Well spring is springing early here at Barefoot. Today two great customers are celebrating their love by getting married at Barefoot! Pretty crazy! Ofir and his lovely bride will be tying the knot here at noon February 20th, 2007. It will be a small, informal happy bunch of people. You are welcome to come on down and celebrate their joyous union and wish them happiness and bliss. And I am sure they would appreciate cheers and tears. I know they will be flowing here…

Check out some recent news that a bunch of coffee coolios out in Sacramento are getting. News article

excerpt:

“Coffee is the third most traded commodity in the world. Millions drink it as part of their everyday routine, but very few know, or even care, where the beans come from or what they should taste like. That’s where local coffee connoisseurs like Sean Kohmescher and J. Valenta enter the equation. For them, coffee amounts to so much more than a hill of beans, and their passion is altering the face of coffee commerce worldwide.

Their movement is called the Third Wave.

“It’s a return to real coffee culture as it came out of Italy,” said Valenta, owner of JavaJ in Roseville, of the Third Wave philosophy. The history of the movement is founded in the belief that coffee was introduced to America in cycles. There’s the First Wave, which was the proliferation of consumer coffee in the mid-20th century–think freeze-dried Folgers. The Second Wave was the ubiquity of the espresso-based drinks in America, à la Starbucks, during the ’80s and ’90s.” read more News article

here are some photos that jeff taylor of PTs coffee took.

and here are some of the ones we took: Flickr 

We are having an amazing coffee time on this trip! We have seen the 2006 Cup of Excellence winning farm El Injerto and spent two full days touring our farm Finca Vista Hermosa. It has been an incredibly eye opening trip. My bottom line take away is that coffee is too damn cheap! They work too hard to get it to us and we do not appreciate it nearly enough.

Day six started with a very early morning trip to the award winning Finca Vista Hermosa in the rugged highlands of Huehuetenango in the far north of Guatemala. We drove up for several hours getting higher and higher. Then we turned left onto a very steep dirt road. The very full vanload of 9 people then began to climb the almost vertical moutains on the way up to the Finca. Every time we thought that it could not get any steeper, narrower, more scary or more beautiful views we would round another hairpin turn with maybe 3 inches of raod to spare with a 400 foot straight drop and there would be even higher peaks and more breathtaking views.

Eventually we actually made it up to the Finca at around 5250 feet high. We were now over a mile in the sky. The air is thin, the clouds are in your ears and the jungle is awesome. Everywhere we looked there were beautifully healthy coffee trees heavy laden with ripe coffee cherries. Our intrepid roaster party leap out like excited school children. We swarmed all over the wet mill and the drying patios snapping photos, grabbing half fermented coffee and shrieking with delight. At El Injerto we only saw their trees and the mills but not processing coffee.

As we arrived at Fince Vista Hermosa they were just releasing a perfectly fermented batch of pulped coffee into the washing sluices. It was a very slick and cool operation to witness, but even more fun to actually perform yourself! Yeah the Barefoot crew got into it and we were paddling coffee in the washing stations and cleaning and sorting like mad. Just wait till you see the great photos we got!

We drove down to the bottom of the farm down to around 3800 feet. There we found the most amazing coffee tree. It was so laden with perfectly rip coffee cherries it blew our minds. So being highly competitive Eugenia and Andy decided to have a cherrie picking competetion along with Aaron Blance of Brown Coffee. 15 minutes to pick as much as you could in a picker basket. It was exhilerating and very hard and dirty work. Wait till you see the photos to see who won…

we then went back to the wet mill and saw the workers bring in loads of super ripe coffee cherries for processing. Tons more great photos here. They measured and then water sorted the ripest cherries out to the depulper. Then it is on to the fermentation tank for a 24 hour around the clock watch to ferment the coffee to exactly the right stage, not an hour longer. This is where most of the magic comes from in processing coffee. a tiny misstep here and the entire harvest is ruined.

It then went out on the drying patio to dry and be turned constantly.

day Seveñ””””””””

early in the morning we hiked up to the top of Finca Vista Hermosa up to about 7000 feet high. The view would have been incredible except for the clouds had rolled in. 7000 feet is very high! and very wet and dense jungle.

we saw Catui, Caturra, Bourbon, Margioype coffee trees and quite a few of the Fincas micro’lots. just wait untill new harvest when we get our hands on some of these new micro lots from Finca Vista. New worlds await!

We toured their sheep operation where they create organic natural fertilizer for the plamts and get fresh goat milk. A very impressive and still low tech operation. Gods natural order in evidence.

Later in the afternoon we helped process more coffee and learned more about what makes the farm so special. Then we went to CAFECO the dry mill in Huehue that processes Finca Vista Hermosa coffee. An amazing operation that you just have to see to believe. Wait for photos.

then dinner at the Martinez house with even more of the amazingly tasty food. If we all ate like this we would be healthy, wealthy and wise.

So tomorrow morning we will go to Antigua to see a farm called Filadelfia. Then on too Guatemala City for cupping at Anacafe.

today the coffee crazies visited the famous and El Injerto farm in huehue. awesome amazing farm. great people. super fun!! will post more tomorrow. must sleep……..

Edwin Martinez of Finca Vista Hermosa and Arturo of El Jinerto. The new generation of coffee quality in Guatemala.

Sunday we drove from Guatemala City up to Huehuetenango. Our illustrious hosts Edwin Martinez senior and junior were patient with us gringos as we gawked and stared and delighted in the scenery, great people and cool sights. It was an excellent but long trip. wE REACHED A TOP ELEVATION OF 10,000 feet on the Pan American highway. Breathless in Guatemala…

That afternoon we visited the famous ruins of Zaculeu. amazing! amazing ruins, amazing people, amazing place. Very interesting that the Spanish ´discovered´and ínfluenced´them into oblivion.

Lots of great food and great company. Along with us on the trip were some amazing coffee luminaries, George and Laurie Howell of Terrior Coffee, Jeff Taylor of PT´s coffee, AAron Blanco of Brown Coffee and Simon Thompson of Cravens Coffee. You would not believe the amazing depth of coffee knowledge and passion that could be crammed into one small van. Thank you all.

Today in Guatemala we went to do a massive cafe crawl across Guatemala City. We had so many requests from the Baristas at many of the espresso bars that attended the Barista traiing to visit their cafes. So off like intrepid explorers we went in search of coffee happytimes. The cafes that had Baristas at the training and we wanted to visit were; Cafe Barista, Biscottis, Cafe Gitane, & Cafe, Cafe Saul and McCafe. Yes you read it right Mcdonalds McCafe had their general manager of all McCafes in Guatemala there at the Barista training!! And you know we made her get down and messy making espresso just like all the rest!

So we haeded off to this amazing mall called Miraflores. We thought we would find 1 or 2 of the cafes there. We found ALL of them except for McCafe!! All of them in one big mall. And all of them were a FAR cry better in coffee flavor, ambiance and appearnace than even a standard cafe in the states! The whole crew went to each of the five cafes and had several espresso drinks from each one. MASSIVE CAFFEINE OVERDOSE!!! The standout was Cafe Barista which had by far the best espresso with dark red/gold flecks and great flavor, beautiful steamed milk, and an amazing decor that was head and shoulders better tham almost every cafe I have seen here in the states. Go there and visit them. Second was & Cafe which had the swankest hip vibe and look. But OK coffee.

So if you go to Guatemala City and want great espresso go to any Cafe Barista or & Cafe. Tell em barefoot sent you.