April 7, 2009

Hello!
We apologize for the lack of blog entries recently and will post them as soon as possible. In the interim, I will give a quick report on the last few days since I returned to San Francisco.

I left Spirit on April 1 and started the long travel back to San Francisco to attend to administrative duties in the office. At that point, we had spent an amazingt few days on the beautiful island of Dominica. We arrived on Saturday and spent some time in the capital city of Roseau exploring their lively Saturday market. Sunday, two groups of girls went to separate Church services and in the afternoon we all did laundry! I'm sure you have never seen a group of girls so excited about doing laundry -- especially Ashley because her entire bag (as well as her bunk) had been drenched. Monday, we spent some time with our local guide, SeaCat and drove the southwestern shore of the island. Along the way, we were treated to snorkeling in bubbling ocean water, hot water baths and a phenomenal view from Scotts Head. Tuesday, we spent the day visiting Castle Bruce High School and exploring the Carib Reserve on the other side of the island with our wonderful hosts from the Sineku Motivators Club. Wednesday, we were back with SeaCat and did the challenging hike to Dominica's famous boiling lake.

All of you following these posts may not know that our inimitable program director, Molly Simmons, was called home from Puerto Rico on March 18 due to a serious illness in her family. She returned to us On March 31 and we were both glad to see her and relieved that things at home had stabilized. In addition, Marcella, one of our students, joined us in Dominica after a long wait for her passport. We are glad to have her join us as well!

Since my departure, Spirit has travelled to Nevis, an island just north of Dominica, where our students met some turtle hatchlings with local biologist Barb Whitman and were able to see some of the monkeys that inhabit this island. We hadn't expected to stop in Nevis, but fair winds have put us a bit ahead of schedule and thus we made a bonus stop!

From Nevis, Spirit travelled back to Tortola in the British Virgin Islands and that is where they are today. During this stop, they plan to visit Trellis Bay, the home of the Carib voyaging canoe Gli Gli. They will depart Tortola tomorrow and sail for the Dominican Republic.

I'm sure the girls entries will give you LOTS more detail but I hope this fills in the blanks since the last post.

Nettie Kelly