Tag: Food and Drink

Coffee Tasting at Toucan Café Medellin

It’s almost the end of our trip to Colombia, and we had another “Must do” to cross of our list: a coffee tasting! Fortunately, we found a great place to sample and learn more about coffee in Medellin.  Toucan Café and Tours, only a 5 minute walk from our hotel in Poblado, hosts coffee tastings every weekday at 4PM. Here’s our experience at a coffee tasting at Toucan Café.

Coffee Tasting overview

We not only got a coffee tasting from our guide Juan (Not Valdez!), we got a master class in coffee origins, preparation, and the smells and flavors of coffee! We also got lucky and had a private class of just the the 2 of us! Both David, who organizes all the tours offered by the company, and Juan speak perfect English, so it was an easy and fun experience for us from the booking to the class.

After the history of coffee and coffee growing briefing, which Juan adjusted when he heard we had done the coffee farm tour in Manizales, we moved from the classroom to the café.

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Manizales Town and Termales

After a fantastic night’s sleep at the finca, yesterday’s plan was to explore the nearby town of Manizales and local hot springs, or termales. We had a great day and are so glad we visited Manizales town and termales.

Manizales Landscape

Manizales is part of a beautiful landscape but I could never live here. The driving up and down and around winding mountains is too much for my motion sickness! I have taken gravol before every single drive into and out of this coffee farm and I am still feeling it!

visit to the town

We took the Hacienda Venecia van to the highway and the lovely Angela from the hotel accompanied us into town. We hitched a ride with a collectivo jeep for a 15 minute journey that cost 5000 COP for the two of us (about $2.20 Canadian). Cool trip – the views along the mountains are lovely. I just would be addicted to Gravol if I lived here.

We walked around the town a bit, visited some plazas and a cathedral.

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A Bogotá Experience at Andrés DC

Don’t trust everything you read. About a half hour north of Bogota is a very famous restaurant called Andrés Carne de Res, considered one of the many recommended things to do in Bogota. Yet, because of its distance from the city, we determined was too far for us to go. We resigned ourselves to missing this one. Well, last night we were having a beer at a local brewery in a Bogotá barrio called Zona Rosa and noticed that Andrés DC, an outpost of this famous restaurant, was right around the corner from us. Lonely Planet said it wasn’t worth it if you couldn’t go to the original. We threw aside our fears and ignored Lonely Planet. Good choice. We had a great time and a true Bogotá experience at Andrés DC!

Exterior of Andres DC in Bogota
Exterior of Andres DC
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