a long laps into eden

I was responding to Sara Qualin's inquiry into my whereabouts on facebook and realized it was really about time to update everyone as to where i am and what I'm up to. Sorry for the long laps, there is no internet at Barton Creek Outpost. After Ahnna went back to wenatchee, i went back out to the outpost where Ive been working for my stay. Its been a great time. I would have liked to have already moved on to Honduras to be working on my dive master, but i was down to 3oo dollars before the government just gave me 600. Stew says the paperwork is in the mail to get me the 5000 for the trailer. I'm working on getting a massage table so i can start making money out at Barton Creek. I'm really pretty in love with that place. Its just starting to be discovered. In the most recent Lonely Planet it is one of "the 5 highlights of belize" Its a very basic kitchen, a camping grounds and a swimming/fishing hole. I catch what i call freshwater shrimp (which are really more like clawless crawdads) for bait in the rocky rapids of the creek. Jim and Jaquelyn have also just become a listed WWOOF farm. Willing Workers On Organic Farms. The first wwoofers are set to come in around the end of June. They will pay 20 Belize a day for meals and have a place to stay in exchange for 4 hours of work a day. I am hoping to come back after Honduras and help in the initiation of an organic nursery and farm and the establishment of a new wwoofer program.

At the moment i am working for them as pretty much everything but a cook. I manage the place in their absence, every morning i get up around 5:30 to do the dishes i was too lazy to do the night before, after non-lazy nights i don't usually get up until 6:30-7am. Then there is The List; sweep the deck, clean out canoes, bathrooms, behind bar, pick and squeeze two gallons of OJ by hand and much more. I am occasionally a babysitter, bartender, server, landscaper, and unofficial volunteer manager. No one told me I'm a manager, but all the volunteers ask me what to do. The lawn maintenance scene has moved up in the world from machete to weed whacker. I have a new fellow worker named Edwin, he reminds me of my working friends in the states back when i did manual labor and service industry jobs, except that he is really hard working and believes in responsibility and making the boss happy(sometimes). he is trying to teach me Creole but its not working to well. I like trying to learn though.

I work alot, but that's ok, i get to play alot too. The outpost is on 175 acers of jungle, orange groves and creek front. There was a botanist who lived on the land before the current owners and as a result there is an abundance of beautiful tropical flowers and fruit. The rope swing is my eternal childhood. So far my trick repituar includes a front dive, a front flip, a hanging backdive that Trevor Bevis names "The Spiderman", a back flip, a spinning back flip (which rarely turns out right and is usually painful), a back 1 1/2 into a watermelon (cannonball dive), and I've almost gotten all the way around on a double back flip. I enjoy time almost every day laying in a hammock with a book, even if its only for 20 minutes. I try to do my yoga atleast 3 times a week. and i watch good movies with my new belizian family and constantly changing travel buddies. I've met some really cool people here. there are two dreaded girls from oakland Ca. named Maya and Naomi. They are really chill fun girls who have been volunteering here a few times. We are hoping to fix up the staff cabin sometime this week so we will have a nice place to sleep and have staff parties. we may make a little tree fort somewhere on the property just a high spot to sit.

I'm running out of stuff to say, I'll start uploading pics of stuff like the new waterfall hiking trip that is available through the outpost, for 100 Belize, that's 50 US, you can follow Jim on a death defying 2 1/2 hour nature hike up a creek valley into the jungle, to see an 800 foot waterfall and have lunch, then hick back out the same way you came in. I thought it was worth every penny.

I killed my first ferdilance (very aggressive poisonous viper) the other day. It was just a baby, but it scared the crap out of me, and Kaitlyn was lucky to survive since she stepped right over it.

Before i sign off, a special shout out to Sarah and Travis, Travis, every time i see a frog, lizard or snake i think of you, you would hate it down here because that happens 10-20 times a day. Sarah, fix your boy so you can come down and check this place out.