Hike to La Loma

This past weekend, the boys club had some visitors. One of Diego's friends from Nebraska brought his two grandkids to visit, Collin and Caleb. The boys club had planned a hike up one of the local mountains, and invited the two Nebraskans along. But before the hike, the boys played in a baseball tournament (what would a weekend be without baseball!). They played two teams from the local towns, and narrowly lost both games. Here is Arenoso (the town where the boys club is) playing against Pedro García.

Waiting in anticipation for their chance to play, some boys from Tinajita.

As you can see, we weren't the only species enjoying baseball on a sunny Saturday morning!

After the games were over, we gathered for a lunch of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (yum!) and got ready to hike. We were excited!

We hiked right by Franchi's (below, in the middle) house, which was about a half of a mile from the road up a steep incline and across a pasture. No wonder he has so much energy, walking that every day!

Our first stop was at a rancho. It's basically a tin roof and a cement floor built in the countryside for people passing through or seasonal workers.

The boys found a dominos table and couldn't resist...

They also found a roosting hen...

...who was very busy!

We horsed around for a while, climbing trees and playing games, then it was up, up and away!

We reached the top of La Loma (The Hill), and it gave us a beautiful 360 degree view of the surrounding countryside. The town of Arenoso was back to the east, while we could see the mountains sloping down to the ocean in the north. To the south and west it was more mountains.

I've been trying to teach the boys some orienteering, and here is a confused Luís Diego spinning in circles with his compass.

On our way back down we sampled all the local fruits we could find. We had guayaba (guava), chinola (passion fruit), and naranja (orange). Here's Franchi chomping into a guayaba.

At a different rancho on the way down, we found an altar set up for the local saint. The boys loved taking pictures of it, and made sure they got a few pictures with Rebekah and I!

We made it back, unscathed, after a beautiful hike into the mountains. It was a great way to let the boys loose to work off some of that energy! I have a feeling we'll be back up there again soon.