The Farm Life

Each day is a new adventure – in this case, it was getting from our hotel to our next stop, Finca La Flor, which is in a very small town about an hour and a half on the other side of San Jose. After a rally style taxi ride through the largest city of Costa Rica, a bus ride to the next city, then a 2 hour wait in a cold drizzle (though we passed the time with a couple games of Farkle, and a fun Spanglish conversation with two girls, Denize and Yerlyn), then a 1 hour bus ride to our destination city which included a stint on a washed out dirt road, and a short jaunt down a narrow rural road, we finally arrived at our destination.

Finca La Flor is a agroecological farm and environmental school to promote and educate sustainable living and organic farming. Finca La Flor focuses on recycle/reuse/regenerate, provide work for the community, reforestation, organic farming, and education on the connection between the land and the people.

We arrived shortly before dinner, met two other volunteers and visited with the founder of Finca La Flor shortly, and then retired early. Our first day on the farm began with a hearty breakfast, followed by a hike into the forest to collect bamboo leaves to be used as mulch on the farm. The scenery on the walk was breath-taking. The plants and flowers, the views down upon the neighboring towns and the hillsides (we were quite high up), and a small waterfall all made for the picture-perfect Costa Rica that you see in the brochures and web sites. And our guide/teacher, Venicio, was very informative explaining all of the many attributes that the land and plants bring to the farm. Of course, hauling two full bags of bamboo leaves back up the hillside helped to bring us back to reality that we are in fact working on a farm.

Later in the morning, we broke off into separate work groups. Haley worked in agriculture hauling branches that she later fed to the many goats here on the farm. She then laid mulch around the vegetable plants. I worked with the animals, first hauling 40 pounds of King Grass up the hillside several times over. Then I helped clean the goat stalls and fed the horses. Each day we rotate jobs, which include those we did today, plus working in the kitchen, gardens, rain forest, compost, medicinal herbs and specialty jobs.

The afternoons include Spanish classes taught by Venicio, and some down time to shower, recuperate and socialize. Everyone that works here has been very friendly and helpful – Bridgette the founder, Venicio the general manager and Spanish teacher, his sister Eugenia who cooks breakfast and lunch, Elisa who cooks dinner, Wilber who works with the animals and crops, and Luis who works with the medicinal plants and teaches about their usage (and has run with the bulls in Pamplono!!).