# @danbuettner on Instagram

- **Type:** Video
- **Original URL:** https://www.instagram.com/p/DcRM6E4RBun
- **Gondola URL:** https://gondola.cc/posts/69305746-danbuettner-instagram
- **Thumbnail:** https://img.gondola.cc/tr:w-,h-,fo-auto/postThumbnails/b6609cfdde.jpg
- **Posted:** 2026-08-20T16:36:40.000+00:00
- **Account Owner:** Dan Buettner (@danbuettner) — https://gondola.cc/danbuettner

## Caption

I first met Panchita when she was 100. She was swinging a machete.

Francisca Castillo raised four children largely on her own, took care ofher parents, and woke every morning to put on a carnival dress and eat breakfast with her son Tommy, who was in his eighties. Black beans, a corn
tortilla, habanero peppers, black coffee. Then she’d sweep her front porch and wait for the first of her morning visitors.

After she appeared in my first book she captured the world’s imagination: the centenarian who wielded a machete on Oprah and an axe for NBC. But that
was never really the reason. People fell in love with her warm heart, her generosity, her simple goodness.

I asked her for her secret. “No secret,” she told me. “God decides all.”

She approached the world like a fiesta. She was a great inspiration to me personally in writing Blue Zones, and I know she inspired many more around the world.

She passed away in December 2016, at 110.

#bluezones #bluezoneskitchen #bluezonesdiet #costarica #nicoya centenarian
badasswomen powerfulwomen longevity liveto100

## Stats

- **Views:** 12,180
- **Likes:** 1,707
- **Shares:** 0
- **Comments:** 45

## Tags

bluezones, bluezoneskitchen, costarica, nicoya, bluezonesdiet

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