Obviously, this was a while ago.

I last posted from a comfortable bed in the middle of Asunción with everything I needed around me. Since then I have been stranded in a small town for two days, bumping along the dirt roads and cleaning the hell out of the new house and the stuff we have to put in it. Things don't keep well with chickens. 


On Saturday we wanted to leave, on Sunday the rain started (but we left anyway) and we got stuck, on Monday we stayed stuck (but had a good dinner) and on Tuesday we arrived. 


Robert Owen, the scientific coordinator of Para La Tierra, has loaned me a 4x4. It's kind of a beast. I managed to negotiate my way from Asunción to Santa Rosa with only a few minor mishaps. The worst was when we drove the wrong way down a one way bit of road on a corner in the middle of Asunción. Half way there we got a phonecall advising us not to try to reach Laguna Blanca because there were trucks blocking the road.


Being stranded is bad enough, but being stranded in Santa Rosa is worse. It is a dead town. It has one road lined with shops....and that's it. We found the nicest hotel in the area and holed up until the rain went away, drinking beer and watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer. That part at least was good. We were like aliens from space in town. We couldn't find anywhere to eat on Sunday night, as most things are closed, but stumbled upon a woman and her daughter with a stand and a bbq selling kebabs, sausages and mandioca. They invited us to sit down and proceeded to watch us intently until we left. We had to stay in Santa Rosa for two nights while the rain continued. In the end, one of the guys who works at Laguna Blanca had to come and look for us on his motorbike and take us to the reserve via a much longer alternative route. We almost didn't even get through. 


When we arrived we found the furniture we bought and had delivered last year being used as a chicken house. To get access to some of the things we had to carefully remove hens and their eggs from on top of tables and cushions. The whole lot was covered in a mingy kind of stoor which took Jen and I three days to clean off. With the house finally clean, or as clean as it's ever likely to get, we went shopping. 


Jeni and I went all over Santa Rosa getting all the things we needed yesterday. It was great. We are known in all the shops now. I think they think we are a bit mad. As Jeni said, they have probably never seen girls shopping like this before! We came back with wire, cutters, a spade, 2 massive bits of polystyrene, rope, packs of beer and wine, loads of plastic containers and a whole car full of groceries. Just your standard stuff for life in the cerrado.  


Today we went walking in the cerrado for the first time. We didn't set off early enough and before long it was just too hot to keep going. I think we will go in the morning in the car instead. Will be quicker and there is air conditioning.  The first volunteers are arriving tomorrow with any luck. They spent an extra day in Puerto Iguazu so we got a spare prepare day. So far we have spent most of it sorting scientific equipment into boxes of things we can use, boxes of things we recognise as things and boxes of things that we have no idea what they are or what we are supposed to be doing with them. Now we are trying to draw a map of the area using google earth as a guide. Thank god for google.