Hi everyone, welcome back to the channel. This is my seventh blog post in the series and I have a lot to catch you up on.
It was a very busy printing week at work which kept me going back and forth between the two buildings to post process and gather the parts. I was given several smaller scale quality of life designs to address issues raised by operator and shift supervisors on the manufacturing floor. With my main projects on hold as I wait for raw material quotes and reserve times to test my fixture with operators on the machine, these quality of life designs have been a good opportunity to keep my CAD up to par and do some rapid prototyping with the SLA printer. This upcoming week should be pretty interesting as I am going to observe some work done on the main laser machines used on the floor which should give me a better idea of the steps engineers take to maintain these money making machines and prevent future issues.
Now onto the travel of the week. The 4 of us and two local Costa Rican students traveled to Puerto Viejo in Limon province on the Caribbean side of Costa Rica. We woke up at 4 on Saturday to leave by 5 as the traffic can be very difficult when going over the mountain as our driver explained. Luckily, we did not face too many problems and arrived around 9. We had a tour planned for 11:30 so we walked into town and grabbed some food to chill out and stretch our legs from the long car ride. We took the time to explore a small section of the beach during this time. They were some of the nicest beaches I’ve been to and not crowded at all like in Manuel Antonio. Unfortunately, the currents were pretty dangerous in that section of beach so we did not end up going in at all but the fresh ocean air was still a plus and the views were incredible. At 11:30 we caught a ride to the animal sanctuary a few miles up the road and toured the local animal sanctuary with this great guide who spoke passionately and shared great detail about each animal we encountered. It was amazing to hear of the great work this sanctuary was doing to rehabilitate injured animals brought to them from all over Costa Rica and release them back into the wild or, if unable to survive in the wild anymore, offer them a large habitat to live out their life and become an education tool for the visitors. We saw turtles, a cayman, a crocodile, parrots and macaws, tucans, owls, sloths, deer, boar, snakes, and spider monkeys (I am missing a bunch but you get the gist of the extent of the sanctuary). That night, we had a fun dinner at the local restaurant outside our hotel and woke up early the next morning to see one of the most beautiful sunrises on the beach at 5 am. We promptly went back to bed for some zzz’s before packing up and traveling to our final event of the weekend, a chocolate tour at a local cacao farm. The guide, a Scottish lady, had been producing chocolate for 17 years on the farm after she left left the states. She was very passionate about the craft and gave a captivating speech about the cacao tree and the history of the farm dating back to the Spanish settlers who planted all the cacao trees found in Costa Rica today hundreds of years ago. After the tour, she took us through the whole process of chocolate making from roasting the raw beans harvested from the pods on the trees to remove moisture, to the deshelling and grinding process, to mashing the chocolate nibs from the cacao beans in a large press that uses friction to melt the chocolate into that oozing goodness which goes on to make all sorts of sweet goodness. We even had the chance to make some of our very own chocolate snack using molds and the very chocolate harvested on the farm. It was a wonderful experience and something I recommend if you are ever visiting the area. After that, we packed into the car and headed back to town for a quick lunch where I finally tasted the famous Caribbean rice and beans and it did not disappoint. It may become my go to at any restaurant I visit from now on. That’s a wrap on week 7 folks, only three weeks left but I still have some exciting trips planned so stay tuned. Pura Vida!
