The rich volcanic soil combined with rainfall and an endless growing season have made Costa Rica one of the world’s most renowned coffee growing countries. This tiny country in Central America, neighbored by Panama and Nicaragua, produces about 2.6 million 60 kilogram bags of gourmet coffee each year, placing it about number nine of the world’s top coffee producing nations. Federal law restricts coffee cultivation in Costa Rica to the Arabica hard bean coffee.
Coffee Tours in Costa Rica
Finca Rosa Blanca, an environmentally-friendly boutique hotel and coffee farm about 30 miles from the capital of San Jose, allows guests to participate in the harvest and processing of coffee beans and then offers instruction in making the perfect cappuccino, latte and espresso. Located at 4,000 feet above sea level, the inn and its 40 acres of tree shade grown hard bean coffee are certified sustainable by the Costa Rica National Organization for Coffee.
What that means is that some of the environmentally disastrous effects of coffee production throughout the 19th and 20th centuries are slowly being reversed on plantations such as Rinca Rosa Blanca. A stay here focuses on the stewardship of the environment and the integrity of the coffee culture.
Owners Glenn and Teri Jampol, who moved to Costa Rica from New York in 1985, strive for guests to leave with an understanding of the history of coffee trade and production, as well as how to discern the distinct flavors of various blends of coffee beans. Guests may pick their own berries, clean and dry the beans and roast and package their very own blend.
Or, if guests prefer not to get their hands dirty, daily “cupping” sessions are offered with expert barristers and coffee guides on lovely decks over looking the coffee fields and the volcanoes beyond. This is the only coffee tour in the country that offers a cupping afterwards. The Costa Rica National Organization for Coffee certifies that Finca Rosa Blanca is a sustainable, environmentally friendly coffee production facility.
Sustainable Coffee Plantations
Finca Rosa Blanca was the first boutique hotel in Costa Rica and currently the only one that has a 100 percent ranking in sustainability. Glenn Jampol, an artist and architect by training, sat on the board that established the original sustainability in tourism standards in the country. He and Teri have dual citizenship in the United States and Costa Rica.
Coffee harvest in the San Jose growing region runs roughly October to January. The Costa Rica Coffee Institute (ICAFE) is located approximately five miles from Finca Rosa Blanca in Santa Barbara de Heredia. The organization is a good source for other coffee tours in Costa Rica.
Diana Lambdin Meyer - As at home on her family's grain farm in southern Illinois as she is riding a camel on the Sinai Peninsula, Diana Lambdin Meyer most ...
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