Nicaragua
Departamento de Nueva Segovia

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    • Day 38

      Sicher in Nicaragua

      February 1, 2023 in Nicaragua ⋅ ☁️ 27 °C

      Derzeit verbringen wir gefühlt mehr Zeit an den Grenzen mit dem Ausfüllen der immer selben Export/Import Dokumente und dem Warten auf Stempel, Zettel und Quittungen als auf dem Motorrad.

      Nach dem scheinbar internationalem Standard von vier Stunden konnten wir auch heute wieder den Schlagbaum, diesmal an der Grenze Honduras zu Nicaragua hinter uns lassen und früher als gedacht die letzten Kilometer in Richtung Hotel in Angriff nehmen.

      Dort angekommen haben wir die Yamahas entsprechend sicher abgestellt. Wir freuen uns schon jetzt auf die 350 Fahrkilometer morgen, um neben der Grenze nun auch Land und Leute kennenzulernen.
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    • Day 183

      Grenze nach Nicaragua

      October 24, 2023 in Nicaragua

      Der Grenzübertritt nach Nicaragua war der schlimmste, den wir in Mittelamerika hatten. Wir sind mittags an der Grenze angekommen. Zuerst wurde an unseren Motorrädern eine Inspektion durchgeführt, damit wir ja keine illegalen Dinge (wie z.B. Drohnen) einführen. Anschließend mussten wir durch die übliche Prozedur aus Einreise und temporary import für die Motorräder. Als wir dann einreisen wollten, haben sie uns aber nicht rein gelassen, weil irgendein Dokument fehlte. Nach ewigen Diskussionen, wussten wir dann endlich was zu tun war. Also lief ich bei strömendem Regen zurück zum Zoll, um das fehlende Formular zu holen. Dann stürzte das System ab. Nach über 30 Minuten warten, hatten wir es endlich. Wir durften einreisen. Haben noch eine Versicherung am Straßenrand abgeschlossen und wollten nach knappen 4 Stunden Grenzübertritt so schnell wie möglich in unsere Unterkunft. Es wurde dunkel und wir mussten noch zwei Stunden fahren. Dann hat es auch noch angefangen in Strömen zu regnen. Die Fahrt war die absolute Hölle. Es war stockdunkel und wir konnten vor lauter Regen kaum die Augen offen halten. Als wir an der Unterkunft ankamen waren wir komplett durchnässt und erschöpft. Es hat drei Tage gedauert bis unsere Sachen wieder trocken waren.Read more

    • Day 3

      First Night at Finca el Arbol

      January 7 in Nicaragua ⋅ ☀️ 23 °C

      At the Finca the volunteers already awaited us to give us a briefing and quick tour.

      Meanwhile Claudia cooked us a light dinner of Beans, Plantains and Guacamole. Which we all sat down to enjoy at the big long table.

      Due to the travels (and probably jet lag) most called it an early night. Smart.
      Because we would soon realize the rooster seems to have a faulty morning-detection ability. 🤨😅
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    • Day 4

      First Tour of the Finca el Arbol

      January 8 in Nicaragua ⋅ ⛅ 19 °C

      At 7-ish we set out on our first tour of the Finca. There isn’t a distinct trail we followed and at times we were certain if we’d loose Tim we wouldn’t find back to the house…
      …so he made sure to feed us enough coffee and Cocoa beans to keep us sharp and following him. 😅
      We passed by the accommodations and cooking site of the workers and met some familiar names that finally got faces (like Orlin).
      They grow different tipicas of Arabica so we got to try Geisha, Bourbon, Punk Bourbon, Panamara and many more, learning to tell the difference.
      El Arbol is named after five gigantic trees that grow in this region (at an unusual altitude for them) - even Dejan looked small between the roots…
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    • Day 4

      Coffee Education part 1

      January 8 in Nicaragua ⋅ 🌙 18 °C

      The afternoon was dedicated to learning about the coffee region and plant specifics. In the morning we were tasked to collect plant material that looked different and Tim used it to demonstrate and teach us.
      Kinda like Grammar School - keeps the kids busy and excited to be participating …😜

      We also learned about the current challenges to the coffee production - not just climate change, but the work force of Nicaragua is migrating and it’s hard to find enough to pick the harvest. One of the reasons to explor partially machine assisted picking - even though in this steep terrain and at the quality they would like to produce the options are limited…
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    • Day 5

      Mil Variedades/Finca Esperanza

      January 9 in Nicaragua ⋅ ⛅ 20 °C

      After an amazing porridge breakfast I realized I got super lucky: I had left my hiking shoes in the one spot of the finca where the roof leaks. AND we had a little bit of rain last night. What are the chances of that?!?!? Pretty similar to winning the lottery, so remind me to play next chance I get.
      No worries: My trusted Timberlands did not hesitate when called📞 for duty. 🫡 And because I was feeling really fortunate, I made sure to switch the moist socks out as well.

      The first stop today was the small Mil Variedad Finca. It’s at 1500müm (sea level) and you could immediately tell it was cooler up there than the Fincas we were used to.
      After picking the best mandarines 🍊 and eating them straight off the tree we dodged a nest of killer wasps to continue to identify different coffee species.

      Honestly I was just blown away by the view. I think Tim is a bit frustrated with me - at this point I feel like I really can’t tell them apart… 🌳🌲😅😆

      Ok, the bigger ones are “Mara” (save the ending so it could be either Marogogype or Maracaturra) and I feel like the most common one is Paraeinema. 😂🤣

      …and I totally needed to get my notes to finish this post 🙄🤨
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    • Day 5

      Finca Santa Rita -planting a coffee tree

      January 9 in Nicaragua ⋅ ⛅ 25 °C

      Once done at Mil Variedades we toured the slightly larger Finca Santa Rita. If I remember correctly it is about a quarter the size of El Arbol…

      It was exciting to see familiar names of Kaffeemacher coffee flavors: Los Chenes, Doña Marguerita… All of them are areas where coffee trees are planted and the names go back to prior people present on the farm - usually grandparents.

      We made it through more coffee species guesstimating before arriving at the spot where we would each plant a new coffee plant.

      Tim and Adan made sure to measure out the distances with the “A tool” and let us know where to dig. Spade at hand we cleared the soil coverage and dug the holes as deep as they needed to be.

      Of course there was also time for coffee and cuddling with the 4 week old puppy. 🥰🐶

      All in all, a day can’t get any better than that! 🫶🏽

      We headed back for lunch and theory similar to yesterday. Learning about Diseases and fertilization.

      Just as jet lag was hitting the hardest the dog 🐶 Tony Mercelo created a diversion by bringing me a banana 🍌 I needed to peel for him to eat 😂🤣😍

      Tomorrow we start at 6am together with the pickers!!!
      And what we pick we get to process as well 😍😇

      EXCITING!!!
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    • Day 6

      Picking coffee

      January 10 in Nicaragua ⋅ ☀️ 25 °C

      The morning started at 6am so we could leave together with the other pickers - ok, we didn’t really leave together as the newbies needed an instruction first.

      In teams of two we got a basket to pick the ripe cherries in and a bag to put the discarded. The goal is to pick overripe or damaged berries as well and not drop them to the floor where they could attract the coffee insect Broca and lead to infecting a whole harvest.

      The green and pinker cherries stay on the branches for another picking in 1-2 weeks. The cherries get picked individually, not striped, as to not damage the stem - because the next seasons cherry will grow from that stem.

      By the end of the pre-breakfast shift we had gotten pretty decent at not picking the wrong stuff - although our speed is still a joke compared to the workers…

      After breakfast we failed to find where we had picked on the first go and walked right past 🙄😂 finally there our skills had definetely improved. 😜 By the end of our shift at 11:00 the ten of us had collected 52 kg or 4.25 measurement buckets. That is about half as a worker 6-15:00 will pick 😂🤣
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    • Day 6

      Processing Coffee

      January 10 in Nicaragua ⋅ 🌙 20 °C

      The coffee processing usually starts right after the harvest gets picked and weighed. Nowadays there are dozens of methods to do it - we decided on two different ones for our coffee lot:
      Natural (full cherries)
      Honey (depulped beans)

      Both were floated first to seperate the unripe from the ripe cherries. Then the Natural (2 buckets, libras, 60lbs) went straight into a barrel where it will sit for 24 hours.
      The honey went into the demulsifier. For our small lot a hand operated one, that splits the pulp from the beans. Then it is also rested in a barrel for 24 hours.

      Our pickings went from 4.25 libras (52kgs) down to 2 libras each and 1 libra of beans for the depulped version… to be continued.

      The next step is washing- since that won’t happen for a while we skipped ahead and washed a bigger lot of the Santa Rita farm.
      In the washing (see video) the better quality beans as well as leftover pulp get separated due to the density differences (lighter things float on top).

      We also took out faulty beans where the parchment was already damaged.
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    • Day 7

      Ocotal

      January 11 in Nicaragua ⋅ ☀️ 31 °C

      Coming down from the farm we stopped at Ocotal to have some lunch. Like half the town we got in line and at the buffet ordered our lunch.

      Most of us did so by pointing … 🤣
      We finished our tour to the city with a stroll to take in the sights and some of us ice cream before heading back for an afternoon of school.Read more

    You might also know this place by the following names:

    Departamento de Nueva Segovia

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