I have a confession: I took 443 pictures this past weekend. Mostly just Saturday. I promise I will not post all of them. I promise I will try to use them judiciously and in place of copious words. Whew! I feel better.
OK...ready...set...Go!
This is a field of tea, early in the morning when it was still cloudy and misty. And beautiful.
This is Fiona, the owner. Her grandfather came to Kenya in the late 1800's and accomplished many things. He built a girls' school, a church and the Tea Farm. They originally had 350 acres of tea. It looked like this:
The first tea was brought to Kenya because Indians (from India) were contracted to build the railway system, and they liked to have tea! A few sample trees were brought along and planted as an experiment.
This is one of the old, original small leaf tea trees in flower.
The flower forms a seed, but nowadays they make new bushes from cuttings, not the seeds.
The tea is planted in rows that grow together at the tops because they are constantly pruned. They are kept pretty low for easy picking and are cut back to 22 inches every four years to keep things in check.
The new growth is harvested every 14-21 days by hand. You pick the bud of a new leaf and the next two leaves keeping the bit of stalk with it.
Tea is a great cash crop because it can be harvested 365 days a year. Coffee only comes in twice a year.
So these leaves are picked by hand, sorted for quality, taken to the nearby tea factory and processed into tea as we know it in 24 hours. You have to have a factory nearby because the tea making process must start within hours of being picked.
The process sorts out the softest and best bits from the most fibrous and makes several grades of tea. If you get Pekoe Tea, you have the best bits. Cheaper teas are made by mixing in the stalky and veiny parts.
Their tea becomes black tea during processing, but you could make green tea out of it just using a different processing method.
Either way, it's a beautiful way to make a living!
