Visiting Kona Earth Coffee Farm in January
8 March 2010
This post is from Papa Gary and Grandma Laqueta during their visit back in January.
When you live in San Diego and have grand children there and in Colorado and
Hawaii, life is good. But you do a lot of traveling! San Diego was rainy
and cool in January, Colorado had snow, so it was a good time to visit Hawaii.
As you may remember from earlier posts, Kona has been in a drought. Not to
worry: it always rains when Grandma Laqueta comes to visit. This year
was no different, it rained every day we were there [Edit: and not a drop since
they left]. Even with the rain, there were still many hours of sunshine
to enjoy. We visited the Coffee Growers convention, hiked in the native
gardens and shopped at the International marketplace.
A visit to Kona Earth is always fun! Although the farm is high up (2000 feet)
in coffee growing country, it is a short 7 mile drive to the beach and only about
10 miles to downtown Kona. So you can collect fresh eggs for breakfast then
go surfing and be back for lunch and a nap during the afternoon showers.
Grandma Laqueta got to visit Emily’s school while Papa Gary embarrassed himself
trying to surf at Keahoe Bay. The highlights of the trip were taking Emily to
Kaloko-Honokohau National Historical Park to get her Junior Ranger Badge, and
snorkeling with Sarah at turtle beach. We also kayaked out several miles into
the ocean to search for whales and dolphin but didn't see any this time. Other
highlights were Wii bowling and boxing with the girls and the great “Full Moon
Pig Hunt”. The Hunt will be the subject of a separate posting you may want
to avoid if you have a weak stomach.
Late January is the height of harvest season on Kona Earth Farm so we got to see the
pickers in action. Papa tried his hand, picking just over 20 pounds of coffee
cherry in 1 ½ hour, before his fingers started to cramp. You have to
respect the experienced workers who picked over 300 pounds in a day. Several
young couples picked together while their small children played nearby. Farmer
Gary pays them well and they all enjoy working in his clean, well prepared fields.
We hauled more than 3,000 pounds of cherries to the mill one afternoon.
Aloha!
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