Got up at the usual 7am and headed to breakfast--I sort of feel like the cooks know what we all like and since we go for the same thing every morning, it seems to me they remove it from the meal. The first day we had bananas, pineapple, guava, and watermelon and now since they knew we liked their native fruits, there is only guava (which no one really likes) and watermelon left. There is always rice and beans (but I am sick of rice to be honest and I never liked beans to begin with). Also we really liked making toast and scrambled eggs and those are gone now too. Breakfast is a very slim picking now----I asked for peanut butter this morning because they made us peanut butter and jelly sandwiches the other day for lunch so I know it exists and they brought it out----the group all took advantage of it, making lots of toast and pb--now I am sure it will be gone tomorrow, but it filled me up today.
We had an hour to wait before the tour started at nine. Today we were learning about pineapples!
We drove about 20 minutes to the pineapple plantation. This plantation is the biggest organic growing plantation in the world! The plantation is 1400 acres and has 22,000 plants/acre. 80% of the plantation is organic and 20% is conventionally grown. They use to be entirely conventional, however, people didn't want to pay the extra money it cost for organic production and the plantation almost when under. They had to produce 60% organic and 40% conventionally to save the plantation and now have gone back to 80 and 20.
Our tour took place on a huge cart pulled by a John Deere tractor. The plantation is so big and the path is so muddy that there are only driving tours. We boarded the cart and were off!
What I learned: A pineapple plant has three chutes (one crown chute on top of pineapple, one stem chute on the bottom of the pineapple and one guide chute which is toward the bottom of the plant) but only one fruit! I was told that if I took the crown chute and planted it, a pineapple plant would grow and produce pineapples. However the weather conditions (humid, lots of rain) would, however, also need to be present as well.The leaves of the plant are so long and prickly and the pineapple grows in the middle of the plant. The guide shared with us that the amount of time it takes for a pineapple to grow is unknown (they don't know exactly when the fruit shows up in the plant-since its covered by so many leaves and then just appears). We were shown a pineapple embryo which is just inside the step and is a little white strip at the center part of the stem.
The bottom of a pineapple is sweeter than the top of pineapple.
The company controls the size of the pineapples with a gas called ethane. This gas is sprayed two weeks before the fruit is done and this stunts the growth process. We got to see many stages of the pineapple: the embryo to begin, then small bulb pineapple, then a bigger fruit with colorful flowers on the top (have 1 year and 3 months until ready), a smaller version of a typical pineapple (1 year to go), and then the mature fruit. How do they know when its done? Its all by weight---after working with pineapples for some time, the workers know when a pineapple is mature and when one needs more time. In the store however, the guide said to look for four important things:
1. the size of the eyes (outside skin called pineapple eyes), the bigger the eyes the more sweet the pineapple
2, The symmetrical shape
3. The healthy green crown chute
4. Yellow color appearing just at the bottom
We got to taste three different pineapples while out in the plantation. When we stopped out in the plantation, the guide would just pull out his machete and slice one up for us. It was wild how quickly the guide would chop a pineapple up---he slices all the eyes (the sides) off and then chopped the bottom. Then he cut about an inch thick chunk from the bottom to the top and then sliced that chunk into pieces to serve us. I was shocked at how sharp and powerful his machete was. No messing with him! One that wasn't quite mature, one that was just mature, and one that was ready to be picked! I enjoyed the first one because I thought it was the sweetest, but there was only a slight slight difference between all of them!
A pineapple fruit can produce a second, third, and fourth fruit, however the quality decreases with every additional fruit.
In about 9 hours, 60 workers in the plantation can pick 54,000 pineapples. They make $45/day for 8 hours of work. The workers are 40% women and 60% men.
Riding through the plantation was just incredible---to see thousands and thousands of pineapples in many different stages of maturity. I was shocked to see how large the plantation and to learn how long it takes to produce one pineapple (over a year a half).
After riding through the plant, we headed to the packing plant. The packing plant had two different belts--one organic and one conventional. The pineapples were washed thoroughly before put on the belts. The pineapples have to float in the water to pass and if they sink this means there is too much water inside the fruit and they are rejected from the beginning. These pineapples are given to neighbor farmers for their cows. Then the pineapples are moved up the belt and two workers decide based on appearance if they pass or fail. The rejected ones are given to local markets within the country and the ones that pass continue on the belt to exportation. I find that really interesting!! The best products are shipped out because they earn more money for them and the not so good ones are kept inside the country.
Once the pineapple passes the workers classify the pineapples into 5 categories (5-10, based on size). They are then boxed up according to sizes and refrigerated until exported and through exportation. The refrigeration keeps fermentation low as it is shipped around the country. It takes about 2 weeks for these pineapples to reach the U.S.
This was the end of the tour however now came the tasting part! We each got our own pina colada made out of a small pineapple which was delicious! We also had pineapple boats (cut up pineapple inside the outside skin) and a pecan and cherry nut cake---it was cold and refreshing but mostly like a fruit cake.
What a great tour!
It was back to Tirimbina for some lunch--salad, chicken leg, cooked plantains, ice cream (they had ice cream in a bag or on a stick--much like a push-pop size, but either chocolate, vanilla, or vanilla and strawberry---both kinds were very rich and delicious).
After lunch I went with one the hotel's driver to the surrounding hotels where he dropped off my survey. Unfortunately he didn't speak any English so it was a bit awkward conversation. He put some American music on and we just listened to that. We headed to the town where he had to pick up two boxes for Tirimbina and then took me to four hotels---however, all but one had not filled the survey out yet so it was a bit discouraging, but maybe I can get some responses via email. I was a bit nervous not being native in their languages, but almost everyone spoke English working at the hotels. I just felt really bad not being able to communicate in their language and not being a part of the conversations.
It started pouring on and off while we were driving and when it rains here it pours--loudly! But the smell of rain is just wonderful! Once I got back to Tirimbina I had some time to send out some emails, update my blog, and then it was time for our final dinner at Tirimbina! Dinner was: Spaghetti, chicken soup, salad, bread roll, really good steamed veggies, and rice pudding for dessert. We sat around our tables and talked a bit and then had to get ready for our Night Tour. I definitely put some pants and my rain jacket on and them sprayed really well with bug spray--I probably wouldn't be able to tell I had another bite since I have so many on my legs anyway, but I was tired of itching so much so I knew it would be best to spray every inch of my body. The night tour started at 7:30 and our guide took us over the suspension bridge to the rain forest. Along the bridge a possum crossed on one of the wires way above our hears and a porcupine crossed right next to our heads. He/She even stopped once and it happened to be right next to my professor who was just in front of me and starred my professor down (looking like he was going to jump at him), but then just kept moving along. We also found many frogs (since it was raining for the first part of the walk, there were many frogs out). We saw some mating frogs as well which was entertaining. I learned the three main differences between frogs and toads.
1. Frogs have poisonous glands in their heads and toads do not.
2. Frogs lay eggs in clusters and toads in a straight line.
3. Frogs have smooth skin and toads have rough skin.
We also saw many spiders, a snake, and a few bats flew over head. I think we hiked for about 2 hours and I was exhausted--all I wanted to do was lay down in a bed, but we all the way out in the rain forest. We turned around and headed back to Tirimbina. What a long day! Time to get some rest before moving to another part of Costa Rica.
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