Home from Vacation...

I probably should have written this first to be logical chronologically but FLA seemed more pertinent to work.

My trip to Guatemala was great. After climbing through the ruins of buildings that had collapsed during the earthquakes in 1773 on Sunday we experienced a small earthquake Monday night.

In the midst of the fun and games LOTS of work was accomplished. It was interesting to work in a world where steel is less expensive then wood. Lots of cutting of metal to frame rooms so that we could put up paneling and install a drop ceiling. I managed to seriously cut my finger within the first hour of starting work but the bleeding stopped and work continued. I kept my leather gloves on the rest of the week. Members of the team also extended an overhang to keep the kids dry during rainy season and painted a soccer field/basketball court onto the parking lot.

We also had rocket launch with the junior high and high school students. Cousin Charlie works as a rocket scientist at Wallops Island and built a launcher that attached to an air compressor. The kids built rockets from two liter soda bottles and water bottles. Add a little water and they went way higher then I imagined. It was fun to see the kids experiment with more and less water to see what would go the highest. The launcher stayed and I anticipate a lot more 'experimentation' and lots of smiles.

The finale of the trip was climbing Pacaya on Saturday with my cousin and getting to actually walk out into the lava field. I've got some great pictures of the lava actually rolling towards us. It's certainly not like being in the US where they would keep you behind fences and let you look through binoculars.

This week I'm bound for Ft. Lauderdale on Wednesday and then to Solinet next week.