Volume 15 Issue 1 » 73
On the Elida Estate Coffee Farm I join
master coffee taster Lan Laws, breathlessly
following him through steep slopes densely
packed with coffee plants. “The weather
here in the highlands allows the Geisha
coffee plant to develop more slowly, which
means its fruit gains a deeper flavour,” he
explains, splitting a red pod to reveal its
two fruity seeds.
Elida is one of 150 coffee microfarms,
many of them started by American expats
soon after their work on the Panama Canal
had completed in 1914. They ventured up
to Chiriquí and were enchanted by the cool
mountain air, the densely forested slopes
and the towering peaks of Volcán Barú.
So they settled on the slopes and devoted
themselves to growing Arabica coffee.
On a coffee tour I taste the four flavours
of coffee produced here: Geisha, Typica,
Caturra and Catuai, all grown best in
the highlands at elevations of 1,700 to
2,000 metres above sea level. Harvesting
and sorting the coffee beans is a labour
intensive job most often completed by the
Ngöbe Buglé, Panama’s largest indigenous
group. Expert fruit pickers and sorters, I
watch them gather intently over a long
table, carefully examining the dry coffee
beans and sorting them by size and colour.
Boquete is relatively new on the tourist
map, its first hotel opening just eighteen
years ago. Today the small town of
19,000 still has a strong expat population,
especially after 2010, when the American
Association of Retired Persons named
it a top retirement destination. But its
dusty streets and small storefronts that sell
fresh mangos, rambutan and citrus have
also become a hub for adventure travelers
coveting whitewater rafting, hiking,
ziplines, canopy treks and coffee tours.
Panama City’s Casco Viejo is filled with relics from
the ancient past: churches dating back to the 1600s,
historic plazas and narrow streets buzzing with activity.
While my teenage daughters zipline and
shriek through the treetops at adrenaline-
pumping speeds, I choose a quieter walk
through a series of hanging bridges
suspended over the rivers and slopes of
the Palo Alto mountains. Along the way
my guide Isabel points out 450-year-old
mamoncillo trees, a hummingbird nest and
some of the 1,100 species of orchids that
proliferate in the cloud forest, so called
for the moist air that hangs over its upper
canopies, creating a distinct microclimate.