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Published: February 19th 2010
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Lazy Day Yesterday I finished my blog post and I grabbed a bite to eat here at the hostel. And suddenly I was overcome with tiredness. I think I mentioned in a previous post that I've not been sleeping to much - I'm averaging about 4 hours a night since I arrived. I seem to wake up at about 5 and I'm just not able to get back to sleep.
Anyway, despite my best intentions, yesterday I really did nothing of note. Just wandering around the town a bit, but mostly just relaxing at the hostel and recovering a bit. So I didn't get those photos of the government buildings that I promised you yesterday - sorry.
Today is the first time that it's actually rained any significant amount since I arrived. It's a grey old day, that's for sure. Obviously the sky is crying because I'm leaving.
Yep, I'm heading up north to an old colonial town called Villa de Leiva. Apparently it's the place that lots of locals go to at the weekend being, as it is, only a 4 hour coach ride away.
Any way, I can tell you about that tomorrow.
Since I don't
have much to write about regarding yesterday's (lack of) activities, I thought I'd just review my time here in Bogotá and tell you about some things that I was thinking of writing about before but never got around to.
Firstly, I'm sure that you can tell from my previous posts that I've really enjoyed my time here. Bogotá does have a bad reputation and some of it is deserved. It's true that I don't feel overly safe walking around the candelaria district after dark if I'm on my own and that's largely because there are quite a few beggars around and the streets are narrow and dark. But honestly, I've not seen anything bad happen here and I've not spoken to anybody that has seen anything bad happen. My overriding impression of Bogotá will be the friendliness of the people, the pleasant climate and the good memories of the friends that I've made here.
One thing that I have been quite disappointed by is that the night life here isn't really all that. Every time that I went out the bars were basically empty. Now it's true that I've been here during the week and apparently things really
begin to kick off at the weekend. Anyway, there's plenty of time for that sort of thing.
Worthy of mention is the hostel where I'm staying - The Cranky Croc. Of course I have nowhere else to compare it to but my nervousness about hostelling totally disappeared as soon as I arrived here. It's really comfortable here - especially considering the price. The hardened traveller might scoff at me, but really I see hostelling as a posher alternative to camping. It's cheap, the people are friendly and it's generally good fun.
That said, I have a private room booked at the next hostel and I'm looking forward to a bit of privacy and to not having to creep around early in the mornings so as not to wake dorm mates.
It occurred to me that I haven't posted any pics of the hostel yet so I'll put some up now. Sorry these aren't great shots - I just sort of ran around first thing this morning snapping away and not really paying much attention to how things turned out - hopefully you can get a bit of a feel for the place, though. (There aren't any photos of the
dorm itself because everybody else was sleeping when I was taking these - I thought it might be considered a bit rude).
OK, this bit you shouldn't read if you've just eaten or about to eat. I'm going to mention it because it's something that I wasn't expecting at all so might serve as an early warning to first time travellers like me.
The thing is that, in the hostel, there are signs in all the toilets that say "don't flush toilet paper down the toilet - please use the bin"!!! USE THE BIN??? I really couldn't believe it. But apparently it's not all that unusual in hostels in this part of the world. Ordinarily I would say something like "picture the situation" but I urge you not to! But the first time I saw it I thought "I'm not sure that I can actually do this". It just felt so so so wrong. But I didn't want to be the one responsible for pools of water on the floor so I just sort of did it. And the funny thing is that now, I don't even think twice about it. I know, I know, it sounds horribly unhygenic.
But the bins are emptied frequently and, interestingly, I've never noticed a bad smell...
I was really unsure about whether or not to post this. But this is a warts and all blog, so that's one of the warts!
Right, I'm going to crack on - need to find a bus station. I'll let you know how it goes.
Hasta luego.
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anita
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Warts
Thanks for the bog update LOL.. Luckily I had just eaten LOL.. The hostel looks really nice. I too have pre set ideas about hostels but actually, after staying in a few in Derbyshire, my opinion changed overnight. Love the name Cranky Croc. Is that cause it's run by an Aussie?