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Published: August 10th 2018
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Once again, Colombia delivers!
The diversity of this country is amazing and in the department of La Guajira you'll find a desert landscape that meets the Caribbean Sea. It is also the most northern point of South America.
We highly recommend doing a tour here if time permits.
A three day, two night tour is a great time to see all of the highlights in the comfort of an air conditioned 4WD.
The best place to start the tour was from Riohacha. If we had started it from Santa Marta we would have had to add an extra 4-5 hours of driving and the price is a lot more.
There were plenty of agencies offering the tour in Riohacha and we chose Alta Guajira Tours as they looked the most professional. All the tours do the same thing with a slight difference in price.
Our tour was faultless and we were really happy with the company.
We were joined by a Colombian couple who luckily were our ages who spoke English and both of them are surgeons!
Our driver Rigo was a cheerful chubby guy but didn't speak any english but we used it as an opportunity to practice our
Spanish and had the other two to help with translation as a backup.
The five of us set off towards the popular kite surfing spot of Cabo de la Vela and watched the landscape become drier and more desolate. This area is accompanied by constant wind and there are 13 Wayuu families who somehow manage to live here.
To help them survive, they have devised a way of getting some form of food, water or money. This is done by blocking the road which forces the cars to stop and handout various necessities, but not everytime. Road blocks can consist of string, motorcycle chain or tyres and is done by children as young as three!
It's a bit tedious as there are many of them around but you can see that it is a good way to survive in arid place this.
We spent the first day visiting various lookouts and beaches, going for swims and driving through dust storms and finished up by watching the sunset near Cabo de la Vela. All of these sites had completely different landscapes and it was hard to refrain from taking too many photos!
Our bed for the two nights was
a Chinchurro, a bigger and more colourfully designed hammock in which we had mixed results for comfort and hours of sleep but a great experience none the less, especially under millions of stars. Either way, once the sun was up at 5.30, so were we.
The second day took us to Punta Gallinas via beaches and sand dunes that drop in to the waves. The force of the wind meant our feet were constantly attacked by the shifting sand.
The dunes were impressive and we had fun making GoPro footage of running down them in matter of seconds compared to the minutes spent getting up to be able to get down.
The sea is also quite choppy along the coast and swimming is limited to a few beaches and the water is slightly cooler than some places along the north coast but very refreshing!
Our last night was spent in another accommodation that also caters for kite surfers. The night was windier and colder than the previous night and even with a blanket provided we still couldn't get warm enough.
On the last day we spent around 5-6 hours getting back to Riohacha where we were tired
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Kamil Cholinski
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Loving these blogs guys!