Our random weekend on campamento

So, the middle of last week JP and I were asked to go on campamento (a weekend sort-of camping trip) with cuarto grado de secundaria, the equivalent of 10th graders. Their class teacher organizes the trip and was short on other adults, so we agreed to go. We went with 22 students to the town of Ite, which is close to the coast, about two hours from here. It kind of swallowed our whole weekend, but here are some highlights.

To get there, the school hired one of the bus drivers who regularly drives the set route up to town and back. He actually stayed with us the whole weekend and was a very good sport and very helpful. Here we are loading the bus outside of school:

By the time we got there it was dark and drizzly, and the organizers realized that our cloth tents (seen on top of the bus in the picture above) would not do very well in the cold and wet. So we ended up staying in some rooms at a place owned by the army or the police, but we were inside. The kids all slept on the floor but the teachers got bunk beds, because, as the class teacher said, we are old and need our rest. The other bonus of this setup was a working bathroom and sink. Here is the place we stayed:
The next morning the rain had cleared up so we were able to move to our actual camp spot, but not before the boys had to push the bus to get it to start:
Our new campsite was next to an agricultural project run by the government, that was doing research on best practices, basically. We got a tour by one of the staff, focusing on the ají they grow--a hot pepper that is used in lots of local food and is really good. Pictured below are beds of ají shoots and then the actual plant.

Another highlight of the tour was all the animals. There were lots of cows and cute baby goats.
After the tour we returned and set up the tent. There were supposed to be two tents but the metal poles for one were too broken so they were combined to make one huge tent. You can see from the picture that it is a little crooked...
We also got to go on a tour and see how the town of Ite is spending its mining money (building tons of stuff) and see the beach!
There was also a spot on the beach with rock carvings that we got to visit--they are still investigating where these came from and how old they are:
After the tour, we returned and helped the students make dinner.
On Sunday we cleaned up and went to the town of Ite for what was supposed to be a gastronomic festival. Before that, there was a volleyball tournament, and somehow JP ended up being the referee for one of the games. The students were very excited about this and cheered every time the announcer mentioned the referee--most popular referee ever! Here is a picture for proof:
In the back you can see the tents set up, but unfortunately that was all we saw of the gastronomic festival. There was no sign of any food by 12:45 and we had to get home, so we all piled back in the bus and drove home.
Yay! We survived!