Our second reason for selecting Cartago was to vist a Coffee Farm, a “finca.” The day we we were to, we realized that we had missed the information regarding the tour times on the website, so we resigned ourselves to the fact that at least we might enjoy a walk around and a cup of coffee. We arrived to find that we had, indeed, missed the tour. To our delight, the co-owner of Finca Cristina, Ernie Carman, generously offered to show us around anyway, and we had a wonderful and informative time moving through the process, from coffee plants to the roaster. We even took a turn at raking the coffee cherries set out to dry. It is important to note that Finca Cristina is small, family-owned farm, mill, and roasting establishment producing coffee which is organically grown in a traditional, natural biodiverse polyculture vs the monoculture (growing crop species over a large area) environment. The practice of polyculture, growing multiple species of plants together in the same place at the same time, benefits the soil and utilizes natural pest and weed control. I was amazed to find huge green bean plants growing beside the coffee beans! And, yes, there were cacti, too! I was especially interested in the various tools used for each step and how Ernie had crafted many of the machines from parts he had thrifted and modified to engineer his process. Andrew was excited to try a coffee cherry as he had read about some of the benefits of the fruit. We highly recommend taking an official tour as you will never take another sip of coffee for granted when you realize all of the “magic” that goes into producing that cupful. We also recommend spending some time with Ernie, whose wonderful stories about the process and decisions made for the farm really brought the process to life. Thank you, Ernie! We, of course, came away with bags of coffee (Medium and Light Roasts) and coffee cherry tea to try.