Othmar and I |
Paracas |
Front of the march! |
Red beach |
July began with our nations Independence Day, so naturally we celebrated too! I wore the famous USA flag pants to school, got told Feliz Dia all day with lots of hugs, and we blasted off fireworks in front of our house with friends! Which we bought from some random persons house for 3 soles a bottle rocket, 3 of which exploded before they got airborne, normal.
The 5th of July our director arrived to take us on our midyear retreat in Punta Sal! We were spoiled with enormous amounts of food, hot showers, comfy chairs, and a beautiful beach to hang out at all day! It was a wonderful break, time to get away, reflect, talk as a community, rest, pray, rejuvenate and prepare for the second half of our year!
Sunset in Punta Sal |
Chulucanas baile! |
The Nazca Tree line! |
Anyway, midyear gave us the chance to talk, figure things out and come back to Chulucanas excited to make the best of our remaining months here! We also went tubing behind a boat in the ocean, saw whales right off the coast, ate sushi and walked around the big beach town Mancora.
Central pastoral! |
Sandboarding |
We got back to Chulucanas just in time to see the Independence Day week activities! This included two day long marches in the plaza with all the schools here marching the high straight legged duck walk in unison. It's rather militaristic or even Nazish, but either way entertaining. We had an achievement fair at school, the whole city was decorated in red and white and all the discos were Peru themed Saturday night.
Our last exciting adventure in July was our day trip to my new favorite city, Conchaque! Conchaque is up in the mountains, a 2 hour bus ride away (with 4 of us and 2 seats, normal) through windy narrow roads! Our day here was spent chasing after Hector (our tour guide), hiking, looking at waterfalls, eating, drinking coffee, and admiring the beautiful mountains.
Yenny and I in our classy uniforms! |