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Plantation Tour

Saturday November 22nd. Dr. Rodrigo Boy took us for a drive to the "coast." The coast, as he called it, is actually 20 miles inland. The ocean was not visible. What we saw was miles and miles of sugar cane fields with some other crops interspersed. This fruit stand on the way gives an example of the varieties they grow.

He took us to his family plantation, owned by his father. The plantation is gradually being converted to rubber trees. Here are banana trees that are producing fruit. Planted among the bananas are rubber trees. They will only take 4-5 years to grow large enough to tap for latex. The less profitable banana plants will then be cleared out.

Rodrigo's brother Fernando is the tree surgeon of the family. He is explaining the process of harvesting latex. Once the trees are 5 years old they begin scoring the trees in a diagonal. It has to be deep enough to reach the lactiferous vessels of the tree but not deep enough to damage the growth (cambium) layer.

They paint on an antifungal material (with a dye) to prevent infection of the tree.

The milk from the lactiferous ducts drains into cups. This is latex. Bacterial contamination of the material turns it into rubber as we know it. This can be sold to make tires.

The liquid form can be used in latex applications such as making surgical gloves. The trees make enough latex to fill the cups up to twice per day. The cuts are made sequentially up or down the tree about every three days (rotating by sections).

This closer view shows some wider gouges that are made to mark the months. After a certain number of cuts, they let this part of the tree heal and start another side. We could see the healed areas on other trees and they were barely distinguishable. The latex that is collected goes in tankers to a rubber processing plant.

This is a new tree they are working on to save on all the processing.

The house is an open building that allows the air to circulate. It was hot when we were there (their cold month) so I can't imagine the summers.

Before the conversion to a rubber plantation, the plantation was largely a coffee plantation. The electrical and mechanical energy of the plantation comes from the abundant supply of water.

The water runs this wheel which drives the coffee washing process. The coffee fruit is picked by hand. It is like a cherry with a pit. The fruit is washed or fermented off.

This area removes the "honey" off the seed.

The coffee is then dried by one of two methods. If the volume of coffee bean is low, they dry it in the sun. This boy is raking it to speed the drying and prevent mold.

When there is a higher volume of coffee, they will use these large dryers. There is a wood fire on the right and a fan blows the hot air to the dryer on the left. Both units are water powered.

Here is some coffee drying under these leaves. We walked all over them so if you taste shoe with your next cup, it was probably us.

Here Fernando demonstrates how the milling process works. He crushes what looks like coffee beans and then blows off the husks. Smaller coffee beans are left behind and are ready for roasting.

This is the storage facility for the green coffee while it awaits roasting.

On the way back to Antigua, the Fuego Volcano put on a show for us.

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