Weekend on a Coffee Farm

Alex caught a cold, so we are relaxing today. Perfect time to write about our coffee farm experience! With a long weekend in our sights and in an effort to squeeze as much as possible from our time here, we decided to use the weekend to explore further south of Medellin to Colombia’s “Coffee Triangle.” We whipped out our Lonely Planet guidebook and without much further thought we booked three nights at Hacienda Vanecia, a hostel on a coffee farm they recommended just outside of Manizales, Colombia.

The Bus Ride

Step one was getting there. While inland flights are actually quite cheap here (~$100 round trip), bus trips are even cheaper. Price was enough to make our decision and we booked 2 round trip bus tickets to Manizales for about $20 per person – the bus company told us the ride would take 4 hours. After sharing our plans with my teacher and classmates, they laughed and told me that 4 hours would be a miracle. We should expect 6 hours on the low end and 10-12 hours on the high end. Turns out the road from Medellin to Manizales is ALWAYS under construction because the road is frequently washed away by landslides (it is still the rainy season here). Not to mention that the road is a very windy mountain road for the majority of the way. Several spots go down to one lane, so one side of traffic often has to wait HOURS for the oncoming traffic to pass. Cool! Fun! I had no choice but to see it as an adventure.

Crossing the Amazon River…

Just kidding, I have no idea what river that is.

And below, a video from the rest area/truck stop.

So in the end, the ride did take longer than 4 hours…we got there in 7. I was prepared for much worse, so I saw it as a success!

The Hostel

We arrived at our hostel when it was dark so we could not see the surrounding landscape, but I had a pretty good feeling we were going to wake up to some beautiful views. I was not disappointed.

The hostel is run by a young couple (maybe 21), Gilbert (from Venezuela) and Jessica (from Colombia). They are both super sweet people and we have enjoyed our meals together. Jessica can’t speak English, so it has been a good opportunity to practice my Spanish! Aside from them, there is only one other person here! A solo traveler from the UK named Lana who is translating their website for them in return for staying here.

This area is bird watchers paradise. Each morning, Jessica has put out fruit and beautiful birds of all kinds of varieties come in for breakfast. I have been especially awed by the amount of hummingbirds I’ve seen! The hostel has been a super beautiful, relaxing getaway.

Hummingbirds were constantly buzzing around these flowers.

Coffee Farm Tour

On Saturday, we took a guided tour of the coffee farm. It was pretty fascinating learning about the process from start to finish, I didn’t realize how much went into it. For one, coffee needs a very specific environment to grow. That is why coffee is only grown in regions close to the equator. Coffee plants also need to be planted on a steep slope to allow for appropriate water runoff. As the coffee on this farm is still picked BY HAND, those slopes make it a very strenuous, labor intensive harvest. Some of the highest quality coffee in the world is grown in Colombia, but almost all of it is exported to developed countries.

Our guide INSISTED we do a slow motion video.

Alex on his way to becoming an expert coffee roaster!

More Pics!

I’ll end with a photo of the hostel dog, Gilli. We became quite good friends after I shared a potato chip with him. Our bus back to Medellin leaves tomorrow afternoon, fingers crossed for a short ride!