Today 25 of us hit the road to visit Rancho Ebenezer, the WGO children's home which is in San Mattias just outside of Tegucigalpa. The Ranch, as it is lovingly called, doesn't have any livestock but is the home for 25 children who are wards of the state. The kids receive care from a team of mentor parents, caregivers, teachers and other staff on a campus that includes individual homes, a school, other support buildings, and play areas. We toured the facility and learned how it operates.
The Ranch also includes a banana finca and a grove of coffee plants. The coffee is harvested, roasted and sold as Cloud Forest Coffee to help support the Ranch. It's just about harvest season so we were able to see the ripening 'cherries' and the roasting process.
Another way the Ranch is supported financially is through the WGO Kids child sponsorship program. The team members that are child sponsors got a chance to meet with their sponsor children, which is always a treat, and everyone got a chance to interact with the kids during their recess from school.
On the way home from the Ranch, we toured a park called El Picacho. At Christmastime the park is decorated with a lot of lighting displays and some of the decorations were still up. The park includes lots of little things to do, but the primary thing to see is the Jesus statue that looks out over the city of Tegucigalpa. The weather finally cleared up today, so we had very nice views from the park.
The rest of the team went on a little tourist trip to the towns of Santa Lucia and Vallee de los Angeles. Both towns were originally settled in the 1700's as gold and silver mining towns. Now they are tourist towns. We were able to see the church in Santa Lucia, which has some interesting art and a spectacular altar area.
In Vallee de los Angeles we supported the local economy by visiting lots of the local souvenir shops. The favorite was a leather shop that made its own products in a workshop in the back. We got a free tour and saw them making handbags, wallets, belts and the like. After spending all our money, we had pizza for lunch in a little restaurant tucked away on a pleasant street. The sun came out as we enjoyed our leisurely meal and a good time was had by all.
When we all reunited back at the Mission House we loaded the trucks with the supplies that we will need at tomorrow's Serve Team sites. We also had a short introduction to the WGO Kids child sponsorship program before dinner, and then, after dinner we had a fun time playing various games and laughing a lot.
VISITING RANCHO EBENEZER
COFFEE
VISITING EL PICACHO
VISITING SANTA LUCIA
VISITING VALLEE DE LOS ANGELES
A LITTLE FUN AT THE MISSION HOUSE
