Working Day Numero Uno! AKA Camp Green Lake

The mountains behind Espanola taken from a ridge above the valley. It is a lovely place....

Ben writes:

"Hello again,

Today we awoke at the lovely hour of 6. At 7 we ate breaky and and at 8 we began our work. We were assigned the task of digging out irrigation trenches for the school's campus. The trenches go back 400 odd years apparently and they dig them out every spring. The campus has at least half a kilometer of these trenches that are used for flood irrigation. Today we dug around half of them out, up to 18 inches deep. It was tiring work to say the least, but it beat sitting in the vans. The dorms here are fantastic. The temperature is somewhere around 25 degrees which is a relief from the cold kamloops winter. Anyway, I'm gonna go toss a disc with the guys."

Ben

Luke writes:

"I think after today I can relate better to Stanley Yelnats.

Starting at around 8 o'clock (after a 30 second shower, a quick breakfast, and an hour of trying to wake up), we picked up some shovels (sadly there was no short shovel), and set to work digging about half a kilometer of ditches for the school irrigation. We were told to dig to the clay, to remove one years worth of dirt. We were also told the clay would be only 4 inches deep in most parts. For the main ditch, where everyone was working together, that was true, but as soon as the group split into two seperate teams, it go alot harder. On one hand, the group that included Evan, Ali, Joccelyn, Sky, Sara, Lisa, and Trudy had to fight through thick weeds that they first had to weed wack out of the way just to access the ditch. On the otherside, Me, Ben, Duncan, James, Chloe, Madison, Dan, and Lee had to first rake half a foot of leaves off the ditch, then dig at least a foot down to get to the clay. I think when we worked it out, our group lugged about 4.5 million cubic centimetres of dirt out of that ditch over the 5 hours we worked on it.

Unfourtionately, many of us did not get the best sunscreen coverage, so there are more than a few sore necks, not to mention the blisters. Also, neither Alexa or Lisa was feeling that well. Lisa had to sleep in untill lunch, and Alexa just woke up.

Even through all the hardships, we still managed to have a good time and meet new people, as well as have a authentic New Mexican dinner (well, actually a few of us had burgers, but they were "Ranchero Burger's" so they at least sounded Spanish)."