Gaitania - a village nestled in a wild and beautiful valley in southern Tolima, Colombia. From Bogota it takes 11 hours in a small bus, crowded with people, chickens and dogs. And it’s worth it.
At the end of this journey, about a week ago, we met with the winner of Colombia’s 2015 Cup of Excellence competition, Astrid Medina Pereira, plus a whole host of other cafeteros (coffee growers) living in the area.
Mention the Galapagos Islands and most minds turn to oversized tortoises, blue-footed boobies or maybe Charles Darwin and his theory of evolution.
There is, however, a small coffee industry on the volcanic rocks that sit in the Pacific Ocean, about 900 kilometers west of the Ecuadorian coast. And as we discovered on an amazing trip to the Galapagos earlier this month, the beans they produce are surprisingly good.
A couple of weeks ago we packed our bags and took the short flight from Bogota to Caracas, crossing the snowy peaks of the Andes to check out the coffee in our neighboring country.
Then we drove west, headed for Venezuela’s coffee zone. Navigating sign-less roads and dodging some of the most erratic driving on the planet, we eventually made it to Portuguesa state, the main coffee-producing region.
