Homestay

 I had the privilege of staying at a farm on my trip.  It reminded me a lot of Robinson Crusoe because the house was very open. 

 I had been looking for this lizard for a few days and finally got to see it in a palm in front of the homestay.  It's common name is the Jesus Christ lizard because it can walk on the water!  What adaptations allow it to do this?  It was an amazing creature!

 This is the free ranging family pet, Pancho!  They exclaimed his name, so I can't really write it without an exclamation point.  Like our pets, Pancho! likes to try to eat his owner's food, including meat.  He sometimes disappears for days and the host thought it was funny when I said, "El tiene muchas novias!"

 Here's a view from upstairs.

 Here I am in front of the house.

 Here is Don Douglas (pronounced Don Dooglas).  Here we were feeding the tilapia. 

 Here we're about to go on a hike on their land through the rainforest to the river.  In English the river was called Two Calves because two giant gold calves had been discovered in the river.  Local people were trying to prevent the gold from being pillaged by the Spanish.

 This tarantula was caught by Don Douglas' son and here we were letting it go.  The boy told us that it was "a small one." I touched it and it felt just like it looks, kind of fuzzy. 

 Here are two other teacher who were on our homestay.  We had fruit and rice and beans and coffee and very hot hot sauce for breakfast.  Yum!

 The family farms these yam like tubers mostly to eat.

Don Douglas is holding a fruit here that is poisonous, but is useful when boiled and the vapors are inhaled.  It clears the sinuses.



All in all, these people were so kind and generous. It was an adventure to stay with them and it pushed the bounds of my Spanish as I spoke the most Spanish of the four teachers.  Luckily humor is universal.