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Published: February 22nd 2010
One for the tourists
I didn't see anybody using this all day. But makes for a nice shot, anyway.Hi all
I had to look back to see what it was that I last wrote about - and it was only Saturday that I wrote it!
Guess that the laid back VdL vibe is working its magic on me.
Saturday night was the main night of the astronomy thing in the main town square here. The place was packed. I tried to get some photos, but I hadn't bought my tripod out and everything looked a little shaky! There was a point where there were hundreds of people in the square, each with a telescope of some description. And then they turned off the lights on the square and there was this huge collective "wowww" resounding around the plaza.
Having stuffed myself for lunch, I wasn't really up for dinner, so I went to a local bar and just soaked up the sights and sounds. I wrote down a couple of things to pass onto you - pleased that I did because I wouldn't remember them now if I hadn't!
The first thing is (and you notice this almost immediately in Colombia) that the armed forces and the police all appear to be unbelievably young -
The Space Shuttle in full flight
...well, an inflatable version at least. maybe 18 years old or something like that. Maybe the older forces get to do more interesting stuff than standing around a town square. I dunno.
Secondly, buckets of beer are a great idea! That's buckets with ice and bottles inside. I seem to remember that they do the same thing in Rio. But anyway, it keeps the beer cold without having to constantly ask for more beer. Neat. (Not as neat as the giraffes, of course 😉
I forgot to mention that I'm still high! Altitude wise that is. According to my watch (who's GPS function doesn't seem to work) we're at about 2km up here. Feels really weird to think of it. Still, no chance of being flooded, I guess. Earthquakes etc yes, but flooding - certainly not 😊
Anyway, that was my Saturday evening sitting around chatting to a couple of locals and soaking in the vibe of the town square. It wasn't long before I was monumentally tired - I turned in at about 10pm and slept through the night - a solid 10 hours sleep...finally, beginning to catch up on my sleep.
I went to my favourite restaurant for breakfast -
Andres Diaz
Founder of VdL the nice thing about it is that they only serve traditional food from Boyaca (the department that VdL is in). I had Mogolce (I think - I didn't write it down too well!) which is a sort of granery bread, Cazuela Boyacense - an interesting soup of milk and water with two poached eggs, cheese and Almojabana (the bread that I was telling you about yesterday) and some herbs of some description. Also, rather than coffee, I had Chucula which is like hot chocolate but without any cocoa in it. I wrote down the ingredients but don't know what any of them mean!
Arroz - rice
Habas
Frijol
Alverja
Maíz - maize, I guess
Lenteja
Was super tasty. It came served with Elenvuelto which looks a bit like a long croissant but is actually more maizey, I think. Sorry, wasn't organised enough to take photos!
Again I was thoroughly stuffed and sat around for a while wondering whether I would ever be able to move again. Eventually, I made it back to my hotel and had a shower and read for a while.
At around 1pm, I decided to go to see "The biggest 'ceramica' in the world".
The biggest ceramics factory in he world...well, that's what I thought. I set off (stupidly) in the midday sun, following the map that Claudia (the restaurant owner) had drawn up for me. Before too long I was on a dirt track of a road wondering if I'd taken a wrong turn somewhere. I kept asking people for the ceramics factory and they looked at me as if I were nuts. Still, they said that other landmarks on my map were in the right place and that I seemed to be on the right road.
At some point I came across a vineyard. It said on a board outside that they did tours on Sundays at 2pm so I thought I'd hang around for it. There was chap sitting outside eating his lunch and it turned out that he was the owner. His name is Joachim Herzberg and he is from Germany but had been in South America for years working as an agricultural engineer. We had a good chat and talked about his life in VdL and his history of living in Colombia. I had a glass of his wine which was really tasty (I don't think that Colombia is
Just in case you didn't believe me
You'd think that they'd re-paint the sign. Something tells me that this place isn't in all the tourist books. all that great for wine growing but he seems to have done a pretty good job).
After a while, I headed off on my way (having totally forgotten that I wanted to go on a tour of the vineyard!)
If you fancy checking the place out, these are the details:
Vinicola y Posada Guanani, Villa de Leyva, Boyacá.
Mobile: +57 310 871 1749
email: guanani30@hotmail.com
Any way, back to my quest for the biggest ceramics factory in the world (Joachim hadn't heard of it either btw). I set about following the map again, really enjoying just walking through the countryside, the views of the mountains, seeing the wildlife and the flowers. Eventually I got to the point where I thought I MUST be near the factory. And then, just ahead, I saw the most unexpected sight - a house made
entirely from terracotta! THIS must be the place - it wasn't a factory at all but "the biggest piece of ceramics type thing in the world".
Outside a small child told me that it cost 5.000 COP to enter (I'm sure that that's tourist prices - I'm not even certain that I had to pay at all -
Inside La Casa Terracota
A bit intense for my taste. certainly I didn't get a ticket!).
Inside was just a sea of terracotta. I wondered if anybody had ever lived there. Wandering around I found an upstairs "room" with a mattress and sheets - that got me wondering if somebody STILL lived there. I never found out, but I'll ask around and let you know.
Anyway, I headed back to VdL proper and back towards the hotel, stopping on route at my favourite restaurant for a Jugo de
Feijoa - I have no idea what a Feijoa is but it tasted good after such a long hot walk.
En route to the hotel, I saw that my favourite bar was open and showing a football match (Barcelona vs Milan) so I sat down and watched the last 20 minutes of the game and had a good chat with Jorge, the bartender. After freshening up in the hotel for a bit (read "sleeping") I headed out again. I met another german guy (2 in one day!) called Marc sitting outside my fave bar (I'll write about the bar another day) and we chatted about life on the road - he's been in Colombia for 5 weeks and was reflecting
on how good it was to be in a bar that played rock - poor guy was salsa saturated after staying on the Caribbean coast. It was interesting hearing his reflections on how different things are up north. He was saying that the people in this part of colombia are much more open and friendly - he felt that, in the north people were only interested in getting his money. And it's not the first time that I've heard it. Well, I guess that I'll see for myself eventually. I was (finally) feeling peckish so I ordered a pizza from across the road - they delivered it to me in the bar! That's what I call service. The pizzas here are incredibly good, by the way.
Again, I slept really well last night (although I had quite a late night, it's true). This morning, being the creature of habit that I am, I headed down for breakfast at my fave restaurant and this time opted for somthing more akin to an english breakfast - scrambled eggs and bacon with maize washed down with a jugo de
uchuva. (What's the word for this fruit in english? I forget).
Other than
that, today has been all about catching up on some emails, chilling out, relaxing, wandering around the town. Not much to say, really.
So, I guess that will do for the update for now. As you may have guessed, I'm planning on staying here a couple of days longer than anticipated - I can just feel the stress streaming out of me. Mónica thinks I'm nuts! hahahaha. Or, as they say in Spanish, "jajajajaja".
Hasta luego
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anita
non-member comment
Cermamics
Amazing photo's especially the ceramics factory. And that toiler looks groovy man. I want one. Can you bring me one home and the wall surrounding it LOL.. I love your camera.. I may just have to buy one myself. Be safe xx