We booked a tour from Australia via email, communication was amazing and David answered all of our questions easily and in depth. Leading up to our arrival in Peru David and I communicated via whatsapp. It turned out the farms we were supposed to be visiting were no longer available for the tour, which was a little upsetting but within a day David had arranged another type of tour. When we arrived in Cusco David met us at our hotel and talked to us about what we would see and where we would visit. David was flexible with pick up points too and we arranged for the pick up in Ollantaytambo instead of Cusco. Omar was our guide for the tour and we had a driver as well, he was on time to pick us up and the car was very comfortable for our drive to Quillabamba (approximately 4.5 hours through different altitudes, we had altitude sickness tablets which helped). We checked into our hotel and then headed to a co-operative, called Kampaq which processed cacao & coffee beans from local farmers, the visit of the factory was very informative, the manager shared lots of information about the fermentation & roasting process. After this we were taken to a farm in Echarati at the start of the Amazon. Mario was the farmer and he took us around the farm, showing us all of his cacao trees and the different varieties, we tried fresh cacao pulp (which is delicious, a bit of a passion fruit taste), he showed us his citrus and coffee trees as well as his beehives. We then made hot chocolate by roasting cacao beans, then peeling the skin, then grinding into a paste and then adding water and honey to make a liquid. At the end his whole family came out and we drank the hot chocolate all together, it was fantastic. After the tour I was feeling a bit unwell so when we got back to Quillabamba Omar took us to the chemist and helped me buy medicine as I don't speak Spanish, then the 3 of us went out for a very nice dinner together. We would highly recommend the tour, it was definitely a highlight of the time spent in South America. A big thank you from Patrick & Keva
