On Monday we left Ned's farm for 3 days to help out at Patricia's family's farm, 5km down the valley, as the rains were coming and they needed extra help (more from Patricia than us). We had to cross an incredibly narrow wooden bridge to get to the family farm, which everyone from the little kids to the Patricia's 75 year old Mum has to use to get in and out. The French guests (Samuel & Cyrielle) came with us for one night before catching the bus back to Quito. We spent a relaxing day with them picking coffee, swimming in the freezing river and learning how to make little baskets. That evening Samuel and Cyrielle made brilliant crepes with a filling of butter and sugar - healthy. Over the next two days we worked much harder picking corn, separating the corn from the cob, making a fence out of scrap wood and old wire and clearing two fields for the new crop. Although Katy managed to avoid clearing the fields as she had hay fever so helped in the kitchen. I lost my hat in one of the fields and looked for over an hour for it but couldn't find it - I guessed it would get burnt in one of the bonfires to clear the waste but it was eventually found and returned to me. One evening we were invited, with the family, up to the hut where the international artists were staying to see their work from the week - it ranged from awful to weird (including a three minute video of one of them cutting their nails in the forest) and seemed very easy compared to farm work. They will exhibit it in Quito so we hope to be able to see it and giggle one more time.

It was an honour to have the opportunity to live with Patricia's family and learn more about the rural way of life in Ecuador where almost all the work is done by hand. Everyone works tirelessly including the children (3 - 10 years old). The food is good and plentiful but working on the dry land is dirty, so everything else becomes dirty including the house. There seems to be little effort given to keeping it clean; probably because it is wasted effort (it will just get dirty again) and there is so much else to do. The toilet was also awful. We tried to help on the land but at best we were as good as the kids who are incredible for their ages. Patricia's Mum was also an incredible worker and was very very strong. They kept telling us to rest and kept asking us if we were tired. The family pets were the standard dogs and cats (Olguin the cat was our favourite) and a chicken that lived in the kitchen called Morenita. This chicken was given special permissions above the rest because it had lost its mum to a skunk. Patricia's Mum talked about the sorro (skunk) as if it was a great old adversary of hers.

We caught the milk truck back up to Ned's farm on Thursday and enjoyed the availability of clean clothes and a hot shower. We spent the rest of the day weeding and on Friday Ned and I started building a new barbed wire fence while Katy helped Patricia in the vegetable patch. On Saturday we all hiked to the waterfall together and had a lazy afternoon (which Katy spent mostly in bed).

Very early (5am) on Sunday morning Ned and I headed into town for some early internetting so I could prepare my Bloodhound Super Sonic Car talk that I had offered to give. The initial offer had been to talk to the kids about it at school but this had developed into giving a talk at the town hall. As I should have expected the schedule for the day kept changing so instead of giving my talk at 10:30 it ended up being near 2pm. I had a translator so the 30 minute talk went relatively smoothly to the medium size audience that I got. The Bloodhound project will be surprised that I've managed to spread the word to this rural part of Ecuador. On Monday and Tuesday Ned and I completed the barbed wire fence and Katy joined us to add a water supply to the cow field. Katy milked the cows and was very pleased at how well she did. We ate our lunch time meals up in the fields with the amazing views as Patricia was kind enough to bring it up for us.

While at the finca we learnt a lot more about Ecuador. The government has been spending lots of its oil money on schools, social reforms and benefits for the poor. All kids can now attend free school until 16, which we see as good, but the farming communities see as taking the kids from the land and losing their skills. We understand that 10 years ago it was believed that to be a good husband you had to hit your wife but the government is now changing that. If a wife now reports abuse to the local police the man has to stand in the river with a bar of soap and wash until all the soap is gone. If she reports it to a higher authority then he will get a fine and potentially a sentence.

Despite having so many positive things to say about the people and the beauty of the place I feel that I'm happy to only stay for two weeks (half of what we originally planned). I don't mind the work being hard but it is repetitive and does get dull. I have therefore found it difficult not to have my mind occupied for long periods - Katy says she doesn't mind this :-). I also have a great desire to get back to travelling and seeing new places. I've learnt that I'm not great at dealing with a difficult situation (living with a family which I can't communicate with) if I have a choice about it - I would prefer to take the easy way out and leave with the great experiences that I have. Other volunteers and Katy seem to be much better at making the best of the situation than me. I have found a great respect for the people that farm the land here - much more than I could ever have got from watching from the bus window.

So as Katy agreed we left on Wednesday 8th, with an eye watering 4am start to catch the only bus of the day out of town and headed to Quito and the Southern Hemisphere. We plan to use our extra time for some intensive Spanish lessons and some longer stays along our way.

When we arrived we were told that us just being in rural Ecuador allowed people to see that white people were not infallible. Well if I've achieved one thing since being here it is certainly that! The kids now probably think that white people are weak and stupid.

Simon