Producer: Pepe Jijon Farm: Finca Soledad Location: Intag Valley, Imbabura Province Variety: Sidra Process: Wave Washed Altitude: 1,550 masl Fermentation ▪▫▫▫ Sweetness ▪▪▪▫▫ Acidity ▪▪▫▫▫ Roast ▪▪▫▫▫ Finca Soledad is the patriotic project of Seven Summiteer and 1st generation specialty coffee producer Jose Ignacio “Pepe” Jijon. In the early 2000s, Pepe solo cimbed the highest peak in each of the seven continents — conquering Mount Everest as the 7th summit — as a salute to mother nature and a tribute to his homeland, Ecuador. He is esteemed as the first South American to have done so. Through that extreme, athletic feat, Pepe aimed to inspire the youth to make their country proud through worthwhile pursuits that show reverence for nature and showcase the tenacity of the human spirit. He aspires to enduringly achieve this same aim through Finca Soledad’s focus on careful cultivation and mindful processing only of rare varieties. These days, and for the last 15 years, he’s been working toward the same aim through the famed Finca Soledad in the remote Intag Valley of the northerly Imbabura province. It’s his family’s artisanal farm where all intentions and energies focus on producing the purest possible expressions of terroir and rare coffee varieties, Typica Mejorado and Sidra, both indigenous to Ecuador, and suitably acclimatized Geisha — in ways most respectful of the environment and rewarding for the people involved in cultivating and processing. In the world of coffee, he is most admired for his humility, vision, and tenacity, having sought the counsel of the most seasoned producers and persisting in coffee farming amid the overlapping socio-economic challenges in the country's agricultural sector. Through Finca Soledad, with its focus on artisanal production of only rare varieties — Geisha, Sidra, and Typica Mejorado — mindfully processed into the purest possible expressions of terroir and variety, in Pepe’s own words, “irreplicable expressions of time and space.” In receiving Sprudge Magazine’s 2023 Notable Coffee Producer Sprudgie Award, he highlighted how coffee “has been harder than climbing than Mount Everest.