Update from Tom in El Salvador
Sitting in the hotel lobby killing some time before grabbing some dinner. Today was amazing so far. 3.5 hrs of sleep @ Matt’s but the travel was smooth as silk.
We met up w/ Sergio (who owns Los Planes) and he went to lunch w/ us by our hotel. There is an amazing cafe in the outdoor mall next to us called Viva Espresso. They serve all the coffees we know & love. Plus they’ve had multiple National Barista Champs. The owners are friends of Jeff (and now us!) We sat there, talked to the owners (Rico & Lily) along w/ Sergio. Then Lucia (from Las Mercedes) showed up w/ her family and Sergio’s wife, Isabel, showed up w/ her family. It was like a meeting of El Salvadoran coffee royalty. Awesome.
Tomorrow we drive up to Los Planes. It’s North/East almost in Honduras. We’ll be there until Sunday, watching the harvest (it’s in full process), learning about how coffee is processed, hiking around checking out the crop, and whatever else they want us to do. Monday we’re going to cup a bunch of coffees at a processing mill. Then come back to Viva Espresso to test some espresso Jeff brought and watch their Baristas go through their competition routines. After that, we’re going to visit another one of their cafes and eat at a restaurant near there. That’s all I know.
