Our first stop was the Naranjo Coffee Plantation in the mountainous Alajuela region. This is coffee grown at above 1500 feet. Less acidity and really smooth. Guillermo got us here early before the heat got going and to meet Jose who he wanted to be the person conducting the tour of coffee production. Cafe Naranjo is a cooperative growing organic coffees. Jose does not work for the owners, but they have hired him as a guide. His passion was that of an addicted person-he ended the tour by brewing a small cup for each of us using a strainer to pour the brew into the cups. It was super good.
Their website is: <http://www.cafenaranjo.com/en/>
Our leather seated, air conditioned bus.
The main building after hiking up the hill from the parking lot.
That’s Jose in the middle in the
blue shirt.
Lovely flowers everywhere.
Rows of coffee plants cover the hillsides.
Marilynn is being outfitted in the picker’s basket in order to pick coffee beans by hand—no machines are used in the harvest of coffee. Mostly migrant workers from Nicaragua work the fields.
A huge hornet’s nest under the roof of the sorting shed where beans are graded and sorted.
The roasting room where the beans are roasted and packaged.
The filled bags are labeled for shipment. Green Mountain is one of the buyers.
Fresh coffee at last!