Still picking coffee and we will be going on well into January.  My main worker is even coming 'off' vacation to wear my bee suit tomorrow and pick around the hives.   Good for him.  I am otherwise occupied with just 3 days left to Christmas.

The orange harvest will be over soon, probably in about 2-3 weeks.   So a final push to candy oranges.  My maid peeled about 300 or so for extra Christmas money over the last couple of days........kitchen is full of rind steeping in syrup and in various stages of processing. Fridge jam packed with juice.

We have done most of the workers food baskets.  Another trip to David today for things to finish them off.   This year, we are going to help out a family who used to live on the farm.   A single mother with three children who is making around $26 every two weeks ($52 a month) working full time.  Yes, it is not legal but it happens.

Christmas shopping trip in close 100 degree weather down the mountain in David is tough.  On the other hand, here you get service.   You do not have to carry your bags around the shop or to your car and people are there to help you find what you need.  There is also excellent wrapping services in most shops.  All you have to do is find the shop (not as easy as it sounds); Find parking (even harder);  check over all merchandise more than once and thoroughly (Here there is a very high incidence of returns, not quite right things and wonky parts) and then stagger in and out in the extreme heat.  

Then bananas - yes, what happened to all my bananas? Not just my bananas but all the bananas in this banana rich town.  I like to have a supply by the terrace so we can watch birds when we relax out there - something I am looking forward to over the holiday.

Well, the coffee pickers have an appetite for them.   I would love to know how much of the diet is banana, but I bet it is somewhere between 10-30% if you include plantains.  There must be 5-10 thousand Indigenous camping out in Boquete for the coffee harvest and that amounts to a lot of bananas.   So, my birds are not getting so many these days, the horse is getting carrots, the rabbit has been eating grass and I have not had one for breakfast for nearly a month.... 

Lastly, what is all that sound of gunfire?  Sounds like someone is firing rounds day and night in the Barrio above me.  I feel like I'm under attack.  Well, it turns out it is fireworks.  It is normal.  It will last until the New Year.

Do love walking the farm on a Sunday afternoon.   Enjoyed the last few warm sunny hours of the day outside.   This is what I found:  Quite a few early cherries.  They are low quality beans and we need to get them picked and sold probably for local consumption.    Have fungal problems too, fairly normal but never good.  Baby tipica plants doing well and in general yields look much better than last year.  It has been a drier rainy season.   

Now it is raining hard.  About to light a fire out on the terrace and enjoying a steaming cup of .....................not coffee............Yorkshire Gold tea.  It is tea time.

We have several types of banana here on the farm.  They are all out of this world good, the most delicious balance of fruit, acidity and sweetness.  A flavor you only ever get when you cut them fresh from the bunch. 

 This week, I learned that we had been selling spare bananas to the local mini-mart for $2 for a bunch of 200 bananas or more to retail them to locals here.  That would be about a cent a banana or one hundred times less than the ones in Starbucks.    Similar story for our coffee.   Such is life as a producer in the tropics!