The Sussex countryside was treating us well, and this had inspired us to search coastal opportunities in our other continents as well. So in South America, we established contact with an extremely worthwhile social project in one of the favelas of Rio de Janeiro, working with mentally handicapped children helping to prepare them to take part in the world famous Rio carnival (I'd be lying if I said the teams didn't pop down to Copacabana beach at weekends as well...!)

Likewise in Africa. The first ever "Quest Parents" team which flew out to South America in 2002, decided it was time they deserved a reward for all their hard work in the Andes two years previous. So they stormed into the office and demanded a relaxing break on an African beach, who were we to refuse them? We did take a little artistic license with the itinerary of course, and added in a couple of trekking safaris and even a bit of white water rafting down the Zambezi. Also, instead of just lying on the beach (they'd get bored of that), it made more sense to keep them occupied with a PADI scuba diving course. The whale sharks, manta rays and other marine beauties more than made it worthwhile though, so no complaints at all - phew!

Now, we've always been very fortunate to have leaders who go above and beyond the call of duty, both for our teams and our projects. This year however, we discovered a new level of sacrifice from Olivia who was leading one of our conservation teams in the animal sanctuary in Bolivia. Whilst helping to construct a huge new enclosure for a recently rescued jaguar, Olivia managed to trip while walking through a pile of wood. Without seeing where she was stepping, she managed to put her foot right through a nail. This made her fall and she broke her fall with her hand - on another nail! So the only thing we could conclude from that was that we have leaders willing to crucify themselves for our projects (please let it be clear though, we're not making any comparisons here...).

At the same time, another leader - the notorious ex-student Simon Tierney - joined the ranks, leading his first team in the Santa Lucia cloud forest. When the humidity in the hills was getting to the team and nobody had any dry clothes left, he gallantly offered to run into the nearest village and do a mass purchase of clothes. He returned with an interesting selection, not exactly to the liking of the group, but his claim that large pink ladies' pants were they only items on offer in the village soon made the team see the value of his gesture! Once again, a demonstration of the calibre of our leaders...