In our long winding tour from Huehue to Antigua there were plenty of photo moments including this view of Mt Atitlan that Klaus was taking advantage of.

We stopped at the R. Dalton Estate before Antigua. They’re a very well established coffee producer that falls into the “Disneyland” estate category by Edwin’s definition.  On the grounds they had a very large wet mill, dry mill, vast drying patios and a beautiful roasting and tasting facility.  Everything was very clean and polished with placards describing each step of production.  The farm has done so well our guide said this area is kept open simply to honor the R. Dalton family.  Their real production goes on in an even larger facility off-site although some production still goes on here.

Their cupping room was all class with sample roasters, ample lighting and space as well as a rotating, marble cupping table. We were all drooling over the setup.   Our guide talked a bit about how they run cuppings at their estate and some basic pointers on how to cup correctly.

Perry and Lindsay were elected to be the official tasters.

One cool cupping technique they showed us, modeled here by Eddie, involved agitating the dry grounds in the cup then slapping your hand over the top of it.  When you lift your hand off, it gives an ultra concentrated whiff.  Cool, thanks R Dalton!

Antigua was beautiful. The streets are all done in pastels and each door is individually designed and incredibly ornate. There are way too many shops to look through in a day.  We settled down into a little restaurant called Frida’s (as in Frida Kahlo) for some great food crazy art.  Then it was back to Guatemala City for our last night.

Eddie took to some of the nicer cafes in Guatemala that night. Among them is Cafe Barista which had a nice ‘hipster’ feel (for Guatemala) and some pretty decent coffee.

I had the espresso which was pleasent.

Apparently they’re pretty hot stuff around these parts.  I saw this sign in one of their cafes in Antigua:

That says “National Champions” if you were wondering

We had another great breakfast at Edwin’s parents house before heading off to the airport.   The Martinez family are probably the most hospitable people you could ever meet not too mention amazing cooks!   We’re definitely indebted to them for giving us such an incredible experience.