Passion for Mother Earth, & Chocolate

 
Grab a beverage and settle in kiddies, this will be a bit of a long one as we cover our first stop and the Cacao Tour.
 
Arriving in Puerto Limon,Costa Rica was smooth and The Ships Morning Wakeup system is great. Saves springing from the bed to silence either or both of our phone alarms.  Ya just reach over and knock the phone off the hook, roll over and catch a few more zzzz’s.
 
OH WAIT... 

We gotta roll out to meet L&D & S&E for Breakfast in Giovanni's before heading out to the Cacao Trail & Chocolate tour.  

So much for a little more nony-nony land.

 
Breakfast in Giovanni’s was delightful, so much less stressful.
Hell, there’s only TE6 and 4 Pinnacle cruisers, how much stress can there be?  

Uh… ya do know who we're talking about… Right?
 
Move on Chucky!
 
The menu is not much more expansive than the main Dining room but the “Pancakes” are a poor attempt at oversized silver dollar pancakes, and so thin that the word Fluffy DOES NOT APPLY. 

BUT, the service is great [empty dining room] the orders are correct, the food HOT and the Coffee Soooooo much Richer and better than the everywhere else on the ship. 
Hey, it’s Giovanni’s – Dat’s Italian! 

Therefore, Dragon Lady and Chucky are in heaven, not so much so for everyone else! [tea drinkers just don't get it]
 
Now it’s a trek to the very front of the ship, via deck 5, thru the closed shops to debark on the Forward gangway on deck 2 at the 9AM, to catch the tour bus by 9:15.
But… the local officials are slow to clear the ship so the stairs are at a dead stop and the deck 2 crew is sending those on the elevators back up to deck 5 to wait.  It takes till 9:45 before the stair line starts to move and of course very slowly due to the number of people that did not pay attention to have their seapass cards ready and are holding up the line while they fish thru their purses, pockets, back packs, stocking stash, Bras, and…
{Oh look Harvey, it’s under your hat!}
 
After a long walk on a longer pier and through the parking lot of Puerto Limon, Costa Rica, we find our bus and Guide for the Cacao Trails and Chocolate Museum tour.
 
After a quick panoramic tour [that’s a ride around town in a bus] of the very impoverished port city of Limon, it’s a bit of a ride to the Cacao Trails. 
 
The Guide [we'll call him Juan – because ever anal Chucky, excited about all the chocolate ahead, forgot to make note of it] keeps it interesting with lots of details on the area, history, culture etc., and stopping frequently to point out 2 and 3 toed sloths, one with a baby, in the trees on either side of the bus along with monkeys and various flora and fauna.

 
Cost Rica is a major Banana exporter, with huge Chiquita, plantations along the way to the tour.
 
Once at the Tour Stop, “Juan’ cautions everyone to stay on the trails, DO NOT venture into the brush, because of the various poisonous snakes and vipers, some of which masquerade as twigs and branches just waiting to drop on your shoulder or climb up the pant leg of unsuspecting tourists.  Oh... and of course there are the Boa Constrictors and assorted Pythons just lurking around for a tasty Tourist tidbit.
 
And… “Don’t forget your sunscreen”, says “Juan” looking at a particularly Midwestern looking ultra-pale face, “and your insect repellent”.
[We'll we are in the jungle… sorta], as a particularly LARGE mosquito carries off one of the small children.
 
Up the rocky, slightly muddy trail we go, winding this way, and that around this cute bush past that weird tree [watch out or the twigs masquerading as snakes] until we reach the “Chocolate Museum”, such as it is.  Actually an overly long Tiki hut with a book case a small machinery display and a souvenir counter [of course].
 

Guard Cat on Duty

And a Guard Cat that occupied one of the guest chairs and who was working very hard on his morning siesta.

 
Here we meet Lorena.  She of the Long Wavy Hair, Sparkling Personality, Flashing Eyes, Blue Dental Braces, and a total Passion for Mother Earth and all things Cacao.  [Chocolate to you]

Here starts the tour, up more paths to various stops to point out and elaborate on flora, fauna, sculptures of ancient indigenous origin and the culture and showing her love of Mother Earth and all its fruitful bounty.
 
Up a few more trails to the Shaman’s Lodge, [no shaman home today] where she continues on the cultural tour touting the various herbs, roots, oils etc., all that come from nature to heal us without manmade chemicals.  Some in the group later expressed a feeling of refreshment and wellbeing from the smoke of the herbs burning in the fire pit in the Shaman’s Lodge that managed waft over everyone.

Next stop was the rudimentary press, really a tree stump with a whole in it and a pole through the hole resting on a slotted anvil where a sugar cane stalk is pressed and crushed to release the cane juice, which is reduced, and refined into the raw sugar used in producing the finished chocolate product
 

More trails and trekking as she points out the actual Cacao pods and the tiny bloom that it grows from, and onto the harvesting trough where the cacao pods are cracked open, the seeds/beans are dumped to be washed down constantly to remove the oily gelatinous slime covering the beans before setting them out to dry in the sun. 

Here she cracks open a cacao pod and gives us each a fresh raw bean to taste by sucking the gelatinous coating off but not biting or cracking the bean as it is still raw and the taste would NOT be good.  You can taste the bitter chocolate as you suck the bean but the flavor comes later as we will soon find out.
 
From there we are led to the auditorium like shed that displayed all the tools used for harvesting and processing the Cacao. 
 
Then we are treated to a demonstration of the pealing, husking, grinding, cooking and making the chocolate from the cacao beans.
 
First the beans are coarse ground to crack off the outer shell which is then flipped over and over on a large woven mat to allow the wind to separate the shell from the beans.  Then the bean is ground into a finer powder which is then heated on a stove before being mixed with powdered milk, the refined cane sugar, and vanilla, to make the bitter sweet chocolate that is then patted into a round flat pate’, cut into slivers and served to us on a leaf. 

 
Waaaay Cool!  
 
Next we are led back to the “Museum” and served some fresh fruit and Lemonade before a brief break to hustle some tchotchke’s, ground coffee, chocolate etc.
 
Back down a much shorter trail to the bus, and with stops along the way to see more monkeys, Sloths, Bananas, the ditches to irrigate the bananas, the men harvesting bananas, and the long lines to send the bunches of bananas down the hill to the truck, we are treated to a little tour of Cahuita, Limon a delightful little beachside village.
 
Then it was back thru less than delightful Puerto Limon, thru the “Duty Free” Tchotchke shop and back onto the Jewel of The Seas.
 
Now famished from all that snake dodging, flora observing, chocolate in the raw tasting and banana plantation viewing, they race back to get into the Windjammer for a nosh just before it closed, then up to the cabin for a quick snooze, shower and relaxation before heading to the schooner for happy hour.
 
This got longer than expected so we'll cover dinner and whatevah in the next note… or not, it all depends on how he feels after dinner and the 9:45 show.

Oh, and Chucky finally found his notes on the Guide “Jesus Mora” of Sunrise Tours,

SunrisetoursCR20@Gmail.com.

If ever in Costa Rica, book him for a tour. He really is a cool proud Costa Rican that will make your tour interesting and exciting.  Just be sure to bring your sunscreen, insect repellent and snake boots.

Ciao 4 Now,

Uncle Chuck & The Luvin’ Chocolate Even More, 

Dragon Lady