bake multi-grain bread with our friend Edgard!

Day 203: Hand-washing charla

Here is Lib playing the story-teller role. We made a little theater show of 'Mariquita Cochinita' about the little dirty girl who played with dirt and pooped in the fields. She got sickened by the evil Valentin, a parasite, who grows on dirty hands and food. The moms and kids loved the whole thing and with some luck everyone will wash their hands appropriately!!