I’ve written before about the great farm we get our coffee and macadamia nuts from. Tropical Farm is in Kaneohe and it takes us 30 minutes to drive there but the coffee is so good that we don’t mind. They grow and package all the mac nuts and coffee right there on the farm. Not only do we love the coffee, visiting the farm is always nice because it’s kind of festive and welcoming.
There are always tour buses coming through. And once K and I noticed that they did hourly tours of the farm. While K’s family was here, we took one of these tours.
It was weird! I mean I found it really weird. K thought it was fun. But it made me kind of depressed. Mostly because the performers/tour guides seemed to really be tired of the whole schtick. Imagine giving the same tour 5000 times, growing tired of it, then having to give it another 5000 times. Our tour felt like the one after that.
They drove us around the farm on a little green bus. The farm itself was so beautiful: birds of paradise, guava trees, coconut trees, mangoes…all manner of greenery and fruits. But the little green bus was spewing so much exhaust that I could only smell the fumes. And the driver would drive by long palm fronds that would smack you in the face because there were no windows on the bus. I couldn’t tell if he was doing it to be funny, passive aggressive, or if he just wanted us to feel the like anything could happen.
Next they brought us to a stage/pit. He made fire from rubbing two sticks together and then another guy came out and started doing tricks with the fire. I couldn’t help but wonder what this had to do with coffee or mac nuts. He then showed us how to open a coconut with a sword…actually, a spear then a sword. At one point the fire starter said, ‘I hate my job’. I couldn’t tell if he was joking. And if he was, I don’t know why that’s funny. For the finale we took a twirl around a man made pond on a big boat/canoe.
The guy giving us the tour, despite his traditional polynesian costume, had a whole Benny Hill style act. Lots of innuendo. Which again, I found oddly out of context. I think I would have rather seen the room they pack all the delicious mac nuts in and what measures they take to ensure freshness.
The people on the tour were almost as bad as the tour guides. At one point the tour guide stopped the bus and asked if we knew what a guava was. Duh, who doesn’t know what a guava is??
From the seat behind me a haole says, ‘no’
So the our tour guide hops off the bus to pick us some guava and says, ‘do you want to try guava?’
From the seat behind me haole says, ‘no’
Sheesh. Then why are you here? It was all in all, kind of sad. I kept the guava for awhile. I didn’t eat it. But I like it as a jam. None of this experience changes how I feel about Tropical Farm. I will go there again and again. But I think that they should rethink their tourist offerings.
Three One Nine 