Part 2: Cocoa Farm

It is quite a process to make chocolate and I can now say I have tried some from every step of the process.  My favorite is the very beginning and the very end.  Cocoa forests are very magical looking places like something out of a fairy tale.

The trees start as little plants in pots

The fruits grow from tiny flowers

There are cables across the farm to transport the pods to the main part.  The sloths use these as highways to get around.

The pods come in green, red or yellow.

You suck on the mucous membrane around the seed- it was really sweet and really good.

The pods are drop into the machine.

This separates the pod from the seeds

The seeds are dried under the green tarps in the top of the picture.

Then they are fermented (ok, we didn't try this part).

They are packaged into bags and sent to chocolate companies or made into chocolate at the farm.  The seeds are really bitter at this point.

The seeds get toasted.

After going through a couple more processes you get this liquidy goodness.

They scooped a bunch onto the cocoa leaves for us to eat. They made sure to point out that we could also eat the leaves like Byron the sloth does.

After the chocolate hardens its still in somewhat of a raw form (see above).  It then has to be tempered to make it smooth and different flavors are added.  Tempering is a process of heating and cooling the chocolate and then it is put into molds and you get chocolate from the stores.

Next up: the banana process, from the farm to your grocery store.

Part 1: Sloths

Today and yesterday were amazing and we did so much that I am going to split it up into multiple parts.  Between today and yesterday, I took 470 pictures!

We went to a cocoa farm, where over 300 sloths live and are studied.  We got to see three (2 three-toed sloths and 1 two-toed).

Sloth number 1: about 2 year old, female, 3-toed.  She looks cute and cuddly, but was growling at us the entire time.

The greenish tint is from moss that grows on them.

They get weighed and measured.  This one tried to climb the scale. 

The blue tie is so she won't get caught again, then she was released.

Sloth number 2: A 5-6 year old male, the yellow line down the back indicates a male, 3-toed

He was already caught by the time we saw him.

Three toes!

He didn't want to get back in the bag so we could hold him.

Skye 

Maggie

Emma

Jenny, she really identified with the sloth :)

Nick

Brandy

Then he got carried back to his tree in the bag.

 Sloth number 3: 10 year old male named Byron, 2-toed

Up next: how to make chocolate from cocoa beans!

The Little Things

Here is a list of all the differences (good and bad) that I have noticed between Costa Rica and the US.

• Fresh fruits (mangos and avocados are my favorite so far) that are easily accessible and really cheap.  There are trucks full of fruits on my walk to class every day and I was able to get two avocados and a mango for $2!
• Chikys- shortbread cookies with chocolate on the bottom.  There isn't really anything special about them or different than cookies in the US but they are really good.

• The plumbing is really old everywhere so you can't put toilet paper in the toilet.  In all of the bathrooms there are trash cans that you put toilet paper in.
• The showers have these giant shower heads that electrically heat up the water while it passes through the shower head.  So you can either have a hot shower with no water pressure, or a cold shower with a lot of water pressure.  Your choice...

• Public transportation is amazing, easy, convenient, and cheap.  To get from my house to class is about 50 cents.
• This morning there was a large cockroach crawling around my room.
• I need 3 keys to get into my house.  One for the garage door that looks like a fence, then there is a door that is just bars, then there is the actually door.  Then there is an alarm system (but that is never used).                                               
• Drivers and motorcyclists are crazy here.  Everyone honks all the time to say thank you, hello, hey watch out, stop I'm going, etc.  Pedestrians do not have the right of way.
• Children live with their parents for a lot longer here.  It's normal for people to live at home while they go to college and sometimes even once they get married.
• There are so many amazing animals.  For example:

 Osos Perezosos!!

I'm going on a field trip tomorrow and Saturday to a chocolate, banana, and pineapple farm that has sloths so stayed tuned for a lot more pictures!