Colombia: better late than never?
Well, it has been quite some time since our last blog entry. We have all kinds of good excuses for this, but if we are diligent about getting our last few months summarized, I think it will all make sense. So, let me set about doing a bit of that.
We last left off on our arrival in Popayan, Colombia on the 27th of July. We took a few quiet and restful days walking the streets of this city with white buildings, a few cute little old bridges, and a beautiful church with dome visible from the wonderful rooms in our hostel.
We then proceeded by a long overnight bus to Bogota, the capital of Colombia. We often find that long distances (over 12 hours) are most often serviced by overnight buses with reclining seats and the thought that folks will sleep away the trip. Will and I often find this last part to be a bit hard. The buses often make stops during the night, and manage to find all the best bumps in the road. So, on this occasion we found ourselves particularly tired and the next few days in Bogota went along at a sedate rate.
We stayed near the old Candelaria section of town that was simply gorgeous and were happy to wander the streets, looking at old buildings. We also visited the Gold Museum and an art museum focused mainly on art donated by the famous Colombian artist Fernando Botero, which included many of his works.
Following these few days we traveled to Medellin, Colombia. Along the way, the terrain changed from the Andes we'd been so used to seeing on our trip so far to estancias with strange looking cows milling about among palm trees.
We'd been looking forward to our visit to Medellin so much because we stayed with a very good friend of our friends the Snyders, named Susana. Spending time with her, her beautiful and precocious boys, and her wonderful sister and getting to meet the beautiful city of Medellin was a breath of fresh air: the kind that comes from getting know someone fun and wonderful and finding goodness in the world. Plus, their restaurant Le Coq is awesome.
We next traveled to Cartagena de los Indies, on the Caribbean coast. This old city, with history of the Spanish navy and pirates and gold, was a gem. We spent the sweltering afternoons napping and drinking cold drinks.
And also playing in tunnels. Castillo San Felipe de Brajas was one of the Spanish fortifications that has tons of tunnels that are open to tourists. Since climbing trees isn't quite as easy as it used to be, there really isn't much better than a good spooky tunnel to make me feel like I am 8 years old again! But, in the end, I was the one who finally wanted to turn back. Will was all for sloshing through some slimy water using the flashlight on the handle of the umbrella to light our way!
We followed along the Caribbean coast to the town of Santa Marta, arriving in a torrential downpour amid flooded streets. We stayed a great hostel called Brisa Loca with very helpful staff, a gorgeous pool, rooftop deck and tons of folks on holiday, or traveling before heading back to university. Santa Marta was also our jumping off point to visit Tayrona National Parque and sleep on the beach in hammocks for a few nights. Due to the rain, we settled on just one night. As we entered the park we had to let the police search our packs, but since we only had our daypacks with us, this didn't take long. They were very curious, however, about the small wooden box Will had in his pack. When the police opened it to find a beautiful grooming kit from Brooks Brothers, I smiled, looked at Will and said, “muy especial, no?” The guard laughed and wished us a good day. Will did not apologize for his fondness for good grooming. We hiked through jungle, seeing monkeys, and strange and beautiful trees and creatures like blue crabs scurrying into their holes. We then came out from the trees onto some of the most gorgeous stretches of beach that I have ever seen. We walked along the beach until we came to a campground. The place was amazing and we swam and sat in awe for a day. The system of registering campers was ridiculous and left us in a tent after the hammocks had filled up.
We headed back to Santa Marta, but only after stopping at small kiosk Panaderia where we ate the most amazing version of a pan au chocolate that either of us had ever had. Amazing. Then we made a change in our plans. We decided against proceeding to Venezuela. Our primary interest was in one region in the southeast area of the country where Salto Angel falls are. But given some advice from travelers and some additional online research, we decided that it might not be worth the trouble. So, we had to get onto a plane for the first time in our journey and we get ourselves to the Amazon! We took three separate connecting flights to do this (angering me even more that not only did we have to contribute to massive carbon emissions by taking one plane, but 3!) on the 15th of August and arrived in Manaus, Brazil late that night. (Will still did not apologize for his fondness for grooming when the carry on bag containing said important sharp objects became an issue with airport security. Fortunately for all concerned, the grooming kit was not confiscated.)
