Adios, Urubamba!

Adios, Urubamba!

By the Instructors

Saludos desde Urubamba! (Hello from Urubamba!)

Today marks our final full day in Urubamba. Tonight, students and their homestay families along with a few ISP mentors will gather at our program house to celebrate our weeks together with an evening of delicious food cooked by our homestay families and students, mini-presentations from our dragoncit@s about their ISP experiences (including a dance performance from Ava and Natalie and a charango performance from Zia, Sam, and Katya!), and to share words of gratitude towards families and our Urubamba community. Already, our students are talking about how much they have enjoyed their time here and how hard it will be to leave. Our next stop will be the community of Paru Paru, where we’ll learn about textiles, native potato varieties, and earthen buildings with adobe. Before that, we wanted to share a few photos with you all!

Thank you for everything, Matt and Ja Muna

Thank you for everything, Matt and Ja Muna

Hi friends and families at home,

We had a great few days at Koh Klang. Our wonderful hosts Matt and Ja Muna kindly opened the door of their home and their community to us, and we learned a great deal from them. From mangrove reforestation to the development of eco-tourism in the community to the local arts and crafts, we experienced them all and learned a lot along the way, not to mention that all this happened in the beautiful setting like a paradise.

Thank you for everything, Matt and Ja Muna! Until next time…

Now Koh Pra Thong, here we come!

Carpe Mundi team

Click to see more amazing pictures!

Tired, Sweaty, & Musty

Tired, Sweaty, & Musty

Hi everyone, we’re very smelly right now.

We’re on the island of Koh Klang in the province of Krabi, Thailand, (still in the south, very sunny, my skin is peeling off).

To get to the island we had to get a long tail boat from Krabi. It was about a 5-10 minute boat ride, little did we know that we had a local celebrity providing the transportation; Pee Superman, shout out to him. On the ride over we saw a few water monitor lizards aka. Ms. Kipling from Jesse.

A glimpse into our first two weeks

A glimpse into our first two weeks

Hola familias!

Our dragoncitxs are doing beautifully in this peaceful, small town of Urubamba that is our home for these nearly-two weeks. Every morning we wake up surrounded by incredible, lush, green mountains and we have been very fortunate to enjoy many sunny days here in the Valle Sagrado. It has been a real treat!

Click to read more and see some amazing photos of Jakob and Natalie and their group!

Greetings from Krabi!

Greetings from Krabi!

By Nevaeh and Anabelle

Greetings from Krabi!

This is Nevaeh and Anabelle, coming back at you after three days in Thailand. So lately… We’ve been at this pretty cool place called Spirit mountain, in Krabi, a small costal town in Southern Thailand.  We met our two new instructors, Graci and M, the latter we lovingly call PM to show our respect in Thai. We’ve been staying in a small retreat space called Nature Mind ED, which values connecting with natures and sustainable living. The property is home to rock climbing, cave spelunking, gardens with composting and many cute critters (Nevaeh disagrees that last statement, she doesn’t like the critters:( ).

Start of Urubamba Homestays, Issac’s birthday

Start of Urubamba Homestays, Issac’s birthday

By the Instructors

Hello Everyone,

We are thrilled to announce that our group has successfully arrived and settled into the picturesque town of Urubamba, nestled in the heart of the Sacred Valley, and we are now ready to begin our first homestay experience! This marks the start of a truly enriching chapter for all of us as we dive into the local culture and community.

The kids are alright (but a little breathless)

The kids are alright (but a little breathless)

By Talia, a group mate of Jakob and Natalie’s

Thursday Feb 2o, 2025

Our last day ever in the sun. We were bummed to leave the coast in Mejía, but we have bigger things ahead of us. We spent our last afternoon on the beach playing volleyball and getting ferocious burns before having our first weekly group meeting, appointing our first student leaders (yay!, Katya and Lauren), and getting on the bus heading back to Arequipa. At the bus terminal in Arequipa we bought some last-minute dinner and snacks before heading onto the most daunting bus rides of our lives. The 10-hour overnight bus to Cusco. While mostly uneventful, the moving bathrooms proved to be a real challenge

Saludos desde Mejía! (Greetings from Mejía!)

Saludos desde Mejía! (Greetings from Mejía!)

By Soumya, an Instructor

Hello friends and families of our lovely A&A dragoncitxs!

It has been a few days since we’ve shared an update, and much has happened since then. Thank you for your patience! We’re writing this from the sunny, warm coastal town of Mejía, where we’ve pivoted mid-orientation to avoid the torrential downpour and resulting road closures in the Arequipa area. We are in the rainy season; however, we have been told that this level of precipitation is pretty unprecedented and here at the coast, we have fortunately been isolated from the fallout.

First couple days in Peru!

Hi all,

The group has settled into Arequipa for the orientation. While the monsoon season is in full swing the group is finding time to stay dry and engage in orientation activities. From playing games, learning about the history and politics of Peru to learning about how to stay healthy to exercising together to enjoying the first chifa meal, this adventure is unfolding one day at a time, and we can’t wait to see what the following days bring with this lovely group of students.

Enjoy the photos! More to come

Instructors