Our week at a glance: PART 3

Okay I promise this will be the last post about this week's happenings.  Thanks for bearing with us.  So here are some pictures of our walk Thursday afternoon and the rest of our Friday.

Nature walk

This is the view from a bridge in Cocla, a near by town

Bridge to Cocla

These are the cow pies I broke up with a stick to add to the organic compost we were helping our friend Bella make in her backyard.  Not a glamorous job, but someone's got to do it.

Me attempting to "pilar" rice.  Pretty much you pound the harvested rice to get the outer shell off in order to be ready to cook.  This process can last up to an hour and trust me it's definitely an arm workout.

Here's a pro at work.

After you pound the rice you need to sift out all the outer shell to just get the white rice.

My new best friend.  I took the liberty to name this unnamed cat Felix.  He doesn't respond to the name yet, but I know it will grow on him.  

If anyone knows me they know I'm a sucker for cats.

This is the end result of our composting project.  First a large square hole was dug.  Then we made the outer fence to hold in all the organic compost.  This took a lot of machete work that Brennan gladly took on.  Then a bamboo pole was added to the middle of the pit in order to help the compost breathe.  Finally we raked and loaded the organic matter from around Bella's yard and added it to the pit.  Topped it off with the cow manure I so willingly mashed up and a bit of sugar water and it's good to go.  I guess it has to decompose for 6 months before it's actually ready to use.  Such a fun project to work on for the day.  Bella also cooked us great chicken soup and toasted rice for lunch to thank us for all our hard work.

Thanks to Brennan having to go into the Medical Clinic in Santiago spur of the moment on Friday night to check on his cement burns, we had another excuse to stay over night and eat out at Jalapenos, a local Mexican restaurant.  These nachos are no comparison to the nachos at Matador, but they sure hit the spot.

Treated myself to a Pina Colada.

Brennan got creative with the blank canvas on the table.

This is where all the table art eventually goes.

So that's our week at a glance.  We've had some really fun projects to work on, had meals with new friends, ate delicious fruits, explored new parts of town and traveled to Santiago way to many times for one week.  Update on Brennan is he's finally taking antibiotics and should be better in the next ten days.  I know he's ready to be rash free, but he's been a trooper.