Finca Rosa Blanca: a shade-grown, organic coffee farm & inn

A view of the central lodge building of Finca Rosa Blanca inn on a hill, set amidst the tropical forest. In this shot, clouds are coming in... a storm is brewing! It's absolutely gorgeous - both the setting and the buildings!!!! (Images Copyright (c) 2013 Wendee Nicole)

I'm finally getting the last photos from my trip to Costa Rica up on my blog. I can't believe it has been 4 months - wow! Where has the time gone? How is it August already? I have spent a month studying for the GRE (Graduate Record Exam) because I'm applying to a Ph.D. program at Stanford.

Although I am technically a Ph.D. candidate at Rice University, I took a leave of absence in 2005, while going through my divorce. I couldn't finish due to finances and just the stress of raising young kids and being in grad school as a single mom. For a long time, I actually didn't think I would ever go back to grad school but I started systematically researching the three options I had for after the kids are both off to college (which were: go to Africa for 6 months to a year, buy a cheap RV and pimp it out and drive around the US for a year figuring out where to live, or grad school) and came upon the EIPER program at Stanford and it just clicked. I sort of knew in my soul I was meant to be there. There is a story behind that too, which I'll tell soon, but I don't want to distract from the Costa Rica images!

At any rate, I took a practice GRE and did great in verbal but am still needing to get much faster at the math... you only have like 1.5 minutes average per question.  I picked up the math itself pretty quickly (nothing like cramming 12 years of primary math ed into 1-2 months of review...) but just need to improve on the speed. I will probably take it at the end of the month. Anyway I have no idea if I will get into this program but I am really hoping and praying I do. It is perfect for me and my interests and what I want to do with the next phase of my life, which is returning to conservation work and combining that with poverty alleviation which I feel increasingly drawn to due to my faith. If you are so inclined, I would be grateful for your prayers for my GRE and grad school application! I also may apply to the law school there for a joint PhD/JD program... I am still debating on that one in my mind. I really want to, but it depends on how I do on the LSAT - ha!

A solar panel provides electricity to power the lodge. The sky was cloudy so the shot isn't great, but you can see a bit more of the main lodge architecture here. I absolutely love white stucco and this type of building and the decor inside. Finca Rosa Blanca is run by American expatriates Glenn and Teri Jampol, who are the nicest people! They both attended Berkeley so it was fun talking to them about that place, and the Bay Area. /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// (err, that would be my kitty Pippin attempting to communicate in human... she is apparently better at speaking than written English, apparently... hear her say "hello" here).

This is the foyer inside the main lodge (the white building in the images above). I absolutely adore the white stucco and the wood flooring. Everything is decorated in such a beautiful style. I love it! When myself, Elizabeth and Paula stayed here 2 years ago after the Planet, People, Peace Conference we arrived late so it was after dark and had to leave at 4am to catch a 6am flight so we never got to see it during daylight or tour the coffee plantation so I was excited to come back and see it in its full glory. CANAECO (the Ecotourism Bureau of Costa Rica, of which Glenn is President) just announced the 4th Planet People Peace ("P3") Conference to be held this fall. I hope I can make it! This year it will be held in San Jose, which I feel like I "know" now after the tour of the city Heidi and I had.

My room and Heidi's rooms were in a separate building behind the main lodge. These are the patios set amidst the gorgeous landscaping. The roof is made from plastic tiles made from recycled banana bags! Cool, huh!

My own personal patio! Wish I lived here....

This was inside MY ROOM! This whole thing was just my room - wow! To the left it went to the bathroom, with my bedroom to the far left (I didnt get a photo of it for some reason), and to the right is the breakfast nook. The middle door goes out to the patio. 

A closer view of the breakfast nook. 

A shot of the gorgeous pool. I have such a hilarious, fond memory of the last time I came here, with Elizabeth and Paula, and we arrived after dark and made our way to our rooms (which, that time, was in the main lodge, behind the pool) and we had to walk around it, and one of the two girls - I won't say who - was deathly afraid of toads, and there were like a hundred toads all around the pool at that time in the rain. At first we thought she was joking and just a bit leery but she was actually deathly afraid of them! It was cute. :)

Finca Rosa Blanca guide, Leo Vergnani (from Italy), took us on a tour of the lodge grounds and around the coffee plantation itself. Here he is sitting on the edge of a unique solar setup that heats water for the lodge.

This is Leo in the coffee plantation. He taught us SO much about how coffee is grown both here at Finca Rosa Blanca, and in different parts of the world, and later we went back and sampled it (pics to follow) with "cupping" - similar to wine tasting but with coffee. He was so funny with a hysterical dry wit that had Heidi and I cracking up. I took a few iPhone videos of him talking about coffee and hope to upload them here if I can figure out how. He has since moved to Belgium but his protege, Ulises Zúñiga, is now the coffee tour guide. This is an organic, shade-grown coffee product but it took a few years after the Jampols bought it to convert to organic because they have to make sure any chemical traces are gone from the soil.

They have banana (plantain) trees growing in the coffee plantation. Leo told us why but I can't remember!

Heidi and Leo on the trail up towards the main plantation.

Another view of the plantation during the tour.

This depulping machine is called a "chancador" in Spanish. It removes the pulp from the red coffee cherries after they're picked. It wasn't harvest season when we visited, so we didn't get to see it in action. 

This chute takes the de-pulped cherries ("grano" in Spanish) to a fermentation tank where they spend 2 days covered in the sweet mucilage or "miel." [OK, yes sweet mucilage sounds gross, but hey, you know it's just coffee cherry pulp remaining after depulping, right?]. Then it goes to the drying racks...

The drying racks, sometimes called African beds. (I think that has to do with the kind of coffee that is grown around the world). Glenn told me that they experimented with not fermenting the depulped cherries and just drying immediately, and they had a great flavor so they're doing about 50% of their crop this year that way. 

The green coffee beans... These are popular now for that "green coffee bean" extract that is getting a lot of attention! 

And then we went back to the El Tigre Vestido restaurant at Finca Rosa Blanca (which, by the way, is amazing!!) to try out the different coffees with "cupping." We tried Finca Rosa Blanca's espresso roast and the regular roast, as well as a cheap coffee sold in the country. They normally don't "cup" the crap coffee but have it there only to smell the grounds initially but I wanted to taste test/compare it and it was so fascinating to do so! It tasted like motor oil and garbage (not even kidding) compared to the lovely chocolate, caramel and cherry notes of the FRB coffees. 

Heidi and I laughed so hard doing this. You have to sip and then spit the coffee out, which is kind of gross and very funny! Especially with Leo and his cute/sexy accent. LOL. 

I was laughing so hard!! I don't even remember what about but it was fun :)

And they sell bags of the coffee... I finally opened a bag I was saving!

And last but not least, two photos totally out of place but which I forgot to post with my Playa Grande/Tamarindo beach images! I love this shot... It is the beach of Tamarindo, outside of the Hotel Daria where we stayed one night before heading to Finca Rosa Blanca. It is also where I dropped my iPhone in the ocean... and miraculously saved it with rice! 

Me, happy and content, at Hotel Las Tortugas Restaurant in the town of Playa Grande, where we ate before heading over to Tamarindo. 

Sustainable farming in Costa Rica - bananas!

EARTH bananas on the shelves at Whole Foods in Houston.  Copyright (c) 2013 Wendee Nicole

“The most effective way of alleviating poverty is to give opportunities to kids who come from poor areas. Education is the greatest tool we have.” - José Zaglul, President of EARTH University

My latest article came out today! I researched this piece when I went to Costa Rica in April. The pub even used several of my images in the article (including the one above). The 2013 trip was actually my second time to EARTH University, and in fact the first time I went -- to report on the Planet, People, Peace conference on sustainable ecotourism - I was so impressed I decided I wanted to write an article about the university itself. And delving into the history and operations of the university during my article research I became that much more impressed with the place. They have an "upside down education" model that helps students who may not have had as much education as those from say the U.S., and they put them in the field right away, learning practical techniques. They give them money to run a business for 2 years, and then they have classwork. Nearly everyone has financial aid, and more than half get their full tuition paid for. Everyone I met was so passionate about their work there.

The article is....
Food from EARTH: Sustainable Farming in Action in Environmental Health Perspectives July issue.

Or, you can also view the PDF version here, which has a magazine-style layout, which I prefer!

Let me know what you think if you read it! I really enjoyed reporting this piece. Leave comments! Anonymously if you want :)

I just finished another piece on Costa Rica's efforts towards carbon-neutrality, and my next project is to study for the GRE for my grad school application. I'm seriously considering applying to a JD/PhD program at Stanford -- just because I don't want a life for the next 4 years!! Right?! You with me? Wish me luck...

Revisiting Playa Grande, Costa Rica

Sunset at Playa Grande, Costa Rica - nesting site for the Pacific leatherback sea turtles!
Copyright (c) 2013 Wendee Nicole

I still have one more post yet to come from Costa Rica, but I first wanted to share the photos from our visit to Playa Grande, which is on the Pacific side of the small country in the Guanacaste region. We went here the last 2 days of our trip, and it was really poignant to go back to the place where, in 1999, I traveled to blog for The Discovery Channel for two weeks. The blog was called Love & Death on Turtle Beach and it was a wonderful moment in my life, right before a really bad part started!

Speaking of adventures, my next one begins this week! I will be headed to northern Cali again and staying with my friend Miranda Spencer and her hubster Bob Brulle who is doing a sabbatical at Stanford. We will be going to Sonoma where we will do a mud bath (naked!), hot springs, and wineries. We plan to visit Bachelor Ben Flajnik's winery, Envolve, which has its "tasting room" in Sonoma. I was interested that the wine is organic and raised using biodynamic techniques, though I so far have been unable to get a hold of them to possibly interview them for a story. I'm super excited to see my niece's mom and my friend Zofia, who I havent seen since I was en route to Dutch Harbor, Alaska! We spent the day together in San Fran! (and then I missed my flight, but it wasn't because I was late back to the airport, even!)

After Sonoma, Miranda, Bob & I plan to go camping in Big Sur. I've never been there, and it looks so gorgeous - very reminiscent of the Oregon coastline. I'm also applying to Stanford's EIPER PhD program for 2014... so will be meeting with some professors while there. Wish me luck! I am studying for the GRE lately... while writing and trying to get my house ready to sell next year. And without further adieu, here are the photos from one of the loveliest places in the world...

Seeing this hatchery again was so cool. I remember like it was yesterday sitting in the sand with Dana Drake, watching her sift through a nest, counting unhatched eggs and gathering turtles for release. You can read the blog post I wrote that day, The Hatchery.


A view of the beach through the palms.


Heidi strolling along the beach at sunset. We walked up and down the beach, taking photos and enjoying the sunset.


Another shot of the sunset. I am partial to sunset photos! And especially sunsets on the beach...

I was thinking this was Roca Bruja - Witch's Rock - a popular surf spot, but that is actually at Playa Naranjo. I don't know if this one has a name but it sure was a beautiful, peaceful evening. After the sunset, we ate at Hotel Las Tortugas, which was the place we ate at nightly during my two week stay there in 1999. They even had the same utterly delicious arroz con palmito dish (rice with hearts of palm) that I have been raving about for 14 years now! Then we walked out on the beach in the dark and looked at the stars, using the iPhone app on Gustavo's phone. It's funny because it ws a new moon yet the sky was not near as dark as I remember it back in Dec 1999. It was just utterly pitch dark then!


A shot of a wave as it crashes into the shore.


Me on the beach - a bit dark but there ya go! We stayed at the Hotel Tamarindo Diria, in neighboring Tamarindo, which was really nice but a massive 4-star resort/hotel with a golf course, etc.


On the long drive to Playa Grande from Heredia, where we stayed the nights before, we stopped at this roadside spot where Gustavo, our guide, knew that scarlet macaws were frequently spotted - Limonal. Sure enough, there was one!

Another shot. We only saw one macaw, but often there are several.
Another shot of the beautiful bird!

Last but not least, here are my latest articles:

*  I'm Carbon Neutral. Are You? Ensia Magazine, published online May 20, 2013. A closer look at the voluntary carbon offset market.

* Adventurers Collect Data for Biologists: A Natural Symbiosis. BioScience. May 2013.

Jungle wildlife in Sarapiquí

After spending the day at Earth University on our second day, we stayed at the La Quinta Sarapiquí Inn (not related to the La Quinta chain of hotels in the US!). 

During breakfast the next morning, there were several colorful birds and a green basilisk lizard eating bugs on the roof across the way. It is very colorful! I also saw the related brown color Jesus Christ down by the pond that I walked to on the grounds.


He would stick his head in between the tiles, presumably looking for insects to eat!


A female green honeycreeper.

I believe that this is the male green honeycreeper along with an unidentified brown bird. The greenish color of the make and female is different which is weird... Actually that blue one is maybe a different species of bird...

In not quite sure what that blue bird is doing to the brown bird's behind! Ha ha! Just kidding - awkward photo angle, I think. If I'm identifying them right, the right is the female green honeyvcreeper

Two blue-gray tanagers.

These Passerini's tanagers were common.


Breakfast at La Quinta - a typical Costa Rican breakfast includes gallo pinto (black beans and rice), eggs, plantains, and fresh fruit.

A cool red flower at the hotel grounds.

The third morning, we went to the Organization for Tropical Studies (OTS)'s La Selva Biological Reserve, which is one of the most well-known rainforest research centers in the world. I read about it during my college days! We climbed a 41meter high tower! There was one tower that went to 30 something meters, followed by this bridge across to another one, which went another 10 m. It was awesome. We were atop the canopy! Researchers use it to study various aspects of the rainforest canopy world. We just clamped in and had the gorgeous headgear for safety.


This is a view of another canopy across the way from the one we climbed.

We saw a sloth right outside the La Selva office/headquarters/cafeteria. This is a terrible picture, but it's the best I got! I got better sloth photos last trip.


While at La Selva, we saw a troop of black-faced howler monkeys, including a mom with a baby! Not while we were in the canopy, but we did hear them up there. Again not a good photo at all, but it's all I could get!

This is the blue jean frog, a species of poison dart frog that is about 1 cm long! Tiny! We saw it on a hike through the jungle at the Organization for Tropical Studies' La Selva Biological Station.

We also saw a green and black poison dart frog. They are bigger than the blue jeans frog (which is only about 1cm long!)

We saw these adorable Honduran white bats (tent making bats) under a huge leaf at La Selva. 

A view of the rainforest canopy from above. 

The third day, we went to the Tirimbina Biological Reserve and Rainforest Center, which has a sustainable Cacao plantation on site, where they showed us how to go from the fruit (which is yellow) to the seeds, to the chocolate! 

They ferment the seeds, and then roast them in the sun, and then grind them and add sugar. We got to sample the cacao/chocolate roasted, with sugar, and as a drink with cinnamon. Yum!

This is the Sarapiqui River we crossed on a reallllly long suspension bridge to get to the cacao plantation at Tirimbina Reserve.
A cacao tree. For some reason the trunks arch! That's how you can tell them apart from other trees. Also the cacao fruit grows right out of the trunk! That trait is known as cauliflory.

As we walked across the long suspension bridge at Tirimbina, these iguanas were visible in the tree over the river. Massive tree iguanas: Whoduthunk it?

And a hint of what is to come next... this is a most beautiful sunset at Playa Grande on our second to last evening. This is the magical place where I had a most memorable two weeks in 1999 reporting on leatherback sea turtle nesting for Discovery Channel. Check out the archived Love & Death on Turtle Beach.