Advertisement
Published: August 24th 2006
We dress to impress on arrival!
Muddy,wet, tired and sweaty after our trip to reach the farm.Apologies if this entry turns out to be a bit of an epic; we´re going to try and cover the entire 3 weeks we spent at MMRF in one go! Here we go................
I think the journey to reach the farm in San Pedro is going to be one of those that will only be equalled by the likes of the Inca trail!! We set out from Dangriga early in the morning by bus (what else) and being that it was rainy season the road looked a little water-logged, this soon progressed to the road being completely flooded as a river had burst its banks. As we reached the flood we saw a 4WD truck stuck in the middle of it trying to reverse out having not been able to make it all the way through, which was encouraging! The bus driver didn´t seem that bothered and only paused to move our bags up from the storage compartment under the bus into the cab! Good job he did because at the deepest point the water was halfway up the side of the bus.
After fording the river, sucessfully getting dropped off at the right junction and catching a connecting
bus we arrived in San Pedro, armed with some excellent directions to the farm: It´s approximately two miles up river and can either be reached by canoe or on foot through the jungle!! Thinking we wouldn´t fit all our bags into a canoe we opted for the walking option and decided to seek out someone who might know of the farm or its owners Chris and Dawn. The first couple of people laughed/gasped in the kind of way a mechanic would when you´ve just blown your engine and asked them to fix it, but gave us some vague directions. Fortunately we met another local farmer who was happy to act as a guide and show us the way.
And so began the trek through the jungle!! Just after we had set out to start walking it began raining and as it had been raining previously the trail was covered in thick mud, rocks were slippery and we were of course carrying our huge bags! The walk only took about an hour but involved some pretty harsh up and down hills, crossing overflowing rivers and hacking through jungle vegetation. Eventually we reached the banks of the main river (for canoe
Two little princesses
Esperanza (left) and Zephyr (right) access) and shouted across to let someone know that we were there, a shout came back and was followed by a guy in what seemed like a very unstable canoe crossing the river, against the current, to meet us.
We decided it would be best to cross the river one at time due to the weight or our bags and the height and strength of the river. Chris expertly managed to cross us both without either us, or the bags getting, any wetter! He then kindly informed us we had come to visit at the worst time of year (rainy season = lots of bugs) but assured we would have a great time, which we did as it happened!
The farm and the work
Chris and Dawn, originally from the US, have been living on this farm in Belize with their two children, Zephyr and Esperanza, for about 15 years. The farm spreads out over about 70 acres of jungle and a lot of the land had originally been used for citrus and cattle. Over this time they have worked wonders with the farm and they have developed an extensive knowledge of sustainable agriculture and living methods Boys can multi-task after all!
Kev engrossed in one of Chris´many stories whilst also entertaining Zephyr at the same time. through experimentation, research and self-teaching. The farm today is used as demonstration farm to educate locals in particular, but anyone who is interested, on the benefits of sustainable agriculture methods as an alternative to monoculture farming or the ´slash and burn´method favoured by locals which is currently Belize into an
Emerald Wasteland
to quote Dawn! However I am probably not doing their work justice with my description, so check out their website if you are interested in what they do and what they are about or you want to see some pics: ([url=http://www.mmrfbz.org). They also do some very nice T-Shirts - no I am not getting commission!
Our new home was a simple but beautifully built dorm with four twin rooms made from local river stone and wood from the farm with jungle views from our hammock hung balcony and twilight insect/animal choruses, which included a very amusing frog sound. The farm has a huge variety of plant and tree species, many of which we harvested everyday for our food including: avocado (we ate lots of guacamole and also invented the avocado soup!), pineapple, cacao (chocolate), papaya, Chi Kai (edible flower), pumpkin, breadnut (very yummy - kind of potato taste),
Dawn playing in the mud
Dawn literally getting into her work. herbs, limes, coconuts etc. Kev and I have also developed new skills in baking, jam making, and making proper coconut milk by hand - no it does not always come in a can! There were also a big group of chickens, ducks, a very amusing pair of turkeys, along with some very cute ducklings and chicks who provided us with eggs, when they felt like it! Kev has developed a new passion for attempting to catch the naughty birds that flew into the kitchen uninvited: the turkeys kind of gave in once spotted but the chickens were sneakier and kept him on the run for a while.
Being a sustainable farm, day to day life was also a little different to the way you guys know it in the UK. There were compost toilets, rainwater to drink and shower with - or bathing in the river if it had not rained for a few days! We also washed our clothes in the river, me scrubbing with Kev rinsing and getting nibbled by the friendly fish!
Whilst on the farm we did a variety of different jobs to help out. Our first few days we worked in the garden
Sarah
Her sister Maria is not featured as unfortunately no-one likes her, poor dog. infront of the house in the blazing hot sun sweating out the water as soon as we drank it. We were using machetes (crocodile dundee stylee) to chop up and spread out loads of banana tree as mulch to help the garden grow. We also planted some new seeds and tagged them so big foot wwoofers like us would not step on them, not that the dogs paid any attention.
During the rest of the three weeks we had numerous planting jobs to do in different areas of the farm, from small ground covering plants to what would one day be massive mahogany trees (at $20K a tree it should be Chris and Dawn´s retirement fund!!). We also turned our hand to other things such as painting one of the new buildings (after clearing our all the scorpions and cockroaches!!) and building terraced plant beds in the garden. Typically most of the time it was extremely hot during the day so on a couple of occasions we were wet enough with sweat to be able to go and jump in the river fully clothed to cool off and not really notice the difference!
The Nesbits......
Staying
Balaya
The cute big puppy that is only going to get bigger! Look at the size of those paws. on the farm for 3 weeks and being the only volunteers being crazy enough to make the trip and put up with the millitant insects, we got to know the family quite well. We spent most of our first full day with Chris getting an introduction to the farm and its processes - which he could talk about at great length, with latin names for everything - very impressive!! Chris is originally from New York and so the Latin was seamlessly mixed in with stories about life in the bronx, hitch hiking across "The States", previous volunteers (both good and bad!!), the time he had spent living in Belize and his opinions on everything from world politics to useless missionaries in Belize! All in all anything could turn into a very humourous tale and it was very easy to pass hours talking with him!!
Our main interactions with Chris after the first day were in the kitchen, where he was always on hand with a fresh pot of coffee or playing monster for the kids and in the evenings chatting over dinner or watching a film from his vast collection! During the day we would see him around the
farm but would spend more time working with Dawn. Dawn was constantly busy so quite often we would have a detailed list of tasks to fill out the day. On the occasions we did work with her we attempted to keep up the pace and attention to detail with which she approached everything whilst trying to take in all the useful stuff about the plants and reasons behind what we were doing. Dawn also took a larger hand in most of the cooking (sorry Chris but a pot of rice, no matter how big, is hardly nouvelle cuisine!!) and so we learnt a lot about the plants that we could cook and how to cook them as well as things like making bread, which Dawn did by sight and so we had to try and remember how big a pinch of this and how many cups of that we needed. Needless to say some of our bread was a bit. . . . heavy!! Chris did share his recipe for some mean guacamole, which was often repeated owing to the huge amount of avocados that he collected each day!
Esperanza and Zephyr (5 and 3 respectively if I Chop chop!
Kev hard at work clearing spaces for Mahogany trees. remember correctly), Chris and Dawn´s kids, were also on hand to entertain us between work or meals, day or night. They both have really creative imaginations and of all things ´pretty´especially flowers that were often given to us as gifts accompanied by the offer of a story - normally related to princesses, or flowers, or something you had just been talking about with many bizarre tangents and twists. Often followed by a pop quiz to check you had been listening properly! Being the jungle kids they are they have no fear of the many creepy crawlies living around them and would gladly rescue me and Kev from an intimidating tarantula or scorpion! They also found the need for clothes to be surplus to requirements unless acting out a story, which caused their parents´grief when training courses visited the farm. Zephyr in particular has an extreme love for food and sleeping, in no particular order, or place and regardless of the time of day. After making jam she cleaned out the bowl armed with two spoons and then another time had a midnight feast on half a jar of jam when she was supposedly going to the toilet!
All
Dig Dig
Tash hard at work in the garden in all we had a wicked time on the farm, bites, mud and all! Maybe we´ll go back (in the dry season) sometime in the future........
Advertisement
Tot: 0.192s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 18; qc: 82; dbt: 0.0993s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.3mb
dawn DEAN (as in, not Nesbitt!)
non-member comment
Your perspective is such a hoot!
Geez guys, this is really funny reading about our farm through your eyes, it really does take on an Indiana Jones flavor.... You paint us in a lovely light, thank you. (and psst, good job saying you aren't taking a t-shirt commission, jointly we'll make a fortune!)