It is crazy that a week ago today we had just landed in Costa Rica and were just getting set up in homestays and now I feel totally at home in my homestay. So far we have been to the Central Valley, the cloud forest of Monteverde, and driven by the Pacific coast towns of Puntarenas and Caldera. Today we traveled to the Caribbean side of the continental divide to explore a heart of palm plantation that only does well in the warmer, tropical conditions as the Caribbean side has.

As we toured I noticed how the conditions are different for heart of palm compared to coffee. For example the coffee is harvested only during three-four months out of the year while palm can be harvested year round. The parameters that must be met for these crops are a humid, warm, and wet environment which is only found on the Atlantic side of Costa Rica year-round. We also learned of some of the challenges a palmito plantation faces related to distribution is the product going bad during transport. To combat this they ship the palm still in its shell.