Finca Selva Negra
Wednesday, February 13th, 2008The next day I hop on a bus headed further up the mountains towards jinotega for a day trip to La Selva Negra, spanish for The Black Forest. The bus lets me off about ½ way, next to a rusting military tank and a sign for La Selva Negra. I snap a few photos of some boys playing on the tank and head down the road pointing to the Finca. Finca is “farm” in Spanish, btw, and La Selva Negra is an organic, shade-grown coffee farm started in the 1880 by german immigrants who were invited by the Nicaraguan government to grow coffee and help get a coffee industry started.
Their techniques are extremely eco-friendly but even more impressive is the vast acreage (over ½ of the finca) that is covered with virgin rainforest. They have wonderfull trails that criss-cross it and one can stay there in chalets for a bit more money than I wanted to spend given my recent splurges, or pay just $1.25 to have access to the finca and trails. Both matagalpa and jinotega are short bus rides away and have decent accommodations.
I must admit that I was uncharacteristically careless when noting the trails I wanted to take. I knew there were no “looped” trails and that one needed to meet up with other trails to make it back. After poking around the finca for a bit I started my hike around 10:30 and for the next few hours soaked up the lovely green forest and listened to the howler monkeys. I needed a recharge of green and I had forgotten that once again. This was green like I hadn’t seen since costa rica. Then I started to wonder if I was going the right way. Was the trail I was on meeting up with the right trail? There were not printed maps, only a picture on the wall. Often I’ll snap a photo with my point-and-shoot in these situations so I can zoom in and refer to it later, but I was not that smart this time.
I knew I could back-track and find my way, but that would put me out there later than I wanted considering how early the sun goes down in these valleys. So I continued on, trusting my sense of direction and promising to be more careful in the future. Indeed I made it back, feeling invigorated and fortunate. While waiting at the road for the bus I had a nice chat with Alex, a young writer for Rough Guide and unbeknownst to him he gave me my first English conversation in days. A little “laniape” :).
Peggy Rehm