El Porvenir

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coffee

Today was a great day, a lot of traveling, but well worth it. We woke up early and hopped on the magical school bus for about 2 hours. We stopped at an "On the Run" gas station for some snacks-- chocolate caliente (chocolate milk) and BBQ fried corn (pretty much the same as corn nuts) Then we traveled on a dirt road for a long time. It was probably a wash and only wide enough for one car/bus. It was bumpy and I was surprised we made it. After a while we reached the point where the bus couldn't go any farther and we had to transfer to a tractor that we stood in the back of while it pulled us uphill, up the very rocky road. Then we reached the mountain village of El Provenir. This small community only has 45 families and has the most beautiful view from the top of the mountian. We took a small hike and we could see Costa Rica to one side and Honduras the other way. We had lunch on the porch overlooking beautiful farmland and after we listened to Renee, the leader/organizer of the coffee co-op, speak about the community and their organic coffee. Then we walked along a path to where the coffee trees were and we got to pick our own coffee beans. Coffee grows on small trees and the small yellow and red berries can only be picked by hand. After an hour of picking, our group of 30 had picked 160 lbs of beans, which is equal to 20 lbs of dried coffee which makes 2,000 cups of coffee and this whole hour of picking would have earned only $5 for the entire group to split. I never realized how much work actually went into making a cup of coffee. The coffee grown at El Porvenir is organic and in order to protect American roasters it has to be sent to a company in Pittsburg before it reaches the final product that can be brewed as coffee we drink. After we got the chance to see the process after the picking and it was neat to see how they separate the outside shell from the inside coffee bean.
We also took a walk to see the tree that has become the Brigade logo/symbol, which is called a guanacaste tree and is said to be over 500 years old. After a wonderful day at El Porvenir we had to hop on the tractor and bus again to make the long trip back to JHC.

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Photos

El Porvenir
these are boxes where the workers used to sleep during the coffee picking season.

me and caitlin
We were posing next to some horses and they were startled and that startled me!