Ahhhhhh - getting onto the internet today has been a mission!!!!!! I want to scream... but then i remember where I am and it is all ok again. No photos are possible today because this computer is terrible.

The station I am at is very ´rustic´! Our bedrooms have a roof but are open to the elements and the bugs. I´ve seen some enormous spiders and moths and cockroaches and suprisingly I´m not too scared.

I got here on sunday and was picked up at the airport by an american guy called chris who is usually the chef at the station. Unfortunatly he´s on holiday now for 1 month, he is a really good chef and now we´re stuck with someone who doesn´t season the food. Every day the volunteers take it in turns to ne on duty for each meal. That means your in charge of collecting oranges or lemons for everyones juice and laying the table. Pickung the fruit is fun but is getting harder by the day as all of the low down fruit has been picked so now we need to either climb trees or go further away and cut a path with a machette. THere are sooo many fruit trees so we have fresh fruit at every breakfast and fresh juice with every meal. I have never eaten so many rich and beans!!!!But sometimes we have nice fish as well.

SO the schedule each day is breakfast at 7am, unless you´re on breakfast duty and then it is 6am. Then a quick meeting at 8am where work is assigned. Then work until 10am when there is a half hour juice break. From 10.30 until 12 we work again. Then lunch at 12 followed by hammock siestas until 2pm. Then another quick meeting andd work again until 4pm followed by more hammock siestas. Dinner is at 6pm and after that we either hang out in hammocks or go to the bar. The bar is at the neighbours farm which is about 15 minutes walk away. It has 2 pool tables (sloping downhill which has improved my playing no end!!) and a TV with a DVD playing. They only serve rum, coke and beer. A massive bottle of beer is $2, a glass of rum and coke is $6 or a bottle of rum and a bottle of coke is $12!!! The`people who own the farm are lovely. Katherine and I have gone up there after dinner a couple of times to do english/spanish lessons - very funny because the 2 men (1 about 65years old and the other about 17) just want to know chat up lines (but they are completely harmless and nice). The lady there is very sweet and always brings out popcorn. They have some dogs and some really cute puppies. The only downside is the fleas! But the deet seems to work on them, as well as tucking trousers into socks. The bar has the best view in the world. The view is the 1 with the horse in my pics, the sea takes up way over 180 degrees of the vista.

So on sunday we were shown around and then Chris took Katherine and I to the bar. You are not allowed to drink on camp but for the reasons described above this is really no problem.

On monday the morning was probably the hardest of the whole week. We were each given machettes and had to go and chop down trees. I thought we were meant to be tree hugging but apparently not!!! We were chopping them down as they are agressive invasive trees and new endemic trees grown in the nursery will replace them. The mosquito head net is entirely necessary, although not attractive. But even with the net the fire ants get in. They are called fire ants because when they bite you really feel the heat!!! We work in wellies and wear the same clothes every day -nice! The machette has really hurt my hand. I think it is thevibrations of hitting thw wood. I counted the number of chops it took me to cut down a tree - it was 260!!!! Although 70% of them were completely useless as they were in the wrong place! The work is very sweaty. Especially because you have to wear wellies and long sleeves. At lunch i was exhausted and the hammock was welcome!

After lunch i was on the ball and put my hand up for coffe. This means shelling the coffe beans (grown on our station) and then roasting them over a fire. I think there is a pic of me doing them. The roasting takes about 40 mins of continual stirring but it was a welcome break from the machette.

In the evening we just had dinner and then lay around being exhausted. It gets dark just after 6 so we all go to sleep pretty early.

On tuesday morning we cut down mora. These are the rasberry type plants that smother everything. Mora is easier to cut than trees but it goes on forever and ever. We managed to clear quite a lot and sang a mot of mora related songs along the way. I made up the best one - We´re living in a mora world and I am a machette girl (to the tune of Material world, Madonna)!! In the afternoon I helped a couple of other volunteers on their personal project which is making steps to one of the waterfalls to help with the muddy path. On tuesday night we went to the bar and watched a terrible american film.

Wednesday was more mora - please send me some ideas for mora related songs!!!

Then on tusday we did path maintainance up to the volcano. On friday we went on a hike which took 5 hours!! It was sooo hot!! But really interesting as our leader tols us a lot about the plants and animals and continually cut down fruit for us to eat. I managed to get my wellie stuck in the mud and stepped out of it into the mud in my sock... not nice!!! We then visited the Tortoise reserve and i saw my first giant tortoise!!!

Then we went to an amazing beach and saw sea lions right next to us as well as massive perlicans. It was sooo beautiful and the sea was welcome and cool. Then on friday night we came in to port..... amazing!!! Thew port is very small and pretty and trhere are sea lions everywhere!!!!! They make a hilarious noise!!!!

Yesterday was mainly spent wandering around town. Katherine had to go and have a vaccination injected at the local hospital... that is not a nice place!!! Apparently there are volunteers there whoi are completely un trained and help with c-sections and stiches!! I do not want to be injured here!!! That reminds me... i have been told that about 90% of the locals in port have aids.... not good!! Coming in to port is brilliant. It is so nice to have a break from the machette, the mud, carmalittas, rice and beans and to have a real bed!

I´m off to the beach again now...need to make the most of it before it´s back to isolation in the highlands!!!!

I´ve just tried uploading pics but it hasn´t worked so you´re going to have to wait until next week now.

Lots of love to everyone... write me some messages!!!! Now prepare for radio silence for the next week!!!!!