"A very humbling experience," is how 15-year-old Sarah Daniels described her two-week expedition to Honduras with Bermuda Overseas Missions this July.

The local organisation liaised with Habitat for Humanity to work on building two homes in the Central American country.

The expedition, comprising seven adults and 11 young people, was led by Owen Martin and succeeded in laying the foundations of the two homes and completing half the walls of one.

A subsequent volunteer group from the United States would take up where the Bermudians left off.

"It's very humbling to go to these places," Sarah explained. "When you're at the leaving ceremony [at the end of the expedition] you see how grateful the families are that you left your comforts to come and help them.

"It also makes you thankful for what you have when you come home, that you can turn on a tap and drink the water that comes from it. And air conditioning," she added.

Sarah learned about the opportunity through her school, Saltus Grammar School, and following the first information session was keen to embark on her adventure. Her mother, however, was less enthusiastic and "took a bit of convincing".

The online application form included a liability waiver that stated among other things that the expedition might travel "to and from locations where there is a risk of terrorism, war, insurrection, criminal activity …that could threaten the volunteer's safety or health", that no ransom would be paid in the case of kidnapping and that the organisation would not be responsible for injuries — caveats that might make the most sanguine of parents a little uneasy, Sarah acknowledged.

The group was accommodated in comparative luxury in the dormitory of a local college in the town of Siguatepeque.

From there they travelled a short distance to the worksites.

The first week was spent excavating the trenches for the foundations of the two houses. Though they were in two different areas on the outskirts of the small town, they were similar in size and layout. Each was 500 square feet in size, with two bedrooms, a bathroom, a living area and a kitchen. Once the concrete foundations were laid, cement block walls could be built.

The manual labour was done by the volunteers under the supervision of experienced local masons — and without a cement mixer the first week, the work was indeed laborious. Having a cement mixer the second week made it "a lot easier".

"We could do a lot more. It definitely sped things up," Sarah affirmed.

The families, in both cases with a female head of household, were not quite as destitute as Sarah had imagined they might be, though the houses are allocated based on the level of need as well as other factors, and the family had to meet some obligations to qualify for assistance.

They had to buy the land and building materials and hire the masons, though they could also apply for a loan to cover the cost of this.

The Bermudian volunteers provided the unskilled labour, thus helping to keep the construction costs down.

And the family members helped where they could as well.

The expedition was not without its lighter side, and there was an opportunity on the weekend to do some sightseeing in Copan, a quaint town known for its significant Mayan ruins a six-hour bus ride away.

There was also the opportunity to visit the Botanical Gardens in Siguatepeque, and play an impromptu game of football with the locals.

Despite the hard labour and the mosquitoes, the expedition was fun, and Sarah is contemplating another in the not-to-distant future.