This latest trip brought Cheryl and me to Honduras and El Salvador. It was a fully loaded trip so it was really nice to have her around to help remember all the farms we visited and people we met especially after the long days of hiking.
 
In Honduras we spent a few days visiting Beneficio San Vicente in Peña Blanca. My goal this year is to form relationships with producers in Central America and this trip was a great first step in making that goal a reality. As with any statement of purpose it is somewhat loaded and much deeper then just the surface implies. The factors that influence the achievement and motivations at the center of this statement are the real reasons it is complex. We have been roasting and buying coffee since September of 2009 which sounds like longer then it actually is. Especially when it comes to forming relationships with producers. Think about relationships in your own life they did not magically appear it took work and many different stages. Needless to say we are in the very early stages.
 
We spent the first three days of our trip in Honduras and on the fourth day we drove to San Salvador and spent the rest of our time visiting El Salvador. On our first day in Honduras we toured The Honduras Coffee Institute. It is a great facility that provides support to farmers and does lots of research on coffee. That afternoon we visited the farms of David Mancia and Benjamin Miranda both at very high elevation, which made for lots of hiking!
 
Saturday morning was our first chance to taste early samples from this year’s harvest. It was exciting! The coffees tasted great and the word on the street is that their production level is high. Then we and visited the farmers who produced the coffees! Our first stop was to visit the Moreno family. They have a long tradition of coffee growing in their family. Started by their father Daniel the seven brothers continue producing along side their uncle and cousin. They often place very well in the Cup of Excellence competition held in Honduras.

Then we visited the Fernandez family. This was especially exciting for us because it also meant meeting the producer of the lot of coffee that we purchased from the Cup of Excellence competition. Cesar is one of five brothers four of whom also grow coffee. They all farm land that was given to them by their father and work together to grow beautiful coffees. Just up the road from the Fernandez’s farms we visited the Benitez family. This was pretty awesome for me because La Pinona a farm owned by Sebastian Benitez was a coffee that I fell in love with about three years ago. Seeing the farm and meeting the producers of La Pinona is not something I will quickly forget.
 
We drove all day Sunday and made two stops to investigate Beneficio Santa Rosa and a Co-op called Cocafelol. Both were very nice facilities and definitely operated by forward thinking people. Cocafelol is working on producing hand sanitizer from the byproducts of coffee processing.
 
Monday morning in San Salvador we met the Pacas family. They run a few very well organized farms. Their amazingly friendly and knowledgeable staff was ready to answer any question I could think to ask. At dinner we had one the most interesting conversations about soil composition I have ever had. Alfredo and Maria were remarkably patient teachers. It is not a coincidence that their name is also a variety of coffee. Their family discovered the Pacas variety.
 
Our next visit was with Luis Rodriguez he is one of the people who helped us buy coffee from El Aguila last year. Unfortunately we were not able to visit El Aguila because it is in a secluded area and Luis did not think it would be safe to travel there. We did however get to see San Agustin the mill were our coffee was prepared. We also got to cup some early samples with Luis. We are really excited to what El Aguila produces this year!

Our last visit was with Emilio Lopez at his mill El Manzano. His operation is very well organized and amazingly clean. He is doing some great things processing coffee using the natural method, which made for some really interesting cupping. Emilio was an incredibly gracious host.
 
All around this was a very productive trip and it was so nice to have Cheryl with me. Her quick humor and passion for learning brought a really awesome positive energy. It’s going to be hard to travel without her.
 
-Colleen