Breakfast was delicious, as usual. They really feed us well here. After breakfast, we climbed into the vans for one last trip up the mountain. Those of us who were also here in 2015 all rode together and our van stopped at the site where we worked before. Of course it's finished now and so we enjoyed seeing the finished product. It's very satisfying to see that our hard work is being used and enjoyed by the community.
There is one hairpin turn on the road up to the worksite where the canyon is crossed by a suspension footbridge. We've been driving past this bridge every day, but on this day, we stopped the vans and let everyone walk across the bridge. The view down the canyon from the middle of the bridge is spectacular - much better than what you see from the van.
Once we got to work, everyone was very energetic. We really wanted to make good progress, especially since we got rained out yesterday afternoon. The beautiful weather also helped. Including a break for the usual guacamole (hand made by the work crew on the spot), we put in a full day of hard work. Everyone was focused and we got a lot done.
When we arrived at the site on Monday, there were only bare foundations surrounded by ditches. When we departed, most of the ditches had been filled and four courses of block had been laid on many of the walls. It's actually starting to look like a building. Even better, Elias, who is the foreman of the local crew and the architect for the building, shared with us the renderings for the finished product. It was really interesting to see how what we're working on is going to look.
We left our mark on the building. As we filled the last form, each person placed their name tag in a bucket of concrete. Our names will now always be part of this building. It felt like a fitting way to close our work.
We also had one more chance to play with the local children. The weather was fine and they all had a great time making whirlygigs, singing silly camp songs, and playing soccer with our youth. Several of our youth were saying that they want to take the children home, they are so cute.
At the end of the workday, we had the opportunity to say goodbye to our new Guatemalan friends. It was rather emotional, even with pauses for Daniel to translate what we were saying to each other. We left them with some token gifts and our hugs and well wishes.
Tomorrow, we're going to visit some of the local sights and stay in a hotel in order to be ready to leave for the airport super early Sunday morning.
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