Pirates of the Caribbean

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It's been a long time coming, but finally...photos will be on their way...... one day!


Ah, another bus journey...you know when you've had enough as your socks get stuck to the cuts and open wounds of your feet, it's freezing cold, I'm curled in a very small ball, could probably fit into a womb, my I-pod has run out, feel very empty, gritty eyed and sapped of any energy. Perfect timing to be deposited at a random bus station at 3am in Cali.
With no money, we luckily shared a taxi with 2 sweet girls from Denmark, who also had a reservation at a hostel. Unfortunately said reservation no longer existed as we bellowed out from the street to wake the hostel up. Not a good start.
Had to drive around until we eventually found one room with 2 beds, that we piled into and crashed out.

We parted ways with the girls the next morning, deciding to give Cali a miss as walking around we'd got a vibe that quite frankly suggested that all the loony dregs of society had been scooped up and told to wander the streets of Cali, creeping out any Gringos. So far, disappointment as we so wanted to love Colombia, but our hearts were already missing Ecuador.

So, in hope we headed for the Coffee growing region, at least this should be good. We stayed at Plantation House in Salento, run by a fellow Englishman, Tim with his young family and dogs. They were so welcoming friendly and helpful. Good recommendation from our friend Danny, even if an unexpected small grizzly child was thrown in for free, the constant coffee made up for it! Unfortunately it was bloody cold. Had to dig out all my layers and brave the rain, in which there was a power cut, we got lost temporarily and I again had an issue with our door, locking it when there was no key to re-open it...ooopps, involved a bit of a trial to find the set of skeleton keys up in Tim's house.....
Actually slept so well, exhausted I think and wrapped in a coccoon of sheets and blankets, until silence was broken by aforementioned imp of grizzly evil. Explored the cute artesanal craft shops, seemingly incongruous in such a empty, non-touristy town. We walked to a Coffee Plantation, through beautiful green scenery, blanketed forest hills and after several false trails, found the Plantation. A bit of a random approach to tourism, we seemed to disturb a man from his work to take us around the site, telling us the varieties of coffee bean and pointing things out. All rather interesting and of course a free sample was delivered at the end, to entice you to buy it. It was actually very bitter, thus we didn't buy it, which is always a little awkward and so made a hasty leave. Bah, not even the coffee is any good...Sarah and I soon formed a negative opinion of this country and everything in it with a four lettered derrogative. Spent the afternoon playing with the most adorable German Shepherd puppies that ranked highly on the cuteness scale. Puppy dogs make even the greyest of days good.

We left the next day, regardless of the cloud forest that promised to be a nice yet muddy walk, to go to Cartegena. Had a bit of a wait all day for the bus and had to spend the day avoiding weird people, honestly, you'd think there had never been foreigners in Colombia before.
Arriving late at night in a bit of a shady part of town it was nice to have some help from a relatively sane man to get to a hostel as he didn't like the idea of us roaming around. We had to trust somebody, but it's always a little bit in my mind that we're being lured into a false sense of security like in the Scary Movies, but anyway, we found a hole to crawl into, which we promptly crawled out of the next morning in search of somewhere a little more liveable. We treated ourselves to luxury air con, a necessity in this humid city and to make up for Sarah's disappointment so far at not seeing Michael Douglas or Romance in the Stone paraphenalia.
We wandered the old city which was a scene of beautiful, colourful buildings with a caribbean vibe, wih music and people filling the streets lined with stalls. I actually saw a buxom lady carrying a tropical exotic mix of fruits on top of her braided head. Perfect.
It's the only place so far though at night, that feels a little bit shady, probably because we are always warned about Colombia and Cartegena being a notoriously risky place and maybe also because our haven of a hostel was also a brothel, pay for by the hour kind of place. We became the longest residents there and were always greeted with a cheeky wink. (Sorry Sarah, I don't want your Grandma's suspicions raised again!).
Whilst in Cartegena we took a trip out to the mud volcano. It was a drama to get there, involving a thigh work out on a motorbike, me sweatily sandwiched in the middle, clenching my thighs around the poor driver holding onto Sarah's knees for dear life, just like the good old days of Asia. The mud volcano is so bizarre, at only 15 metres high, we walked to the top and peered in the little crater that was filled with clay like consistancy mud. So in we stepped to join a man and his young daughter . It is practically bottomless, well, way deep, but impossible to sink. In fact so hard that said man decided to dunk me, as Sarah failed. That's right, fully immerse me under the thick goop, so I couldn't see, hear or breathe as gloopy mud filled every orifice. As I emerged, like newborn larvae wriggling in a mud puddle I realised a man who manned the mud activity, was clearing my eye sockets and ears out for me. It was hilarious. I temporarily turned into Morph, from Hart Beat. So we blobbed about for a time before a coach load of people came and suddenly it all got a bit claustrophobic. Had to be ferried across and yanked out, with a bikini pantful of gloop to dump before trying to negotiate the slippery tree house like ladder out. Then walking like we'd cacked ourelves we made it to the lagoon to try and cleanse. Easier said than done. I had mud in my ears for days afterwards and my once pink bikini turned grey...forever. Fun though.
A drama as always with transport, no bus came for ages, we ended up waiting near one of many army dudes that line the roads, complete with a mother of a gun. He flagged down a random car and insisted that we get in it. I wasn't going to argue and certainly the man in the car wasn't. He was going to Cartegena though and was really very nice, a random Phil Collins fan we were hostages to listen to him warble away as a price for a free ride back! I think I was supposed to thank army dude with a date, but alas, numbers were never exchanged...

An early start, we tried to go to Playa Blanca, the very popular beautiful white sandy Caribbean beach that postcards boast and the phrase tropical paradise was invented for, but being one of the 10 Public Bank holidays a month (yeah, that's right) it was exceptionally busy and expensive, so we went to Santa Marta on the coast instead. Poor common man's equivalent. Had a shit scary ride along the high winding coastal route in an open minibus, I could practically tear grass out of the cliffs as we sped , the guy was an absolute maniac.
We stayed in the pleasant seaside village of Taganga, a few miles away from the bigger city (apparently one of the most corrupt in Colombia). It was so chilled and secluded in a calm cove. We ended up in a cute little hostel run by a little doddery man and his wife who seemed to adopt us as their grandchildren. They even had a parrot that roamed around and took the mickey out of our laughs.
Our priority whilst here was to book a tour to The Lost City....a 5 day trek through the Colombian jungle to some ruins. Exciting adventures lay ahead for a few days´time. Meanwhile we went diving, which was really nice, but unfortunately no seahorses. The divemaster that knows where they are was away on holiday, typically but was getting back later that same day!! Bah!! It was a really good couple of dives though, the coral is colourful and the group were really nice. Even if our Dive master was as vacant as a blocked toilet.
Discovered that Taganga is the home of THE most delicious iced drinks ever....I became a regular addict to iced coffee and oreo cookie shakes....imagine that. We bumped into the couple of girls from Denmark, who we´d shared rooms with in Cali. Always a small world when you´re travelling. It was so nice to actually go in the sea and be able to swim without fear of the bikini being ripped away by aggressive waves. We had been invited by our dive group to a Pirate party one night. So we´d gone into town and found a seconds shop and bought big, white billowing shirts and Sarah actually got some boots!! They were so ideal. Not sure who they belonged to previously, but tried not to think of this and looked past the stains on the shirts... Anyway, our hostel had livened up with the return of a group of lads from the Lost City trek who were also pirated up. We actually looked pretty good, complete with black bandana and Johnny Depp´s Jack amounts of eyeliner. We tried to get the parrot to come on our shoulder, but it wasn´t having it. Unfortunately we arrived at the party's end....quite a lame party and rather disappointing, but we enjoyed dressing up anyway. Though we did get many strange looks whilst waiting in a queue in the shop, making it onto someone´s camera phone.... Typically the divers informed me that day they had seen 2 seahorses!!!Bah!

The Lost City
Before we knew it, The Lost City trek had arrived!! We were both somewhat nervous and a bit reluctant to do it, but everyone who´d been recommended and loved it. We were able to leave our things at our hostel as we´d return anyway and were picked up in a multi coloured open sided jungle jeep. We collected a very enthusiastic Chris from Holland and were a little concerned it´d just be the 3 of us as we´d not seen any other names on the list!! Luckily another 3 came aboard - Stephanie from France, but living in Brazil, travelling with Sean and Wayne from Ireland. We had a 3 hour drive to the starting village of Manay. The last hour and a half was one of the scariest ever, the road was so potholed, a dried up riverbed I think, that was on a cliff edge to a jungle abyss below and I couldn´t sit up any further than horizontal. It was tough and a couple of times logs had to be hacked with a machete the chef was carrying.
After arriving amazingly in one piece, we had lunch before starting off in the blistering heat on our easy afternoon of 3 hours walking. It was so tough though, an uphill slog all the way, that pushed my lunch somewhere up in my throat, passing returning trekkers that didn´t look too happy or cheerful. Now seriously regretting our choice to come. However, we were surrounded by beautiful countryside and hazy mountains lit by the sun. We passed a major army camp and had our bags inspected, not intirely sure what for...I think it´s just to give them something to do. Military patrol the entire area now as this was notoriously dangerous and at the Lost City itself are 140 army soldiers for presence if anything, as some tourists were kidknapped at the camp there....hence not ever telling anyone about this plan beforehand.
Arriving at camp for 4.30pm we headed straight for the waterfall pool. It was refreshing to say the least, I think I got body shock and having not really thought about how to get back out we had to clambour up the slippery rocks with a rotting rope for help...bruised and battered already by day 1. It was early but dark, making card playing quite difficult, so we collapsed into hammocks we´d put up under a roof. I fell asleep wrapped in heavy blankets listening to a lullaby of frogs, toads and crickets...lullably my arse...
So the next 3 days saw us in a routine of waking with the sunrise, always having scrambled eggs it seemed and walking for mere moments before sweating for the duration. Whenever rivers were passable we went in to cool down. We passed indigenous villages, where the people wear white robe like clothes and gum boots. All very short, but stocky and not that friendly to be honest, maybe they get tired of tourists always photographing them, I know we do, which is why we don´t. Evenings were spent playing shithead, well, the 3 boys would have championships, but if Sarah ever played she always won. Stephanie and I invented waxball- slightly Joey-esque, but a classic game that I simply must put forward to Olympic organisers.
Poor Sean had such awful blisters that he actually had to test the theory that sanitary towels are used by the army to line their boots, and prevent blisters getting worse, it cushions the area as you can imagine. Unfortuanately having had to endure the embarrasssment of asking for these items and sticking them to his feet, they weren´t holding up all that well.
Sarah also revealed her secret at getting bum rage, a feeling that many I´m sure can relate to, but never knew that´s what it was...the annoyance at going uphill continuously and not being able to go any faster and getting an achiness to the glutes and thighs...
We were also all on tick surveillance, as we'd been warned that they were rife...ah, the bane of my life next to leeches!

The day came when we arrived at Ciudad Perdido, having had to cross the river 8 times and walk barefoot through the forest edge...made no difference to me, I actually prefer it, as my boots died anyway with a three inch frayed lace and rip around the front....see previous Machu Picchu entry for photo proof...yes Hi Tech...you let me down when I needed you most!! Unfortunately I crushed my barefoot between 2 rocks in the river and to this day, it is still swollen and painful, splintered bones to the little toe I think. Anyway, the finale of tiredness came as we had to climb 2,000steps, as montiored by Sarah our counting expert. It was really very pretty, like a lush Buckinghamshire forest with overgrown mossy tree trunks and stone steps disappearing above us.

The Lost City itself is smaller than I thought it would be being really overgrown and ideal for hide and seek..I would imagine. Beautifully tranquil and a haven amongst the forest. Stephanie and I were invited up to the army base camp. We were welcomed literally with open arms, though they are so young it´s scary, between 15 and 22 mostly, all equipped with big mother guns and hand grenades. They spent about 3 months there and bless, must get bored out of their minds, so any company is pounced upon. Within moments the music was cranked up and invites of dancing were being offered. Hilarious.
We went for a swim in one of the river pools nearby after a tour of the city and soon we were all sprawled out drying in the sun lounging on the rocks, sucking lollipops whilst guarded by army dudes. Wayne took this opportunity to demonstrate his knowledge of the guns and Stephanie and I took the opportunity to pose with them. So bizarre.
We had numerous games of shithead and tried to carve rings out of hard little nuts, a pastime that the army boys had got good at.
So having spent a day there, we had only one way back, the same as we had gone. By now my blisters were filling with river water, practically weighing me down and the steps were so slippery it was hard going downhill. Poor Sarah fell a few times, once badly and so was having to use a stick to help her hobble down.
Had the oddest breakfast ever, toasted cheese sandwiches with pineapple jam....the jam made it better surprisingly. Sarah discovered a tick on her and in checking, so had I....gross. We took only 2 days to get back, as one of the days was 7 hours long. It was tough, but loved it, and now I see why the people we passed on that first day looked quite miserably knackered. However, we had such a nice group of people which made it all the more enjoyable. I'd only failed in my quest to get an army cap. We waited for our return jungle jeep bringing the next lot of eager walkers, some of whom were totally ignorant as to what lay ahead, I think perhaps the Primark pyjama guy and the baby oiled gel hair gym buff come to mind...he'd asked if I'd got into any bare knuckle fights... and shooting off guns. Me? Of all people, I obviously looked like the prime candidate with major violent tendancies. Had a major bumpy ride back, this time stones and rocks were chiselled out of our path. We picked up a certain Carmen Roderiguez on the way, who took a shine to Chris, re named Greg O'Reilly, by his fellow Irishmen, it was hilarious.
We were warmly welcomed back by our hostel family, perhaps regretably kissed and hugged by the old chap, as we stank. We stayed in Taganga for another few days to relax and I'd decided as I'd got the deal that if I went diving again I would be guaranteed to see seahorses, or my money back!!! What an offer! You can't say much fairer than that. So, I reluctantly left Sarah as her hip and foot were too fragile for diving. I buddied up with the divemaster Jahani and there was another couple from England, Tony and Louise. On the first dive, we saw 2 seahorses!!! I couldn't believe it, my dream had finally come true. My quest for finding them in open water had been completed! I was stoked. They are really quite weird though, just rocking back and forth in some prehistoric little trance, they actually look a little bit dead, or ancient at any rate, but so fragile and delicate. I love them.
On the second dive I saw 4, even spotting one on my very own, hidden amongst the seaweed. They really are incredible and so camouflaged. Lucky girl, as party Dutch would say aka Greg aka Chris.
Had a bit of a scare on our return back in the boat, as a report came through on the radio that a boy was lost somewhere out by the rocks. My heart was racing as we went over to investigate but when we couldn't see anything we headed back to shore, and I was thinking, hey, surely we have to look harder....realising then, it was a missing buoy.....oh, the drama.

We spent a day visiting the National Park of Tayrona, a rather tedious bus ride away, then a motorbike ride, followed by an hour's walk through the jungle to get to the shore, but oh so worth it. This was true Caribbean proper, the typical Bounty Ad, swaying palm tree front cover of any Sandals Mag. So gorgeous. We tried to snorkel, but the cheapy crappy thing was really crap and with a slight wave upon the ocean I had my yearly quota of salt for sure. Stayed til we were the last ones there and it began to get dark and soon found ourselves the complicated task of getting back to Taganga having to wait ages for buses that got searched at every army checkpoint and then to find it wasn't even going to Taganga and we had to walk along the dusty highway until a taxi was the only alternative. Rah!!! Not a perfect end to a perfect day.

Sadly we left Taganga to go back to Cartegena, meeting a nice guy Jason, from Arizona, on our chicken stinking and clucking bus-that's right, they were piled right behind us, cock-a-doodle-dooing for 4 hours, saturating us in their stench. Home from home though Sarah, Stewkley aroma?! We took him under our wing (pun intended) and returned to our whore hostel. Being the first time that a guy had arrived with 2 girls, Jason received the Lucky Guy look from the staff, struggling then to ask for 2 rooms.
Only staying for one night, we got up tres early to get the boat to Playa Blanca as we'd missed it last time. Ended up taking the slightly sketchier choice of local canoe boat transport, ferrying various goods as opposed to the tour boat and lunch. Well, more real and authentic and cheaper of course. The phrase "Half the fun is getting there" could not be more wrong. So we sat at 7am in a slightly larger than canoe sized boat, cramped between cargo, fish bodies, chairs and people, sitting...waiting....sitting...hoping and praying we may leave the filthy stench of the scavenger birds picking out debris, or perhaps us if we stayed any longer. Finally we sped over to the beach....literally, a beach, a film set strip of white sand fronting the clearest and bluey green sea I had ever seen. With just a few beach shacks and hammocks swinging under eaves, it was like being ship wrecked, seemingly miles from the bustle of Cartegena.
We jumped off the boat into waist deep water, getting soaked and waded towards a friendly looking Mama Ruth and her collection of hammocks and chairs. We changed into bikinis and hit the beach, finally immersing myself into the promised clear waters of the Caribbean that Sarah had long told me about. It was gorgeous and so warm. Donning my very crap, basic snorkel, I started to search the seabed. Within a couple of metres and seconds of getting in, I couldn't believe my eyes, when I saw, clinging to a single blade of seagrass, a little lone seahorse, just rockin away. I was amazed, yet again!! Obviously I had been trained well, I am now a professional Seahorse spotter. Lucky Sarah getting to see one after all. There were loads of huge blazing orange starfish, bright orange and wrasse that look like lollipops. It was great.
We managed to find some bottled water, having been unprepared for food and water, and we were offered Coco Loco, by a random drunk, yeah, the only one on the island and he found us and giggled uncontrollably into his rum filled coconut. Man it was strong andvery rank.
We chilled out on the beach for the rest of the sunshine, but it was soon cut short as the weather turned. We were in for a pretty intense thunderstorm. The sky grew thick and dark with rain, accompanied by impressive lightning and wind. Sheltering under one of the covered tables, it got really quite cold. Not what we signed up for. With nowhere to go and nothing to do, time seemed to drag, we were stranded in paradise but far from it. It's bizarre as you start to feel a bit claustrophobic, even though you have so much freedom and living outside.
The afternoon and evening then seemed to go soooo slow and we decided we'd leave the following morning, but with absolutely no idea how to go about this as no boats had come back to the island and Jason had to catch a plane by lunchtime. We had a better night, as quite a few other travellers seemed to appear, goodness knows where they'd been hiding away, but it made the evening a little more interesting. It then seemed to get lighter as the moon came out and the rain ceased...just in time for bed, where a damp hammock awaited me.
At 6am the next morning, I was woken by Jason, who said a boat was about to leave for Cartegena, our only chance of escape!! So, practically sleep walking, I fell out of my hammock, grabbed my things, along with half the beach and stuffed all into my sodden backpack. Within 2 minutes I was sitting on a boat, alongside Mama Ruth , with a huge fish carcass at my feet. We soon woke up as the rain was providing a free shower and the swell on the waves was quite intense, it was reminiscent of passed boat trips in Asia, where our spines and coccyx became our worst enemies. It was painful and scary. Arriving into the garbagey, death pit of stink and decay surrounded by the freakish birds, we wobbled out of the boat totally salt and sand encrusted feeling as scuzzy as ever. We settled our debts with Mama Ruth and headed for our Brothel Hotel for a shower. Yes, we actually joined the rest of the locals and paid for an hour's use of the hotel room and with all three of us in one room it was funnier still. However, the guy on reception looked more surprised when we did actually insist on having towels for a shower, as that was what we really had come to do!
We bid farewell to Jason and then headed for the station getting a bus bound for Bogota, leaving at 12pm.

Bogota
Ten and a half hours later, we arrived. At first sight, a seemingly standard, grey and sprawling capital, but not as offensive or scary as we had been led to believe, though it did have pockets of putrid smells, to add to the saturation of my already stinky attire. We found our chosen hostel and were welcomed to free Colombian coffee whilst we waited for a room to be ready....we waited ...and waited...and meanwhile, we were reunited with Alonzo, a fellow Machu Picchu trekker from the SAS group, friends with afore-mentioned Gary (who'd loaned me his t-shirts). Such a coincidence.
We were eventually shown into our Nunnery dorm - a basic bunkroom with a window, very humble and very cold. I looked for a candle and Bible and rushes to whip myself with....surprisingly none provided. We spent the afternoon sorting a few things out, with travel plans, which consisted mainly of booking a return flight to Guayaquil for a last week in Montanita!!! Such gluttons for punishment, but with little time left you know, sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name, and they're always glad you came....

Bogota's fresh climate certainly gave the early mornings an English summer's/winter's day feel. We did very little of cultural interest in Bogota, maybe a crime, but we had a really nice few days exploring the Shopping Malls and making a few material investments. It took an age to get to one but with the weather becoming freezing cold and HEAVY rain, it seemed a good way to pass the day.
We did venture out of town to the Salt Cathedral though, a little group of us, including Tyra (Canada), Tristan (Australia), Jasper and Alonzo (Holland) and Laura (UK). Bizarrely, Sarah had met Tristan 4 years ago in Mexico under her alto ego name Tiegan-very amusing to watch the confusion and realisation on Tristan's face as the truth unfolded!!
So the Salt Cathedral - 180 metres underground, a cavernous high ceiling-ed world, with occassional artificial lights illuminating crosses and crucifixes that had been carved from salt and strategically placed throughout. There were salt encrusted stalactites and a wall of what looked like a frozen waterfall of salt crystals. It was very impressive. It certainly inspired much wow-ing.
The next day, after recovering from a night out at a club called " The Cinema", we did actually go to the cinema as it was thrashing it down with rain. Again. With more retail perusal the day was not wasted, but it was horrible waiting for the bus home as we were basically getting wetter than in a shower and so cold.....knowing we were returning to a very uncosy room was no great compensation either. It's at these moments, when we are near to going home, I realise the extra benefits and small comforts that I take for granted, like being able to change into something warm and have carpets and slippers...instead we curled up under our rough straw blankets on our hardboard bunk beds and rocked to sleep shivering.....
At last, a morning greeted us with sunshine!! We made the most of it by walking through town to the artesanal market and stopping via craft stalls en route. As it was a Bank holiday (again), it was very busy with locals. In fact not another gringo in sight around these parts. We knew we were a rare sight, when a man on his bicycle pulled up beside us, at very close quarters and just stared whilst Sarah and I were talking. This was followed by an encounter with another man, that spoke English, saying that we must feel famous and how strange that must be, then offered us out to lunch with his make-believe friend......we fled to the park.
Later that day, I was out for a stroll, when I randomly bumped into Party Dutch!!! He was of course accompanied by his fellow Irish men Sean and Wayne,so we arranged a reunion later. We had a stilted night of bar/club hopping, in order to find some decent music and get Party Dutch to prove his title. Sarah represented the UK and quite frankly robbed Greg of his title. Who knew elctronica techno beats was your thing young lady?!
Our last day had arrived and so we packed, heading for the airport. It really felt like we were going home. I suppose though Montanita was now feeling quite like a second home anyway now. Only an hour's flight, but the best plane food sandwich ever, it deserves to get a mention. Returned to our faithful hostel in Guayaquil for a couple of nights and for some major stinking laundry and blog writing to be done!
We soon found ourselves on the bus to Montanita and going to yet another hostel, the lady remembered seeing us from before and so we got a discount! It promised a hot shower! It was already quite late in the afternoon and we wanted to keep a low profile, mainly in fear of seeing a certain Jean Paul and avoiding other vagrants of society that had previously taken a liking to us. We wandered the beach and noticed how eeriely quiet everywhere was. The weather had got chilly and almost autumnal if such a season was to exist here. It was nice though, as we felt like we were really on holiday. Very English seaside, but man, how are we going to get our tans that we'd planned, spending our last week on the beach ready to return and make everyone jealous??!!! Not so likely now. Still, we weren't fazed. If it's warm enough to sit out then sit out we will. The sea was still warm and we had the beach to ourselves. We took our first brave walk into town and within seconds had been spotted by my chums Cesoa, Voodoo child and Hamilton. Ah home sweet home!!! Such a welcome!
We caught up with most of our local crew and spent a week of dancing, sun bathing (or cloud hopping) and generally enjoying our final week. We were joined by Sean and Wayne, fellow Irishmen and introduced them to the Montanita flava. Two other memorable events included Scuba diving..our last for a while I imagine and not only was the dive itself really good, going through swim throughs like an underwater maze, seeing lots of corals and starfish, but when we were between dives, we were so lucky to see a Humpback calf performing aquabatics! It was so lucky, as the migration of whales isn't due for another few weeks, but rare sightings had been spotted and rumours were about that we might just see one. We've always missed the season before, so it was brilliant we finally got to see one. Fantastic or what?!
Sean and Wayne went paragliding, where you sit with the guide behind you and launch yourself off a cliff to glide along the thermals with the birds. We had a few minutes wait whilst the bus was coming for us and so Sarah and I had a number guessing game, which led to the winner, guessing the number correctly, to have a go for free. Sarah was indeed the lucky girl, but no sooner had she been gliding up in the air, did the winds change and slowly down towards the beach they headed......with a quick landing in the field just by the beach. Nevermind.
On our last night, in between bars, I was spontaneously taken for a spin on a quad bike along the beach which was good fun, until I took to the controls and after bunny hopping through the gears, sped through the sea water, just missing the rocks as the wind caused my eyes to water and my vision had indeed been compromised. It also meant that I looked like I'd just been for a spin on the beach, as the salty spray decorated my legs and top and I had one or two hairs out of place as you can imagine. So glam, but ready to continue our last night out.
Morning came and we sadly packed our backpacks, along with several hundred crickets. We got to the airport for 8pm that night, ready to stay there for our 4am check in. Nice. Had very limited sleep upon the metal grill benches. But we had our own personal body guards that sat on the opposite bench, which was a little unnerving at first, but safety conscious. Sarah woke me from my beach sleep as I stumbled towards check-in in a dazed and unconscious state, to see that although we'd been there all night, hoping to be first in line, an almighty great queue lay ahead of us!!! How did that happen?
So flight to Bogota, via the perfume counter to spritz our still chicken stenching backpacks and selves, then to Bogota. By 8.30 am we were ready and waiting for our flight home due at 9pm. Yes, a long day and by 9am, we had the Colombian flag painted upon our cheeks and were dressing up in Army uniforms as Pilots and Generals for some Army roadshow that was an exhibition in the waiting lounge. Cosmic.
When it finally came to going, we had not one peso on us and as we were checking in when we noticed the airport tax fee. Well, we'd not left and were only in transit, so technically we didn't have to pay, providing we showed proof of our tickets from the previous flight. Typically I'd just cleared out my handbag of any crap and papers/vouchers etc that we no longer needed.....including the old tickets. Why me, why does this kind of thing always happen to me. So off I went, remembering exactly which bin I'd thrown them in and started rooting around at full arms length like birthing a cow with my hand up it's arse, feeling my way through sticky coffee cups, greasy Maccy D's and other generally rank refuse. But damn it, find them I did! I presented said sugary damp encrusted papers at arms length to the lady and saved ourselves a whopping fee. Yes Sarah, I took one for the team there!
So off we went, flying home, leaving our little world of adventures and facing the routine of everyday...not that I'm sad or anything, but what will I do without my right arm gal, how will I function and who will save me from my freaky dreams?

It's been so fantastically amazing, everything I could have wished for and so much more and I thank everyone I met who has made it the experience of a life time and Sarah, I couldn't I have done it without you!
Lucky Girls!

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