Blogs from Bogota, Colombia, South America - page 53

Dear all, I wish I had something fascinating to report about my latest travel. I will say this, Bogota is far different than the last few places I've been, namely Maputo, Lilongwe, and Dar es Salam. For example, Bogota has electricity and water 24 hours a day, every day. And while there were a few similarities, such as men with guns, the difference in Bogota was this - I actually believe that these were loaded AKs and not left over from the Soviet Union. Let me back up first. After a terrible flight - spending the night in Atlanta (oh wait, that wasn't terrible, I had banana pudding with Nila wafers, sweet tea, collard greens, cabbage, heaven, sheer heaven), but the trouble came from Delta refusing to claim responsibility, as my ticket was through Continental, and ... read more

(August 22, 2007 through August 30, 2007) I left midday for Bogotá on Wednesday August 22; the plane ride of under thirty minutes was not even long enough for me to get a nice nap before meeting up with Janneth and her family. Earlier I woke up feeling sick not only with a stomach ache, but also with cold like symptoms. Apparently, most of the members at my sister's household also woke up with the same symptoms. The problem was blamed on eating lentils, with pork, too late the night before. Whatever the reason may have been, I had a continuous runny nose and uncontrollable sneezing during my eight days in Bogotá. It was the first time I had visited the capital, and I was much more excited for other reasons than to explore this city ... read more

We landed at El Dorado International airport in Bogota at 8:30pm We are finally here! After months of waiting I am in Colombia! Me and my friends, Sam, AJ and Yune were all excited! Our friends in Bogota, Daniel and Alejandra picked us up. We checked in at the Casablanca Hotel Casablanca Hotel which is near the Zona Rosa area. its a very nice hotel, in a very nice area. The staff was very friendly. Its about $35 USD per night. I highly recommend this place. Its walking distance from restaurants, banks, and shops. We unpack and got ready for the night while Daniel and Alejandra waited for us in the lobby. We took a taxi to Zona Rosa. Wow, this place is amazing! There were so many trendy restaurants, bars, clubs. It reminded me of ... read more

Firstly I just realised that their was a major crash down of the site. Unfortunately my last 5 entries were lost, as well as some of my pictures. All apologies for those who have missed reading them but it will be too much work to write it all down again. -------------------------------------- Colombia is nothing like what foreigners imagine. You need to visit the country and see it with your own eyes that guerrillas and narco-trafficants only represent a small percentage and are very much isolated from the main tourist areas. Even though they have severely tarnished the country’s image and history, the situation has surprisingly improved in the last decade thanks to drastic actions from the actual president. For many backpackers it has become the hidden gem of the continent. I wouldn’t go as far but ... read more

After a really brief time in Venezuela we returned to Colombia. From the bus station we caught a bus to San Christobel, arriving in the rain and having trouble finding a car to take us over the boarder, no one wanted to take us over because we had to stop for passport stamps. Eventually a young chap said he would take us for 60,000, (about $20) probably the price of a full car load. He was very good and took us through to San Antonio, another confusing city with the boarder control in a street that is way away from the boarder and you would never find it on your own. Here we had to pay 40,000 each to leave the country. We had to pay this across the road from the passport office, we had ... read more