Our flight to Costa Rica and onward flight to Colombia had already left - the itinerary supplied by our agent had the dates wrong. Thank the lord that the Cuban airport staff managed to get us on the flight to Costa Rica. Given the same situation, I can just imagine the Ryanair staff rubbing their hands with glee. The flight to Colombia the following morning was fully booked, but they put us on the afternoon flight instead, giving us an extra half day in Costa Rica.
Our accommodation in Costa Rica felt like luxury after the last couple of Casa Particulares in Cuba (we'd dubbed the one in Veradero "The cell"). Just fifteen minutes from the airport in the hills above Alajuela, Tacacori is a little oasis of four detached rooms in a lush garden. The heavy scent of the pale pink datura flowers lining the path hung in the air, and the darkness shrilled with insects. Clean sheets! Hot water! Hallelujah Alajuela!
Our hosts had suggested we take a short walk down the road to Xandari Resort, which has a restaurant. After long hot showers, we'd walked down the dark road, past the occasional barking dog, to the resort gates and the shaking head of the security guard. We weren't sure what to do. We looked out into the darkness - there were no alternatives nearby. Fortunately the guard phoned the restaurant and the staff took pity on us. We walked through the extensive acreage to the restaurant that is perched on a hill overlooking the city. We had an excellent meal (and wine) - our enjoyment no doubt boosted by the mediocre fare we'd encountered in Cuba. Like Eddie said: "That's the best god-damned cracker I've had in my life!"
After a brekkie of fruit (including golden and white pineapple) and coffee - while the resident parrot decimated the foliage surrounding his perch - we headed to Doka Coffee Estate for a bit of a nosey and some lunch.
The hills around Tacacori are prime coffee-growing land and the lodge is surrounded by coffee estates. The land is filled with birds, insects, snakes and animals, so the coffee growers plant fruit trees between the coffee plants to provide an alternative food source. The neat rows of glossy-leafed coffee plants are interspersed with limes, bananas and mangoes.
Costa Rica has loads of volcanoes providing rich soil, and it has a good humid climate for coffee-growing. They just put the coffee bean in the soil and it sprouts into a little stem with the bean at the tip of the protrusion. It takes a surprisingly long time for the plants to start producing - about five years.
Coffee flowers smell amazing and can be used to make perfume - but there is more money in coffee. The beans are picked when they turn red. For each basket of beans, the workers are paid $2. It's not much money for Costa Ricans so all the pickers come from Nicaragua and stay in purpose-built accommodation on the estate.
Doka is one of the oldest estates in Costa Rica and still uses machinery to refine the beans that is more than a hundred years old. I was amused to see it was all made in London.
The estate also has a butterfly house. I wished my butterfly-loving friend Sheree could have been there.
The list
Tacacori Eco Lodge: small hotel run by a French couple, with four private rooms set in lush gardens, $85 B&B
Xandari Resort & Spa: gorgeous resort ranked by Conde Nast Traveller as one of the top ten Central and South American resorts, five minutes walk from Tacacori, has a great restaurant with stunning views across the valley
Doka Estate Coffee Tour: coffee estate near Tacacori that runs tours and has a restaurant and butterfly house, $29 (coffee, tour and lunch)
No comments:
Post a Comment