February 7

Saturday

Up early this morning for a half day trip out to Caye Caulker. The weather couldn't have been more perfect. It started off a little chilly but warmed up beautifully and was clear and sunny all day.

Caye Caulker is a small island off the coast of Belize. Very small and caters exclusively to tourists but looks like a decent place to stay for a couple of days. Julia had been before so she took us over to a quiet little place right on the water where we had our breakfast picnic. My breakfast tostadas never tasted so good! We hung out there for a while, got some sun and recapped bits of this week. We walked around the town a little, stopped at the market stalls and bought some earrings. Back on the water taxi by noon feeling very much like I'd just spent a whole day relaxing, not just a few hours.

We stopped at the Robateau's to pick up Keith and then back to the church while Jen and Janice packed. For lunch we finished off the last of the tostadas. I'm embarrassed to even think how many I've eaten by this point. Probably just as well we're heading home tomorrow.

Got Jen and Janice to the airport for 2:30pm and then Keith, Julia and I drove out to the eco-reserve park to go for a swim. There weren't many people there so we were all pretty happy about that. We all had a swim (chilly, but I made it in!) and then warmed up in the sun.

Back at the school we had our last dinner together. Julia and Keith played a bit of hockey with some of the kids and by 9:30pm everyone had gone.

Major Robateau apparently told Keith that at first he wasn't too sure about having a team of four women come down to work for the week, but after seeing what we could do and did do, he said next time keep the guys away and bring us back!

It's been great working with Keith and Julia again and also a lot of fun getting to know Janice and Jen (Julia's cousin).

Oh - this afternoon, as we were getting ready to pull out from the school to go to the airport, all of a sudden, behind us this little head popped out from the back seat and there was Ishmael! Even funnier was that we'd been joking last night about him doing exactly that kind of thing!

Anyway, it was sad to see the girls go. Really felt like our group was breaking up. We worked well together and enjoyed each other's company. With any luck, we'll be able to do it again some time. Soon, I hope.