That thing on my plate looks familiar

The next day was spent learning about the community, and how they live and survive in the Amazon. We painted our faces with the juice of an Amazon fruit, and headed out to the community garden, to learn about how you can grow practically anything in this hot wet climate.

Much of the community garden had been washed out by a flood only 4 weeks ago, and already, everything was growing again. We picked things, and then planted new things to replace them. This included cocao, plantains, bananas, manioc, and special leaves for wrapping. We spent much of the morning doing this, and helped with the digging and planting. It was clear that the women of the community were much stronger and were working much harder than we could in the tropical heat.















We returned for lunch, and fresh telapia, which they raise in ponds, were waiting for us. We took the fresh leaves we harvested, added salt to the fish, and wrapped them up to be placed on the open fire. This was to be served with the fresh plantains and manioc, which we had carried home. The fresh fish was accompanied by lemon grass tea, and served on tables covered with banana leaves. Yup, it was absolutely fantastic!

After lunch, we hung around the community. They have a small shop with crafts done by the locals. Each piece has the name of the person who made it, so when you buy it, all the money goes directly to that person. I got a very cool bracelet that was made from the woven fibre of a palm and local dark brown seeds... I really like it.ç

We also tried our hands at the blowgun (though not with poison darts!). Suzanne was the only one to hit the bulls eye (a papaya). They also demonstrated some traditional dances and we also went down to the river to see how they pan for gold.














The next activity was very unexpected and very wonderful. We learned to make chocolate from scratch. It started with the seeds of the cocao pod being roasted on an open fire for about ten minutes. After the seeds had cooled, we hand peeled each one. The roasted and peeled seeds were put through a grinder (more hard work in the tropical heat), where is was ground into bitter chocolate. We added powdered milk and sugar, and then put the mixture through the grinder again. Voila... fresh chocolate!

That night, after yet another extraordinary fresh dinner, our dessert came out. Bananas covered in chocolate sauce, the one we made! You just have to love GAP Adventures.