Cali, San Sipriani, Popayan, and Ipiales - farewell Colombia!

After Salento we headed south to the salsa capital of Colombia, Cali. Almost immediately, we had agreed to join a group of people heading to San Sipriani the next morning, which is a small village by a river, only reachable by the train tracks that link the coast with the inland and is used mainly to transport bananas. The locals have devised a makeshift 'train' that is basically a wooden bench on bearings taken up and down the tracks using a motorbike that is strapped to the front and has one wheel touching the track (see below!).

The bus journey from Cali took ages but did feature a first for us in Colombia - the bus was stopped by the military and all the men aboard were taken from the bus and frisked! Once we had made the enjoyable trip down the train tracks, it was time for some tubing! We walked thirty minutes up the river and tossed our huge inner tubes into the water and floated off downstream. The river is set deep within the jungle and this, mixed with the crystal clear water, made for a relaxing float downstream, inbetween the hair-raising rapids!

The next day we thought we would check out the sights of Cali and after 15minutes we were done - a beautiful city Cali is not! We tried to go to the cinema, but there were no films in English. The one highlight of the day was drinking a bottle of rum with an English couple that were cycling down through Central and South America and listened to some great stories from their adventure! In the evening, we went out for a night on the tiles and ended up in a Colombian gay club - Ben´s popularity in Colombia continued here!!

Done with Cali, we caught a bus to Popayan the next day. This bus journey featured another first as the bus broke down an hour or so into the trip! We were left on the side of the road, fighting with the other passengers to get onto one of the passing buses! Popayan is a gorgeous white-washed city with a relaxed feel. We wandered around the city before heading up ´El Morro´a large hill on the edge of the town, on top of which is a big statue of Simon Bolivar on horse-back, to watch the sunset. As the only gringos up there, we attracted a fair amount of attention and Ben was once again having his photo taken by the local girls!

We had hoped to visit Purace National Park, but sadly were the only two people interested in going and so the jeep did not make the trip. Instead, we headed for some thermal pools that were really hot - you were only allowed to sit in the hottest for 10 minutes before having a cold shower as it makes your heart race! Thanks to the sulphur we stank of rotten eggs when we left and received a few funny looks in the supermarket!

The next next day we headed for the indigenous market in Silvia to do some people watching and Clare did a ´great' job of subtlely taking pictures of the indigenous people until she was told off when taking a photo of them returning home by bus! We took a tour up into the mountains with Freddy Vargas to see where the indigenous people live -. The tour was interesting, if a little dubious on the sensitivity front - at one point we were feeding school children biscuits! We declined the offer to try on the traditional dress of the Indians.

Lene arrived that evening and we took a bus to Ipiales on the Colombian border the next morning. The journey takes 8 hours and we were advised to do it during the day, for safety reasons. The bus station was as frantic as ever, with everyone trying to get us on their bus. Somehow, despite the myriad of buses heading for Ipiales, we ended up on the smallest bus in the country! Not good if you have long legs!

There was nothing to do in Ipiales itself, which is pretty much your bog-standard grubby South American border town. We stayed in a cheap and grotty hotel, but in the morning it was worth it, as we headed to Las Lajas. This is a stunning gothic church built into a valley, although it is still at 3000m and so walking up the steps to the church was hard work!

It was then time to make the border crossing. We were all quite sad to be leaving Colombia, as it was our first country in South America and we had had a fantastic time. The people are friendly, the weather was mostly terrific, and there was so much to see and do we could easily have stayed for 6 months!

Hostels;

Iguana, Cali: Clean hostel with friendly staff.

Hostel Trail, Popayan: lovely clean rooms with excellent internet access. However, it´s a bit of a staging posts between Ecuador and Colombia and so people don´t seem to do a lot, hence there not being enough people to make the trip to Purace.

Hotel Belmonte, Ipiales: Cheap but pretty dark and dank with terrible beds! On the plus side, each room has a TV with cable!

Note: Photos to follow when we find a decent PC in Ecuador!!

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