Part 3: Banana Farm

There is a lot more work that goes into growing bananas than I had expected.  The farmers work hard to make sure the bananas are as little bruised as possible (they mention to us though, that even if there is a problem on the outside, the banana is still fine on the inside).

All of the bananas are at different rates of growth.

Each of these parts make up one tree. The grandmother has been broken off, the middle is the mom and on the left is the baby.  Each part only lasts for about 24 weeks to grow the fruit and then dies.

These blue bags are like bug spray for the plants.

The plastic protects the different layers of the bananas from growing in to each other.

Before the bananas are cut down, cushions are put between the layers.

The bananas get hung up and...

...pushed to the main building.

Each bundle is so large, that the trees are held up with ropes so they don't fall over with the weight (see all of the orange cords in the pictures above).

The bundles are cut off the stalks and cleaned.

Then they are sorted.  The small and bruised ones were going to England to be made into baby food.

The larger ones where packaged carefully into boxes and loaded on trucks for the US.

Next up: Tirimbina Biological Reserve