Bushwhacking!

ADRA owns a plot of land in the jungle of Caué District.  It was bought many years ago to be a sort of experimental research farm, but has lain dormant for several years now.  We're still holding onto it because we know that one of these days, we'll figure out what to do with it.  But for the moment, it just sits there, slowly getting overgrown and maturing into a full rainforest.  We have a guard who lives there and keeps an eye out on the property, but we were starting to get reports of illegal logging and harvesting on our land.  So one day in February, I went there with some of our staff (who already know the lay of the land), and we hiked the perimeter of the plot, hacking our way with machetes part of the time, walking on dirt roads some of the time, and sweating buckets the whole time!  It is absolutely beautiful territory, complete with a scenic cliff overlook, waterfalls, and black cobras all around.  Thankfully on our hike, we didn't come across any cobras, but we did come across evidence of illegal logging and fruit harvesting.  Either our guard is not on duty much of the time, he's too old to hear the chainsaws, or he's complicit with the activities.  Not sure what we're going to do about it, as guards willing to live out there in the lonely woods are hard to come by.  Perhaps we'll turn our land into an ecotourism trekking ground and make some money off of it that way -- without having to introduce any kind of labor-intensive industry!