After the mud had settled from the morning. We made our way to the Acosta family finca. The headquarters of the finca is a small thatched shelter at the corner of the property, nestled up against a sugar cane field for protection. Looking out form the shelter you can see the finca spread before you with about 50 acres of rolling pasture that then abruptly rises onto, perhaps another 50 acres of a small mountain. See the group of pictures titled “Finca”. There are about 30 head of cattle, two horses and a colt there and when we arrived they were all up on the mountain.
The first order of business was for the two hired hands to set off with Captain (Cappie), the dog, to round up the cattle. This is the very same dog who wakes me up almost every night about 3:00 AM with the loudest bark I have ever heard. Well, that day he redeemed himself in my eyes. He got half the heard off the mountain and into the corral near the thatched shelter so fast I could not believe it. It was truly a thing of beauty to see. The two vaqueros were on foot and they would call out to him, he would look, they would raise an arm and he would go in that direction and contain the cattle and move them toward the corral. Most of the time he did not need any instructions, he would see where the cattle needed to be turned and do it himself. If the cattle were not moving to his satisfaction he would bite them on the back of the leg and that was sufficient encouragement for them move faster. He would range back and forth from one side of the heard to the other, barking the entire time, biting when necessary and loving his work.
While all of this was going on, Javier was sitting back at the headquarters talking to his friends, who had begun to arrive. Javier always seems to be surrounded buy friends and family during his free time. They are constantly in and out of the house and apparently the finca also. The gentleman farmer was preparing identification tags to put into the ears of the cattle while he talked in Spanish about a lot of things with his friends that I did not understand. In the corral the two vaqueros were getting the first four cattle to be tagged into a chute. Once Javier was ready, he strolled over to the chute with his friends and the vaqueros began to restrain the head of the first cow to be tagged. It was not an easy task, but once it was done Javier reached into the chute, took the cows ear and speared the tag through it with a small instrument that is similar looking to a large pair of channel grips. The process was repeated over and over until the first half of the heard had been tagged. It was brutal, hot, dirty work for the two vaqueros to get the cows into the chute and restrain them and the process took two or three hours. Even Javier was not immune to the rigors of the work. At one point his arm was in an unfortunate location at the rear end of a cow while he was putting a tag in the ear of another. To his credit, he never so much as flinched as the back of his arm was covered with...cow manure. Once the first half of the heard was tagged and placed in a separate chamber of the corral, I had the pleasure of watching Cappie work the second half of the heard into the corral for tagging. Another two or three hours and the work was complete and all of the cattle were released.
While all of this was going on Cha Che was cooking a meal over an open fire under the shelter. I have to tell you once again, there is no bad food in Panama. This was a gourmet meal of some kind of spiced rice and chicken (from scratch, not out of a box) along with sweet plantas that were almost like dessert if they were eaten last; and of course cervezas for the adults and what ever for the ninos.
Soon the sun began to move behind the mountain and the gentleman farmer and his friends broke camp and turned toward Panama City.
The relationship between the vaqueros and Javier is an interesting story. Perhaps I'll have time to tell it before the week is up.
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