Daka Estate Coffee Plantation – Costa Rica

Our next stop was to visit a coffee plantation.  Those of you who know me well, know that I am not a coffee drinker.  However, I do like the smell of it, and was certainly willing to check out where Costa Rican coffee comes from (at least one place!).

Coffee Beans

Since 1940, the Vargas family has dedicated itself to growing coffee.  One interesting note about Costa Rican coffee – only 10% of the coffee produced in Costa Rica is consumed locally.  About 90% of it is exported.

Coffee Plant Bloom

But, I’m getting ahead of myself.  Before there are coffee beans, there is a lovely bloom on the coffee plant.  When we were there, most of the plants were past the bloom stage, as it was getting to the end of the summer season, instead of just beginning, as it is for us in the US.  These lovely delicate little blooms, end up producing the coffee beans that many folks love to grind and then enjoy brewed each morning!

Coffee Beans in Storage

As we walked along the various stops on our tour, one of the places that impressed me was the storage barn (it seemed like a barn to me, minus the animals!), where the coffee was stored after drying and processing.  The bags have markings on them, indicating when they were placed in this storage facility.

Best Quality Coffee Beans

Which of these bags contain the best quality coffee – that is to say, which has been processed the most and is ready for sale?  Answer: the bag at the top of the image, furthest away from me.  The way you can tell this is by the overall even color of the beans.  The beans in the farthest bag were truly all of an even color.  Not much variation at all!

Different Roasting Times

These coffee beans are all from the same plants!  Why do they look so different?  Different roasting times.  The longer they are roasted, the darker the beans get.  And, the difference in roasting times is only a couple of minutes difference between each batch!

Mama Banana Plant

However, coffee plants weren’t the only thing we saw on the coffee plantation.  There were quite a few banana plants around.  Here’s a photo of a plant with some bananas on the top portion of the plant.  One interesting thing about banana plants – the plant will only produce as many bananas as it can support and nourish.  The bottom of the plant reflects additional potential bananas that never developed because the plant determined it couldn’t support the growth of them.  Another interesting thing is that after producing this one crop of bananas, the plant sends off a shoot to begin another plant, and then this “mother” plant, dies.  Only one batch of bananas per plant.

Beautiful Butterflies

Another cool place on the coffee plantation was the butterfly garden.  Here’s an image of what looks like a beautiful butterfly (actually two are in this image).  It is beautiful, but all we can see is the underside of its wings.  When it flies (and is impossible to photograph!), you can see the upper side of its wings which are an impossibly brilliant shade of blue!

Enjoy!

Poas Volcano – Costa Rica

Our next port of call was Puntarenas, Costa Rica.  They actually called in Puerto Caldera (Caldera Port) because of the active volcano fairly close to the port.  Costa Rica has a fair amount of volcanic activity still going on there, altho I don’t know that any of them is in a position to threaten the population.

Clear View of Poas Volcano Crater

It was a bit of a drive to reach the national park where this particular volcano was located, and then once we arrived there, it was a bit of a walk (maybe ½ mile at most) to reach the viewpoint to look into the crater.  The liquid in the caldera of the volcano is water.  This volcano spews water when it erupts – that’s different from any other volcano that I had ever heard of!

Poas Volcano – Clouds Drifting

We were told that we were actually pretty lucky to have such a clear view of the caldera, because frequently, the clouds cover the volcano. This volcano, like others and like mountains, frequently creates its own weather, and that weather generally looks like clouds!

Poas Volcano – Clouds Rolling Up from the Valley

When I looked to the left of the caldera, I could see a bank of clouds that were rolling up what I think of as the eruption path.  When the volcano erupts, generally, the water and whatever other material is in the blast, travels down the mountain following this path.  You can see how along the floor of the path, vegetation is a bit scarce.

Active Poas Volcano

This close up is proof that this really is an active volcano – check out the steam rising from the caldera!  The water that the volcano shoots forth when it erupts is drawn from a lagoon not far off to the right of the caldera, altho it was too far away to actually see. 

Enjoy!