Viva Colombia! Welcome to Pereira & World Cup Futbol!

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We flew back from the Galapagos Islands to Quito, Ecuador because it was closer to the next country that we were visiting – Colombia. Our destination was Pereira; a city in the west of Colombia tucked in the foothills of the Andes Mountains in a coffee producing area or ‘La Zona Cafetera’. I couldn’t believe my luck when I found out that we would be in Colombia for the World Cup. It was the under-20 Football / Soccer World Cup. This was going to be epic!

Getting into Colombia from Ecuador was a bit of a process. Our flight from the Galapagos brought us to Quito where we got a bus to the Colombian border. The route had a few reported robbery incidents in the past but we’d travelled on similar routes and were not too worried. We had each other and we’d got this far by being aware and working as a team. The overnight bus was about a nine hour journey. We had to get out at the border / la Frontera to pass immigration. We were really fortunate to meet a sound chap who was Colombian, but living in the US. He took us under his wing and made sure the borders pass went smooth.

Sarah was our booking agent for most accommodations. She liked to look ahead in our guidebook and get an idea for the hostels. Again, she got us a great place in Pereira called ‘Sweet Home Hostel’, where owner, Juan, and his right hand man, Felipe, made us very welcome. This was actually the ONLY hostel in Pereira at the time (2011), so lucky enough it was a nice stay.

Our plan was to spend about 3 months in Colombia. It was kind of a full circle for us. We first visited Colombia back in 2008, when we did a bit of research, took a gamble and hopped on a flight to Medellin for five days. People thought we were crazy…going to Colombia…to ‘that place Escobar was from’. It was great to be back in the country and environment that was the impetus for us to embark on our year long trip.

We got to see both the Semi-final (France 3-1 Mexico) and World Cup Final in which Brazil beat Portugal 3-2. I scalped tickets both times lucky enough. The final was particularly tough to get tickets to but with persistence and luck, I ended up with a couple!

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