Day Three--Hike to Tent Rocks and More

“Quowhatzena” from New Mexico!  That’s how the Pueblo greeting sounds but there is no written language so we are guessing about its spelling.  Yesterday we went on a hike to the Tent Mountains.  It had exotic sites to see.  On the way up the path we found “Apache Tears”.  These are rocks that look like glass.  These stones are native to their land.  Along the way we saw cacti, caves, mountains and  some cliffs that looked layered.  When you look through the pictures that we uploaded you will see rock formations that look like castles.  In one picture you will see Taylor looking up through something like a chimney.  We made it most of the way up the mountain but we had to turn around to get to the Cochiti School on time.

At the school we began work on our service projects with the Cochiti students.  We are working on a large map and a hundreds chart that fill up most of a big tennis court area.  We are also putting some lawn furniture together for a study garden outside of the school.  The money we made from fund raising went to the materials to make this stuff. 

Next we are going to do a pottery class and listen to a storyteller. 

                                                                                                          

By Nia

Afternoon Hike pics and Starting the Mural

Greetings from New Mexico!  We have had some very fun times. We went to a national park and picked a lot of tumbleweeds.  It is actually part of the same park where we are camping.   They were not like the ones in the movies. In strong winds, they still didn’t tumble very far. They pricked your legs and arms which hurt really badly. Some were hard to pull out of the ground but some were not.

            We also went to see our pen pals with whom we were skyping in technology class. We played games with them to learn names and a little more about their school.  We played outside with each other. We were going to the tennis court when suddenly a sand storm came and we got sand in our eyes. Nia tripped over a kid and had her mouth open and ate the sand. So far we have had a spectacular time!

By Yasmine and Carter

First day in NM!

We collected tumbleweed this morning, (some bigger than the students)! Ranger chris also taught us about the cochiti dam and native species. This afternoon was full of activities with our new friends from cochiti school. We did a scavenger hunt and learned about the Pueblo. If its not too windy tomorrow, well start painting a map of the us on the basketball court outside!  Fajitas for dinner tonight! Go team Chubaka!!

Picking tumbleweed?

I got a cryptic text from Mr. Coolidge today, saying that all was well and that they were picking tumbleweed. I'm not sure what that means. I'm sure that they will enlighten us on today's blog posts.

Service work at campsite!

Cleaning up tumbleweeds!

Students in NM!!

They made it!

Just got a text from Mr Coolidge that they have safely landed in New Mexico! The kids are both tired and wired at the same time. They had to rush to make their connecting flight, and are on the private bus to the Pueblo now. Coolidge says they haven't stopped eating since BWI. They will post to this blog tomorrow.

Flight Info

Southwest 1086 - March 17 BWI - Chicago 8:25AM - 9:30 AM
Southwest 3408 – March 17 Chicago - Albuquerque 10:10AM - 12:10 PM

Southwest 919 - March 23 Albuquerque - Houston 2:20PM – 5:20PM
Southwest 1842 – March 23 Houston – BWI 6:25PM – 10:15PM

Safely Off

This morning, all of the families gathered at 6:30am and smoothly sent their kids through the checkin process and then through security with Mr Coolidge. Next update: connecting flights through Chicago.