First night in the valley -eve

Today was my first day off of work. It´s strange but I don´t really have any sense of days and time here...partially because I don´t have my phone with me but also because I really just work between breakfast and lunch, go out to the beach or exploring the village until the sun goes down and it gets too cold to be outside (which is a lot colder than I expected) and go to bed when it´s dark...which usually means reading with my headlamp because I have a hard time going to sleep too early. Monday through Saturday are pretty much the same schedule, and then I have Sunday off... so today was the first day without any real structure.

We slept in till 9 or so and then I got a ride down to the beach Laurie, who was spending his day off surfing. I went for a run on this dirt road that follows the cliffs pictured in my last post and met up with Jodie for some lunch at a cafe by the water. I´m trying to spend as little as possible on food, but it´s been tough sort of living between the camp and the village as far as meals go (also given how often I´m used to eating). Luckily food is pretty cheap... I just bought an avocado, 2 oranges, a bag of figs, and a mango at the corner store across from where I´m writing now for just 3 euro. But it will be much easier once I´m actually sleeping down in the valley and using the kitchen there... which starts...tonight!

We moved my stuff out of Laurie´s when we got back from the beach this afternoon. It´s a little overwhelming to move down there because the other volunteer is only staying for another 2 weeks, and after that I´m not sure if anyone else will be coming. The guests don´t arrive until May 1, and I would really like to stay here long enough to be part of that, but I also don´t want to be sleeping in a tent in the middle of a secluded valley by myself. Worse case, I can try to find somewhere else to volunteer at, but we´ll see what happens.

I have to walk back to the apartment now and get a bike so I can ride to the valley before it´s too dark. Definitely feeling the effects of a full day in the sun right now. A good shower would feel pretty amazing, but once the sun goes down, an ice cold shower outside kind of loses appeal. I´ll have to do a better job strategizing shower time after a run.

Wish me luck on my first night outside!