Kroka Expeditions is an organization based in New England that offers a four month program for young people age 15 to 19. The next program starts this September and takes twelve teens accompanied by two leaders to South America to work with and learn from native Ecuadorians, broadening the students’ cultural understanding and opening our eyes to the world around us. We are faced with the contrasting realities of Ecuador and New England and helped to understand the needs of people in developing countries and the positive role we can play in bringing about change.
Links to Kroka:
Kroka's Ecuador semester page
2010 Ecuador semester blog
Our adventure begins on a New Hampshire farm where the students and leaders spend a month readying ourselves: getting to know one another and building community as well as preparing physically and mentally for the journey ahead. We’ll learn extensively about sustainability, wilderness survival, exploration and various outdoor skills, along with New England history, Spanish, and an array of natural sciences. We’ll swim and run daily as well as going biking and rock climbing to prepare ourselves physically.
In South America, Ecuadorian teenage students join the group. Together we immerse ourselves in the Ecuadorian culture and landscape. Taking advantage of the local connections that Kroka has forged, we work with local people to learn crafts and about the culture using the Spanish we’ll have learned. We travel around the region and explore the mountains and rainforest, seeing first hand the impact of the modern world and the oil industry on Amazonian tribes, even as we are engulfed by the adventure and beauty of our surroundings.
We make a cataraft that carries us down the Amazonian rivers to a village of the indigenous Shiwakotcha people, who teach us about jungle life and native traditions. Along this journey, the group has become a close-knit community, helping us both to think as a group and build leadership skills, something that will serve us well as our time starts to draw to a close and we adventure up into the mountains.
After being submerged in this new culture for two months the group is ready for the final expedition: the challenging climb up the volcano Cotapaxi, an undertaking that tests both the physical and mental strength of the group. At over 19,000 feet, Cotopaxi is one of the world’s tallest active volcanoes. Its snowy peak juts above the clouds.
