Today’s tour was enlightening. While there are many types of commercial coffee farms, Doka gave a unique insight into the cultural aspect of growing coffee. When asked if different families were collaborative or competitive in business, Don Mario answered immediately that it was collaborative, and that the families all worked together to be successful.

Doka was especially interesting to me because it still used the original methods of harvesting and processing coffee, despite technological advances that would make the process more efficient and economically advantageous. I’m excited to see the differences between an estate like Doka and Cafe Britt, which we will tour tomorrow.

I had a general idea of the process of harvesting and processing coffee, but seeing the plantation in person made the process feel a lot more human, rather than a more industrial process that I had envisioned. For example, I knew that coffee beans were handpicked, but seeing the actual baskets used to pick the cahuelas and the 100-year-old machines that the workers use was an interesting experience.

Even before the tour, I could say that Costa Rican coffee is very good. After, I can confidently say it lives up to the hype. Even the “cheap” coffee that Costa Ricans drink that comes from the “low” quality beans is much better than a lot of the coffee we get in America.