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Flowers & Plants, Page 14

Entrance to Finca San Agustin Las Cañas

The Spring Season began a few days ago, so I’ve read somewhere {ñ}. Guatemala’s slogan is the Land of the Eternal Spring, yet in this country Spring has never showed up. As a matter of fact, Guatemala’s weather does not follow the ‘normal’ seasons. Instead, Guatemala has a dry and a wet seasons. The wet season begins in May and ends towards the last days of October; the remaining months are the dry season. So in about 40 days the rainy season will begin in Guatemala and the whole country will be wearing an intense verdurous foliage dress. If you ever decide to visit Guatemala, make sure you bring dark sunglasses because the adjective intense accompanies every shade of the color hue.

Corozo Palms and its Smell are a Staple of the Holy Week

Just like the Christmas Season comes with its own set of smells, flavors and color palette, so does the Holy Week celebrations. I can bring to you still photos, slide shows, video clips and sounds. But I can not bring you the smells. Like I said back in the Virgin of Guadalupe Day, … the incredible power of the sense of smell can detonate nostalgic memories… if only the smells could be seized like Patrick Süskind suggested in his masterpiece Das Parfum (Perfume). How could one go about imprisoning the mixture of the smells of copal incense, corozo palms, fireworks, pine needles, moisten saw dust, fresh tropical fruits, palm flower arrangements and sweat into a digital format readily available to download onto your own computer?

Making Palm Sunday Arrangements

Today’s Palm Sunday or Domingo de Ramos as today’s known in the Catholic Realm. Last year, Domingo de Ramos fell on April …

Bougainvillea-lined Road

This is the kind of road the motorcycle riders arriving to La Antigua Guatemala may find. Even I would like to ride …

Time to harvest the coffee in La Antigua Guatemala

So what makes La Antigua Guatemala the best coffee in the world? To get the best cup of coffee of the world, one must start with the right altitude; somewhere above 1,500 meters above the sea level; add lots of fertile volcanic soil; mix in plenty of rain (about six months); stable temperate weather (about 75˚ F / 25˚ C); once you have the above, make sure you plant the best possible Arabica coffee.

Coffee Harvest Time in Guatemala

Yesterday’s photo was a close-up of the coffee bush in the lower left corner of today’s photo. If you click on the image above you can the coffee bushes (the small trees) being harvested under the shadows of the Gravilea trees in San Pedro Las Huertas, La Antigua Guatemala. Around La Antigua Guatemala you can find coffee bushes everywhere, including as part of the hedges of La Compañí­a de Jesús ruins.

The Coffee Colors

The other day we heard many voices on the other side of the fence; voices of children and women just talking and laughing. We approached the windows on the second floor to see what was all the commotion; then we saw men, women and children harvesting the coffee. At this moment, you can see the turning point of coffee from green to golden yellow and finally cherry red.

Poinsettias and Pine Needle are Christmas Decorations in Guatemala

Manolo and Carmen were reminiscing just the other day about the smells associated with the Christmas season in Guatemala. Pine needles have a very peculiar smell and indeed its smell its burnt in the Guatemalan collective memory of Christmas and birthdays parties. Flor de Pascua or poinsettias are a visual cue of the upcoming Christmas as well. Shops know this and they use pine needle and poinsettias among other Christmas decorations to reel in the customers; it seems to be working just fine in this shop.

Window view of Mountains around La Antigua Guatemala

As beautiful, cosmopolitan, antique and modern as it is La Antigua Guatemala, many people choose to live in one of the surrounding villages that belong to the municipio (county) of La Antigua Guatemala. There are many reasons for this decision which range from the economics, ‘real guatemalan experience’, or simply to live in a more natural and greener environment.

The Roads Around Antigua Guatemala

From the Guateflora series we take a different road to show you the lush roads around La Antigua Guatemala. By the way, the roads that communicate La Antigua Guatemala with the rest of the ‘real’ Guatemala are some of the best in the country, if not the best; they are kept in better conditions than the rest of the roads around Guatemala.

Guateflora: Llama del bosque

This kind of tree with its orange flowers is very popular around La Antigua Guatemala. According to the Guateflora book its name is Llama del bosque (flame of the forest) which brings me to an interesting fact between the English and Spanish languages. Forest in Spanish is bosque, but deforestation is deforestación. In English the root for the word bosque is still available as bosk for a thicket of bushes. Can you come up with other samples?

Guateflora: Falsa Uva (False Grape)

The hoja de falsa uva (false grape) or Parthenocisus inserta as it is known scientifically is a trepadora (climbing) plant. In the trepadoras category the most often used are the hiedra (ivy), uña de gato (cat’s claw), falsa uva (false grape), collar de la reina (queen’s collar), and of course the ever-present bugambilea (bougainvillea). The trepadoras (climbing) category in the Guateflora book has 34 different plants, so I have homework to do. 😉

Guateflora: Falsa Maní­a (False Peanut)

Falsa maní­a or Maní­ forrajero (false peanut) as it is known in Guatemala the Arachis pintoi is a cubresuelos (ground-creeping) plant used often in the garden of La Antigua Guatemala. José, our gardener, told me that you can also use it a trepadora (climbing) plant if you guide it. I really like this evergreen plant which flowers all-year-round a tiny yellow flower. According to the Guateflora book, it can grow anywhere and handles well people walking over it.