Monkeys On Our Heads!

The title of this blog just about sums up our day today! We were accepted as volunteers at an animal rescue center here in Puerto Viejo yesterday and started today. We were thinking that our first few weeks would entail endless cleaning, shit shovelling and chopping of fruits/food for the animals, but no, on day one, hour one in-fact, we were thown in the cage with around 12 howler monkeys! My job was to clean the cages and Rene's was to work with the handyman to fix some cages, bit sexist but who cares (Rene is actually great at cleaning and me at fixing!). Within seconds, we had baby and grown monkeys on our heads, shoulders, in our arms and up our legs all vying for our attention. It was too good to be true and we felt that we should actually be paying for this amazing experience! They are so faccinating and affectionate, I don't think we could ever tire of them.

During the course of the day, we assisted with taking some of the monkeys into the jungle to get them used to being free, feeding baby raccoons and sloths, and of course, some sweeping up and cleaning. We will working there two or three times a week to start with and if we settle in this town then it could be a long term thing. We love it here and with the connections that we are making, it is feeling more and more like home.

Tomorrow we are helping in a soup kitchen for the homeless, and then we will visit the schools to see if there is any work for English teachers so we can earn a bit of money as well. We can't live on monkey love alone sadly!

Pictures of monkeys on our heads will follow after our first couple of shifts. We don't want to look like tourists with camera's just yet, rather more, like hard working, keen volunteers. I have attached a photo of our local beach though instead.