Lunch - Victoria Cafeteria/Café Victoria

Yesterday, Saturday, Lance suggested we have lunch at Victoria Cafeteria which we had yet to try. As you can see from the map below, it is very close to where we live.

Victoria Cafeteria is in a charming wooden building with covered porches on two sides. Lots of flowers on the grounds and in and around the porches. It is located next to Coopevictoria, the huge coffee and sugar cane processing plant.

A couple of views of the Coopevictoria plant next door - that is some huge gear on display:

We can’t figure out what those four big “things” are in the background:

Lots of items to choose from the menu. For drinks, we both ordered mora with milk. They were really large.

Lance’s lunch choice was arroz con camarones/shrimp with rice. The rice was loaded with shrimp.

And for me, it was the casado Tico with cerdo (pork):

From left to right clockwise: pork with grilled onions, plantains, black beans, mixed salad, picadillo de papa and white rice in the centre. 

The portions are huge and neither of us could finish our rice and beans.

This restaurant is in a lovely setting, with quick service and friendly people. Highly recommend.

Click on images to enlarge.

Christmas in Costa Rica - 2020

This is our ninth Christmas spent in Costa Rica and our second Christmas at our house in Grecia. We our now experiencing the dry season with nice strong trade winds, mostly blue skies and nice warm temperatures in the afternoons. Nighttimes are cool (61F!) so easy sleeping.

Because of Covid-19, most public seasonal activities have been cancelled. The Grecia park has been reopened and decorated for the holidays, so people can enjoy that - following protocols of course. The park and the cathedral are the heart of Grecia and this is true of all Costa Rican towns.

The municipality has created a Santa convoy and they have been driving around the different neighbourhoods all week, throwing candy out to the kids. Today we ended up at the tail end of one of them while out and about.

We don’t put up a Christmas tree or decorations but every year we have our driftwood tree with lights (made by our friend Pete) and a little lighted polar bear (came with our house) outside. Some of our neighbours put on elaborate displays. 

It seems to be orchid flowering season, as least for some of my orchids. My epidendrum stamfordianum produced an amazing display this year.

And a couple of other different species have put out inflorescences (flower stalks) so I look forward to enjoying their flowers.

Mature coffee beans (aka red cherries) are presently being harvested through to about March. And the sugar cane is flowering now. The flowers are a beautiful pale pink mauve shade and the undulating, waving fields of sugar cane are beautiful.

Flor Maria, our housekeeper once every two weeks, created this gorgeous flower display for us this week. She used flowers that grow all around our house. She has a florist’s eye and this was a lovely surprise for us. 

To all my friends/readers of my blog - we wish you the very best for this holiday season. 2020 has been a tough year for so many. Please - wear your masks and wash your hands. Keep your distance. I believe that 2021 will be much better.

Here’s a little painting I did of a Christmas Brahman calf. Thanks to Beeche Brahmans, Costa Rica, for letting me use their photo as a reference.

(Click on photos to enlarge).

Strawberries, Breakfast, Cows and Poas Volcano

On the recommendation of a friend, we decided on Friday to visit Bosques de Fraijanes - a recreational park on the slopes of Poas volcano.  The park has a lake and forests and hiking is popular. Another reason for a visit was to buy the luscious strawberries that are grown in the area. 

We left our house around 0730 - we wanted to have breakfast in the Fraijanes area. Freddo Frescas was recommended but instead we stopped at Restaurante Tipico de Fraijanes. It was open and had lots of parking available so in we went. We were not disappointed.

It’s a very large restaurant and the interior is beautiful. I think it caters to a lot of tour groups and tour buses going up to Poas volcano.

The menus are in English or Spanish. We always choose Spanish because it forces us to read and order in Spanish. We no longer have much trouble doing this but if we get stuck, I have a translator on my phone. Our server was really nice.

We both ordered mora batido con leche and a desayuno tipico (typical Costa Rican breakfast). The mora is a fruit similar to blackberries and a batido is similar to a smoothie but you can have it made with milk or with water. We had ours with milk. Lance also ordered a coffee.

This breakfast was excellent. Starting from the left and going clockwise - two eggs, slice of local white cheese, toast, plantains and lastly the gallo pinto. I thought this gallo was really tasty but, as usual, the quantity defeats me and I can never finish the portion. This version had nice big pieces of cilantro in it. Total cost: 11,000 colones (about $18.84 USD). You can get similar breakfasts for less at the sodas but, as I said, this restaurant probably caters to tourists so the prices would be a bit higher.

A view from our table. Dark clouds were starting to come in. Sure enough, as we left the restaurant it started spitting rain.

Hydrangeas everywhere and always blue because of the soil.

Off we went to find the park and strawberries. At an elevation of between 3000 to 4000 ft., almost in the cloud forest, strawberries grow very well. The volcanic soil, temperature and the annual rainfall all contribute to big juicy berries. Coffee is another crop grown in this area. I’ve seen both strawberries and coffee grown under shade cloths. 

I’m not sure what’s under these shade cloths - strawberries or coffee, sometimes it’s tomato plants.

We found beautiful berries at a shop along the way. 2 mil for this container (2,000 colones, about $3.40 USD). I’ve seen much smaller sizes in our local grocery stores for a higher price and not as good looking.

We found the park but decided not to go in because of the rain. We’ll leave this visit for the dry season. The area around Poas is absolutely stunning. Dairy cows thrive here because of the cooler temperatures. Here is a cow tied up to a fence outside the field so she could eat the fresh green grass that was there. Several other cows were also tied up and none of them were bothered by the traffic going by or by me taking photos.

Breakfast was so good and the strawberries a real treat that we are going to make going to the Poas area a more regular occurrence. After all, it’s only about a 45 minute beautiful drive from our house.

Naranjo Coffee Festival

Today we drove to the town of Naranjo, because they were having a two day coffee fiesta. Naranjo is about 20 km away from our town of Grecia. We thought it would be fun to attend and it was. We lucked out and found a parking spot on the road close by the park attended by a guachiman. 

The fiesta was held in the park in front of the church. The smell of fresh roasted coffee in the air was wonderful. There were all sorts of booths selling coffee, art, purses, desserts.

We wandered around, sat for a while to listen to the band, then headed home. Here are some photos I took.

The Naranjo Church:

What you cannot do in the vicinity of the church: kiss, skateboard, ride your bike, smoke a ciggie and I don’t know what the E means.

Coffee booths:

Band:

Art Show:

These are the traditional art works offered for sale. They are 3-D - all those little people are made from rocks.

There are festivals like this one all over Costa Rica and they are fun to attend.

Costa Rican Coffee

I wish you could smell what I just smelled from a newly opened bag of local coffee ... it's this rich, earthy scent of coffee that has just been brewed and poured into a cup for you to enjoy even before the sun has risen here in Costa Rica.

There is a coffee plantation up in the hills of Vista Atenas, where we live. The coffee workers travel up there in the back of a truck early in the morning and we have been waving to each other for quite a while now. Some day, I will be out there on the road with a hot cup of coffee to salute them for all the work they do so I can enjoy the fruits of their labor.

We can buy all manner of excellent coffee at our local grocery stores. I am trying a new one: Coffee Atenas, the labeling and design on the package of coffee is beautiful. It tells me that 5 generations have been growing and preparing coffee, Atenas has the best climate in the world (I can't argue with that), the coffee was grown by the family of Vargas Rodriguez (I hope I got that right), it is certified to be good inside and believe me, it is.

 

 

 

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The Scent of the Coffee Flowers

Last night, I noticed the most amazing scent floating through the air. It was strong, yet sweet. I thought maybe it was the sugar cane but the sugar cane grows too far away from us to get the scent.

Our friends at dinner last night told me it is the coffee flowers that are smelling so good and the coffee beans are being picked now.

We walked into Atenas this morning and for the first time I noticed a field of coffee plants en route. The beans were colored red and I could detect the same sweet smell. It gets stronger at night.

Wow!!!

Atenas Is Our Choice

We've chosen Atenas in the Central Valley as our place to live while we explore Costa Rica. I was recently asked, "Why Atenas and not the beaches?"

We initially want to live in an area that is close to a lot of amenities and Atenas has that. The beach areas on the Pacific side will be great to visit but we may find the weather too hot and humid, at least until we acclimatize. The Caribbean side is another area we want to eventually explore.

For day to day living, it seems Atenas has everything we could want. It has a temperate climate with dry days and cool nights. Apparently, one can fine tune their micro-climate by moving up and down the hills. Atenas also has such natural beauty and culture. It's a tranquil coffee growing town. It's also close to universities, hospitals, the capital city of San Jose, and so on.

AARP claims it is one of the best places to retire and, as everyone knows, National Geographic claims Atenas has the best climate in the world. We don't want to be stuck inside all day with an air conditioner running because we find it too hot and humid outside. I would like to have a swimming pool for the hot days. The cool nights are a big plus to me ... windows open to let in the fresh air. Well, I guess the windows would be open all day and night anyway. No furnace and no AC!

There are two seasons in Costa Rica - rainy (May to December) and dry (January to April).  It seems like there are a thousand and one micro-climates though.