Island Tour - Coffee Plantation

We set off on an organised tour of Big Island this morning - first stop a Kona coffee plantation.

The beans, called 'cherries' when they are ready to pick, were at varying stages of ripeness..

Hawaiian coffee production is small scale and the plantation acted as a weighing station for other farmers to bring their beans for sale.  

The plants are quite close together on the steep slopes..

Perhaps because of this, the farm was reliant on fairly traditional forms of carrying the beans when harvesting..

Around the area of the coffee plantation which was high above the desert-like climate at sea level and very humid, other trees and fruits were growing in abundance..

Papaya..

Dates..

Avocado.. (on a very large tree)

Oranges..

Bananas..

African tulip trees ..

.and an odd plant that we did not recognise..

We sampled the coffee..

We then had lunch in the company of some quite exotic looking free range chickens and got back on the minibus to the next stop.