Community Development in the Mountains

After climbing up to the 900 m pass, past many villages along a much gentler stretch of road, we started descending back to the river only to have one of the bolts attaching Karl's front rack snap. While he struggled to extract the broken piece, a pick-up stopped to ask if we needed help, and we met Donald, the director of Choice Humanitarian's SIKAAB'E Development Centre, and US volunteer Jolene. Since their centre was just 2 km down the hill, they offered to give Karl and his gear a ride to their shop where they had more tools we could use to extract the broken bolt. After trying a series of different sets of pliers, the solution came from drilling out of the centre of the bolt. With the repair complete, Donald gave us a tour of the centre, and we learned a lot about how much of Guatemala's agriculture has shifted from self sufficiency to growing cash crops like cardamom, cacao, coffee, and sugar; forcing families to survive on corn and beans bought in distant markets. The main goal of the centre is to revitalize self sufficiency in these communities and provide training in better agriculture practices, carpentry, cooking and hospitality so that people can take knowledge back to their communities and continue to spread positive change. It was inspiring to hear and see the positive impact Choice has had on the people living in the small mountain towns we rode through. The centre has also recently built two cute little cabins with an amazing view over the valley, so should be offering accomodation to two and four-wheeled travellers in the near future.Read more