First blog of 2012!

So we're finally home, back our jungle town surrounded by kids and true to form we were welcomed back by two lovely jungle storms yesterday and then all day today too! It feels nice being home but I do half miss our holidays too.
We had 5 days with the other Project Trust girls in Mancora over New Years, which was awesome! I loved hearing about everyone else's projects and all the stories of their kiddies, although it definitely made me feel so lucky to be where we are. New Years was pretty relaxed, turns out there is this tradition in Peru where they celebrate the New Year in yellow? So everywhere had yellow banners and flyers and ribbon hanging everywhere and the place where we stayed invented a yellow fancy dress theme for free drinks..sadly I don't actually own anything yellow but i definitely made up for the lack of free drinks so its all good! We said bye to all the girlies on the 2nd they all went up to Ecuador and Alex and I got a bus back down to Trujillo. We'd both had enough of the touristy, drinking side to the holiday-to me Mancora just didn't feel like South America I swear the majority of people I met there were all gringos! So Trujillo was awesome. It's such a big big city and the culture there was just beautiful, even the Plaza del Armas (their main square) made the one in Iquitos look absolutly tiny compared to it.  We got a cute little bus, absolutly tiny like people carrier size (but they somehow managed to squeeze in about 20 people plus us two with our rucksacks!) over to Huanchacho like 20 minutes away from Trujillo. Although it's only 20 minutes away it's on the beach and it was beautiful, nowhere near as hot as Mancora and so much more culture around, it was a smallish village with a beautiful coastline and definitely the perfect end to my holiday.

Alex and I attempted a surfing lesson, which was absolutly hilarious! For those of you who know me you'll know my balence is just absolutly horrific but it was a once in a life time chance right? I'm glad I did it, it seriously tired me out, my muscles were aching ALL OVER the next day and I only managed to stand up once but it was awesome, I felt proper beachy carrying my surf board back across the road in my wetsuit...Seriously jealous of Wendy and Frances for having that beautiful place on their back doorstep.
We got a night bus on the 6th down to Lima and arrived at the airport at 6 in the morning, just 5 hours early of our flight! Haha, we killed time by splashing out on the Macdonalds and starbucks in the airport because we won't be getting any of that luxury for another 5 months right!?

So now it's home sweet home. Not going to lie, it feels pretty scary how quickly we settled back into our routine- by Sunday evening we were sat back in the comedor eating tea with everyone. There are also a lot more new kids which amazed me, it's also given me way too many names to have to remember all over again!  I hadn't realised how much the aldea just feels like our home, I already can't imagine leaving them for good, we're both determined to throw ourselves into life full on to this half of the year because all the kids are now off school for their version of summer holidays until March! We're determined to fill up the days so we know we've made the most of it all here!