Welcome to my Blog!
Since December 2023, I have been serving as a Community Health Volunteer for Peace Corps Peru. Until December 2025, I will be living in a rural Andean town in the Ancash region serving in the realm of maternal and youth health. Here are the 2 objectives I’ll be working on:
- Promoting coordination between the local health post and school to expand nutrition, mental health, physical activity, and sexual and reproductive health education in adolescents.
- Supporting Peru’s national strategy to combat anemia and malnutrition in children under 5 through educational training activities and working alongside community health workers.
This blog is a space for me to document and reflect on my service and experiences while also keeping friends and family updated on my life.
See below for my most recent posts, or click ‘All Blogs’ at the top right of this page to see everything I have written. And, don’t forget to subscribe for notifications about new posts!
If you’ve made it this far, thank you for reading! Hope you enjoy, and always feel free to reach out with an update. Here is my mailing address:
LUCIE RUTHERFORD
OFICINA SERPOST
CASILLA Nº64
AV. LUZURIAGA NRO 714
HUARAZ – ANCASH – PERU
COD. POST. D2001
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Huayhuash: One of the most beautiful cordilleras in the world
A couple of weeks ago, I checked off one of the major Ancash bucket list items: the Huayhuash Trek – an 8-day, 115km (70 mile) trek that takes you through 8,000ft of elevation gain and a maximum altitude of 16,732ft (5,100m). I did it alongside 7 other volunteers, and a guide team run by a…
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The Gordon Ramsay of Iron-Rich Cooking: A Peace Corps Small Grant
For the final quarter of 2024, I spent one too many hours applying for the Peace Corps Small Grant, a maximum $2,500 sum towards any project within my objectives as a Community Health Volunteer (which are teen health and anemia prevention). After many discussions with friends, family, and local counterparts, I had my idea: improving…
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An Important Week: Semana Santa and My 25th
Not every kid can say that they grew up searching for fake landmines on Easter. But alas, alongside the candy-filled, colored plastic eggs of my childhood were Chinese PNM 72 anti-personnel (toe-popper) mines, stake trip wire mines, anti-tankers, Soviet butterfly mines, you name it. $5 for the soft ones and $10 for the hard, but…
Travel makes you modest. You see what a tiny place you occupy in the world.
– Gustavo Flaubert
