On to Orosi Valley

Hola,
We travelled to the beautiful Orosi Valley to check it out. This splendid valley is bounded to the north by two volcanoes - Irazu to west and Turrialba to east, and to the south by the Cordillera de Talamanca, extending south to the Panama border. Both volcanoes are visible from our second storey hotel room. They are clear and profiled in the early morning, clouding over during most of the day.

Orosi is a village of 5,000 with coffee as the main agricultural mainstay. Shade-grown organic coffee is of the highest quality and this place is famous for it. Orderly rows of man-sized coffee plants sweep up and down the slopes, shaded by intermittent slender-trunked, high-canopied shade trees.

In 1502, Christopher Columbus (check out some interesting mind-altering facts at http://www.weeklyuniverse.com/columbus.htm ; they don't teach this stuff in elementary school in Ohio...) landed at what was to become the Caribbean port city of Limon in Costa Rica. Later, in 1563, the Spanish conquistador Coronado, (using diplomacy rather than black powder and cutlasses) established the city of Cartago, just north of Orosi, and proclaimed that the Orosi valley was the most beautiful he had ever seen.

Nearby are working coffee farms, butterfly farms, orchid gardens, mountain bike trails, Taranti national park, hot springs, a reservoir lake, and the ubiquitous birds, butterflies and bugs (BBB). This area is somewhat of a backwater in Costa Rica - it is not a hot, beachy tourist destination, and many Ticos mistakenly brand it as cold (since nearby Cartago IS colder) and rainy (since the nearby Tarnati NP has the highest rainfall in CR at around 8,000 mm (yes, 315 inches or 26 1/4 feet a year!). However, the magic of microclimates means that these abberations are localized; Orosi enjoys an annual rainfall of only 1800 mm (71 inches) and temperatures range typically between 60F at night to 80F during day. That's the tell-tale for Costa Rica climate - a few kilometers and a few hundred meters elevation change makes a world of difference. Our hotel hosts tell us that Orosi has not materially changed in the last 16 years, with few North Americans. So far, so good. It's on our A-list.


Overlook of Orosi village with volcanoes Irazu (left peak) and Turrialba (right peak).










Typical street in Orosi








Our room at the Orosi Lodge. All hand-made bamboo furniture with no nails or screws.











Shade-grown coffee plantation near Orosi









Smoking active crater (center, skyline); one of three craters of Vulcan Turrialba. This volcano is currently closed to public due to safety concerns of heightened volcanic activity. We're at a safe distance (30 km) with camera ready in case it blows!