Awake at 7am, which wasn't difficult, thanks to the roosters ... just like Gramma and Grampa's on the Farm. i am a country girl at heart; ...second only to being an island girl.
This morning, hat and sunscreen required, we climbed the hill across the road with gallons of water, shovel, hoe, and compost. On the trail i saw Tropical Milkweed; on the third plant was a Monarch caterpillar ... welcoming me to Ecuador!
Geovanny cleared this hillside and planted these endemic bushes. "Endemic" meaning that they exist no where else on the earth. Out in the water you can barely see a rock ... that's Kicker Rock ... more on that later.
We are continuing to propagate the hillside, planting small bushes that they started from seed.
Andy had the tough job of digging the holes .... i'll never again complain about my soil! it looks nice enough, but it is clay, without much water.
My job was planting the 26 plants with a little compost. I was tempted to give them a little extra, but Geovanny explained not to use too much since they need to learn to be survive in their own environment. i planted each one with tender loving care, not making much progress, due to my diligence. when the guys finished digging the holes, the quickly 'stuffed' the rest of the plants in existing holes and we were done. i'd probably still be planting. i'll be anxious to see which technique has the highest
success rate; ..... probably theirs!
Lunch break.i decided to make pasta for lunch. after i saw the basil, oregano, and parsley BUSHES in the garden, my pitiful jar of plain tomato sauce took on a whole new look. other than the water taking forever to come to a boil, it was a good spaghetti lunch. After lunch my job was to clean the ranch. we take turns at this job, it's the cleanest ranch i've ever seen, everyday it gets swept and wet mopped. also, no shoes are allowed in the house. i also learned how to launder the towels in the outside 'laundry' .... and .... i am also very pleased to report that we compost and recycle... paper, glass and tin ... yeahhhhhhhhhhh
then i transplanted cukes and peppers into the garden. i actually noticed growth in those cukes between yesterday and today!
Andy let me know that the taxi was arriving at 4:30. We are taking the day off tomorrow and going on a snorkel trip. Yeah!!!!!!!!!!!!! a vacation day already ! as volunteers, we get a bit of a discount at one of the dive shops; and we needed to go to Porto to sign up. After signing up, a quick check of email (no one wrote me yet), and dinner; we were back at the ranch where i spent another hour preparing for our snorkel trip tomorrow, .....snorkel and camera equipment ... i was out of practice and unorganized.
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