Of ranches and rain....

Ah Sunday.....a chance to sleep in to 9!

After a quick breakfast we gathered at the vans for an excursion to [driver] Miguels family ranch about 40 minutes out of town.
The family spends the summer holidays and weekends at this  farm along with a resident family who do the majority of the labour.
I guess our equivalent of this arrangement would be "sharecropping" and I hope the labour movement doesn't hear about it as it seems to work quite well. Very humble by our standards yet comfortable, including a round and  welcoming swimming pool out back.

They have 40 acres with 30 cows, chickens, Guinea Hens, and some cash crops for the resident family.
Miguels father looks after the dairy operation arriving at 3am to milk the cows and deliver to the dairy in town. He then starts his "day job" at the family owned bakery in town.

Prior to our arrival we stopped at the local "Super Mercado" to pick up supplies for lunch.
IMHO the best way to get down and dirty with the locals is to either ride with them in their busses or shop with them in their grocery stores.

Prices for staple goods are generally comparable to home. Some things are a bit more, some things a bit less, some things a lot less and then there is the price of wines and spirits [beer too!].....often half and in some cases a quarter of what we pay.

Lunch, siesta, swim and exploring the ranch dispensed with, it was time to head home to a room that my roomies [Murray & Bob] agreed was starting to smell like a gym bag.....funny how damp clothes don't ever really dry out in this humidity.

Badger Bob and his hole - day 3

Monday dawned with a heavy overcast and a heavier humidity level....thankfully, the forecast high of 26c was a relief and we looked forward to a productive day.

...but first, a stop at the local version of a TSC / Farmers Co-Op store where we made the shop keepers month by cleaning out his supply of gum boots @ 75,000 Guarani a pop [~$20 cdn]
...best 75,000 I ever spent!....we kinda figured the site would be a quagmire and we weren't disappointed.

Now, it's funny how some people find jobs or jobs find some people, or both, and when that happens it can be magical.

It would appear Bob found his calling as a septic tank excavator. He just kinda sorta adopted that task as his own and ran with it.
[which was fine with the rest of us!]
...totally polar opposite vocation from that of corporate law if ever there was one!
...nice to know that he has something he could fall back on if need be!
In any case, we marvelled at his doggedness and determination....in spite of....

....the bad news.....after Saturdays storm, Bobs burrow was quite full of water which had to be removed, bucket by bucket brigade ....all the while being on the lookout for critters of the snake, frog and toad variety. The 10" snakes in the pit resembled our garter snakes but greyish instead of green. Alberto [head mason, remember?] cautioned us that they were poisonous.....oh Alberto, such a kidder! ....hard to take that guy seriously at times.
Turns out he wasn't kidding!

Aforementioned burrow sufficiently bailed Bob jumped right in and picked up where he left off ably assisted on the dirt [more like heavy clay/muck ...but that doesn't alliterate well....but I digress] disposal duties by Marvin [mostly] and Kevin.

As mentioned in a previous post, I'm always amazed at how quickly a group of otherwise unskilled people can just look around, see what needs doing and does it!......but then the rains came once again!
...mad scramble to cover the fresh laid block with the curved roof tiles and Bobs pit with some left over [from some earlier construction project] corrugated sheet metal.