At peace with life on a coffee farm best describes Hugo Chavez, the third generation in his family to own Finca Limonar. In the 1940s, Hugo’s grandfather, Jose Olivio Chávez, established a larger coffee estate in the community of San Pedro Necta that would later be divided into pieces for each of his three children and then passed down to his grandsons. Difficulties such as leaf rust outbreaks and low coffee prices don’t seem to shake Hugo’s tranquil demeanor, which is evident from the approach he takes towards managing the 170-acre estate. Renovation efforts seem limited and there appears to be a lot of deferred maintenance throughout the estate. But despite a bit of disrepair, the wet-mill infrastructure is well designed and fully powered with an unbelievable amount of pulsing water. Harvested cherries literally flow from all corners of the estate through elaborate water channels to a holding tank where less dense cherries are removed when they float to the top of the tank. The cherry depulper is actually turned by the force of water passing through the wet mill. Once depulped, the coffee is submerged in water and fermented for 48 to 72 hours. Next, it is mechanically washed to reduce water contamination and then dragged by clean water through long classification channels to separate out less dense beans. The coffee conveniently falls from the channel onto the patio where the water runs off and the parchment is left to dry in the sun.
