Life on a Farm in New Zealand

Archive South Pacific- HONGI
We are broken up into four groups every day; Daily Chores, Kitchen Crew, Gardening Crew and Farming Crew. The Daily group is the only group who’s job is the same everyday; milking the cows! Your day begins at 6 am when you walk to the milking house and milk 55 cows whose milk is used to feed the baby calves. Then its off to feed the chickens before breakfast. The… Read More

Itza Updates

Archive Central America- QUETZAL
Hello to the Itza group’s family and friends from Carpe Diem HQ, We hope you all are well and have been enjoying the blog and following along on Itza’s adventures.  We wanted to let you all know about a small change we’ve made to Itza’s itinerary.  As some of you may have heard, there has been a stomach bug going around the Itza group, and while everyone has been treated… Read More

A week at Pun Pun farm…

Archive Southeast Asia- SABAI
Hey everyone!  We just got back from our week at pun pun farm, doing various acts of volunteer work for the farm.  We learned a lot about eco-friendly farming and recycling various sorts of resources to save money and help the environment.  It was a cool experience and we got to talk with a lot of people who have been working with these sorts of things for their entire life.  … Read More

When Life Gives You Lemons…Dance!

Archive Central America- MAYA
Leaving San Marcos was a bittersweet experience for the group. We greatly enjoyed our time in this beautiful town, but at the same time we were ready for our next adventure, which was sure to be exciting, just as every new place proves to be. On Sunday morning we left San Marcos and embarked on our 8 hour drive to Coban, where we stayed for a night. The Car ride… Read More

Leaving Xela!

Archive Central America- QUETZAL
Hola from Xela guatemala. This is our last day in the city after over two full weeks. Tomorrow bright and early we will leave for the Lago Atitlan trek, a 3 day long endevor that is sure to be an exiting challenge for grupo ITZA. The general consensus throughout the group is that we are ready to move on, but that doesnt mean we havent had a blast in Xela!… Read More

Chau Ecuador!

Archive South America- INTI
Hello world! I am writing from the city of Quito right now and it is a beautiful, sunny day. The group decided to splurge a little bit on the hostal for our last 2 days in Ecuador.. . and the extra few dollars per person has definitely been well worth it. Last night, most of the group gathered on the rooftop (which has an amazing view of all of Quito)… Read More

Xela

Archive Central America- QUETZAL
We spent last week in Xela at a language school.  I remember after our first day of class we met up afterwards and everyone was so excited! We all loved our teachers and were already learning a lot. After school we did a variety of activities.  Our group did our first hike together, listened to a speaker about the revolution of ´44,  enjoyed some live Guatemalan music, and took a… Read More

A Day On the Farm with P.J. and Tom

Archive South Pacific- HONGI
It’s day three on the Sentry Hill organic farm in New Zealand and we’ve been up to just about everything. Tom and P.J. have taught us how to herd flock, milk cows, feed chickens and pigs, thistle grub, plant crops, sheer sheep, and cook for 19 people three times a day! However today held a special suprise for the Hongi students; Pet Day! We accompanied Tom and P.J’s kids, Ben,… Read More

Calcutta and Bodhgaya – Battle Royale

Archive India- SHANTI
Namaste from Kailaji! Here blogging about our time in Calcutta and our transition into Bodhgaya. We spent 11 days in Calcutta, and looking back trying to figure out what to write about, I realized we defiantly made the most of our time! We spent the first half of our days spread out through many of Mother Teresa’s houses, as Tully covered in the last blog. While we all walked away… Read More

Massai wandering

Archive East Africa- KIFARU
So we know you weren’t expecting to hear from us for a few more days but we had the opportunity to post early so we thought we would update you!! We have been in the village with the Massai since Saturday. We are camping next to the primary school where we have spent a lot of time working. We are helping to build a road for cars to be able… Read More

Auckland

Archive South Pacific- HONGI
After a long morning of leaving te Nananu village and spending a few days at a hostel in Nadi, we finally made our (long way of connecting flights from Nadi to Sydney back up to Auckland), where we would spend three days running around Auckland and indluging in the city. It was a great change of pace for many of us, from the use of internet to the choice of… Read More

Taranaki Outdoor Adventures

Archive South Pacific- HONGI
We arrived on a late, chilly night in New Plymouth, NZ after a long day of traveling from Auckland. Tran, the leader of TOA, picked up up from the bus stop and piled all of us and all of our stuff into his truck. Trans family and Martin, another leader of TOA, had an amazing meal waiting for us at the cottage we would be staying at. Since it was… Read More

Final day in Pasac!

Archive Central America- QUETZAL
Day 4- Today was our last full day in Pasac! Ah!! Estoy triste! In the morning we went on another hike to see an absolutely gorgeous waterfall. It was so secluded from the town and felt like our groups little secret place. Once we got back it was time to prepare for our evening.  We all got the opportunity to go in one of the tamascals and clean ourselves. The… Read More

Utzzz

Archive Central America- QUETZAL
We arrived in Pasac last Monday with mixed expectations. We knew it was another mayan village and were worried about the challenges we would face. We also heard that we were staying with families, which presented the challenge of communicating with families who´s second language was spanish. But the other Central America group said they loved it here so we kept an open mind.  I guess our adventure begins with… Read More

To Count Our Blessings…

Archive Central America- MAYA
Is going to be difficult for this fresh faced 20 year old.  How could something like counting blessings during a trip like this be hard for someone experiencing it you might ask? Let me explain…. Put yourself in my shoes. I get to explain to all of the parents, family, and friends of my new found friends about how lucky, beautiful, and trying the last week has been for the… Read More

Toot, toot! All aboard!

Archive India- SHIVA
Where do we even begin. We left Amritsar on our very first sleeper train ride. We spent much of the early evening together in our little nook of our train car. To paint you a little picture, there were three bunks stacked on a wall, the middle of which swung up from the back of a seat cushion to become a hanging bed. All in all there were 6 bunks… Read More
Archive Southeast Asia- SABAI
sorry for this late blog post but for some reason it didn’t get posted and we lost it 2 weeks ago Sa wat dii kha! We are now back in Chiang Mai about to leave for Pun Pun to volunteer on an organic farm for a week. The past week has been amazing! We’ve been living with the hill tribe people in the Jafu-Jaka village. We made a 15 mile… Read More

Post from National Park,NZ

Archive South Pacific- WALKABOUT
Hello everyone, its Nick here sending everyone greetings from National Park. Last Saturday we arrived in Haukes Bay after an 8 hour bus ride from Auckland. As we arrived at the farm we were greeted by the wonderful family of PJ and Tom and their children George,Ben,and Rosie. We were fed a wonderful homecooked meal and then we learned that we would be taking on different farming and housing duties… Read More