Manos en Acción!

Everyone at the Bigfoot Hostel has begun working on the first stages of our plans to make this hostel and its activities a shining example for the people in this community, as well as the world community. Today we got all sweaty and dirty, breaking ground on the new urban garden across the street from the hostel. Chris Shanks, the brains behind the garden layout said, "This is probably going to be the most bad ass urban gardens in all of Nicaragua." We started the day by digging up the ground and leveling it, be sure to pick up all the rocks and larger clumps. Additionally, we removed a plant vining up one of the walls to make room for the other more productive bean crops that we'd prefer to have planted there.  Then it was time for the new water tank that will be supplying our garden with irrigation.  It couldn't fit through the doors to the back yard area so we had to hand it over from the roof and before anyone even had a chance to realize it, Roberto had gotten it hoisted up on the water tower.  The hoses got hooked up and a couple kinks worked out with the water pump to begin filling the water tank.  After filling it for a bit, we connected the hose and turned the valve and water with great pressure began pouring the through the end of the hose.  Chris popped in a couple sprinkler heads into the hose and the yard received its very first watering, albeit there were no seeds in the ground yet, but it was nice to see how far things have come since the project first began.

BEFORE  AFTER

Then came time for

 building

 the beds. We laid the bricks in rectangles and cemented them together and then filled them with the fertile dirt that will supply the seedlings with the nutrients

 they need until our 

Vermi-compost system begins pumping out the compost to supply the plants with more nutrients. Chris wrote up a preliminary plan for how to arrange the sprinkler system and showed how the garden beds should be arranged around the yard.  After the 

beds and the sprinkler systems are installed,

 we'll begin planting the seeds in the yard.  Its exciting to see the

 beginning of the project as it is one of the main steps for our

 transition to a more sustainable place for people to learn from while they are staying here.

Other projects we have started are doing really well as well.  Our grey water recycling sinks are feeding the plants, and they have shot up in these last few weeks.  For those of you who have not seen it, we made our sinks in the back of hostel drain into a small planter that contains Banana, Papaya, and Passion fruit plants. We implemented this in September and all the plants are thriving beautifully. 

In addition, we've begun filtering our own water at the hostel.  Allowing us to help our guests reuse their water bottles and limit the amount of bottled water they have to purchase.  We're using ceramic filters to filter the tap water, and eventually we hope to supply bottles for any guests who need them so that we can reduce as much waste as possible. 

Keep checking back here for all the other new and exciting projects that we are trying to implement here.  We have a lot of ideas for new eco-tours, organic farming, and reforestation projects that will be in the works over these next few months.