Going Coco in Locombia

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We had another incredibly awful flight! Akin to our other one to Jakarta. Bumpy as hell and fearing for our lives. There must be somthing about flying over jungle! We arrived at Bogota in the evening. The airport is very small (considering it is the capital). There was barely a shop to buy a bottle of water. There was complete chaos outside the airport. It was gridlocked with traffic.

We got a taxi and once we did get out of the traffic, it was like being in that movie "Taxi" with Queen Latifah, where the car turns into a sporty racing mobile. This guy was nuts! He was all over the road and going at high speed. It was terrifying. Police cars dont even go this fast in a high speed chase. He even locked the doors at one point and we thought it didnt take long to get kidnapped in Colombia. Actually he was just protecting us from the incredibly dodgy area that we drove through, with lots of interesting characters and prostitutes on the street. Slightly amusing that the taxi driver was only now considering our welfare after nearly already killing us!

Anyway! We love this little tourism video on You Tube (check it out by searching "Colombia, Why take the risk". Like it says, why you dont need to come here as Hollywood has done so much to tell you exactly what its like! Of course, it is quite a sarcastic clip and they have now used their reputation for risk of murder and kidnaping to coin the cheesy line "the only risk is wanting to stay", we hoped it would turn out to be true.

There is a massive military and police presence around the city, so we are sure there must be a reason for this, but it feels pretty safe. Its a nice city to wander round, in the right areas. Although, we did wander off down the wrong street at one point and it quickly changed into feeling a little dodgy. We got our first taste of Colombian coffee and its pretty good. Even the cheap stuff is tasty. We could get a decent cup for about 20p. We also noticed several people standing with about 5 mobile phones chained to their waist and selling calls for 150 pesos per minute. This was a first.

A bit too many museums after Cusco we decided to go up the cable car for a good view of the city. We left the next day and headed to Coffee country. From here we first visited a mountain park with snow but had to pay a fortune for a tour that in all honesty was not really worth it. We stayed in the Mountain House (the only option described in the LP). This place is rubbish. We wanted a double room, but got a double bed partitioned off in the dorm. We might as well have been in the dorm for all the noise etc. They were really unfriendly and we were stuck in with a load of pretentious little backpackers. We had to get out of there. We headed for Salento. Salento is amazing. Its a tourist town, very popular with Colombians but very few gringos. Its beautifully painted and the surrounding countryside is spectacular. We decided not to stay in the LPs reccomendation this time. Its never value for money and its got on our nerves how one little book can really control where business goes in the town. There are always plenty other options and now we never book anything.

From Salento we went on a Jeep ride to Cocora. The jeep was mentally full and Neil barely had space hanging on the back (only space for one foot!). He got moved to the roof and had to hold on for dear life. We broke down and had to walk a bit till another jeep caught up with us. The Valle de Cocora is incredible. Lucious with huge wax palms towering above everything. Its got a very exotic feel. We hiked until we came to a jungle part with river and dodgy bridge crossings. Vik still in plaster we turned back when one of the bridges just looked too dodgy having already had to bum shuffle across one.

Our second day around Salento and it was Viks 30th birthday. Desperate to go to a coffee plantation we started hiking down a rough road. We appeared to have learned absolutely nothing about hiking and set off with two mouthfulls of water each. Luckily we found a really nice man who was selling some drinks from his back garden, so we headed in and sat and chatted to him for a bit. The surrounding scenery was exceptional and full of coffee, bananas and flowers. We found a coffee plantation and headed in. We found a Hacienda with a load of big rottweilers and dobermans. We felt as though we had wandered into a movie and into some kind of drug lords mansion. Luckily we only found some very friendly people to take us on a tour round. Once we were finished we started to hike back towards salento, then a nice man stopped with his pick up truck and Neil jumped in the back with some of the locals and Vik in the front. We bumped our way back to Salento and the guy didnt want a penny. It had been a great day. We headed back to sit on our balcony, looking at the lucious scenery and sipping champagne. It was the best birthday ever. We headed for a night out in the town, which was absolutely buzzing with latin music and flowing with beer.

After a heavy 30th birthday night we had a day in bed watching movies before taking the 8 hour trip back to Bogota to get the casts off Viks arms. The casts came off but now left with a little bit of a mishapen elbow we started thinking we should come home. We started the ball rolling but the arms seem to be moving ok and it might not acheive anything.

We pushed on to Villa de Leyva, an old colonial town. We were stopped by the military and the men had to get out the bus. So Neil and all the other guys were hands up against the bus and patted down. This happens every now and then and on a later trip they had a look through the ladies bags, except not Viks. Its completely ridiculous as they are very inconsistent, sometimes checking ID, sometimes not and also not actually searching the luggage, so its hard to imagine that they are achieving anything. They always appear to be about 18 years old, so we they are just paying lip service to giving the impression of increased security. The police and soldiers are very heavily armed with huge semi-automatic guns and there are police and soldiers everywhere, we have never seen anywhere quite like it and it can give the impression that country is at war, but in fact it is still waging civil war in the jungles and later during our trip there were reports of 5 killed, 5 kidnapped and 5 injured in the Choco region by FARC rebels. Also, the military bombed a FARC camp in the jungle since we have been here.

Anyway, when we got to Villa de Leyva, we appeared to arrive at some celebration. It was party party party here and we have never seen so much beer being drunk. There was live music of incredible accordian and brass pumping out the popular colombian sounds. Colombians live their lives to a soundtrack of this accordian music called Vallenato. Its absolutely everywhere you go, its on the buses, in the shops, in the restaurants and in the streets. It never stops. It was starting to drive us batty. We have since eventually got into this a bit more but we dont think Colombians know what it is to have silence.

Pushing on we got to the town of San Gil. Also still celebrating this festival of the Virgen of Carmen. Again, beer drinking in the streets with lots of music. We joined in and watched it all go on before us. The following day we took a bus to the little town of Barichara. A colonial town that the LP describes as a hollywood directors dream. Yes, its very nice, but its not what we expected. Its newly reconstructed, full of souvenir shops and extrememely clean and tidy, it lacks character that it probably once had. The following day we decided to check the nearbye waterfall. This was really nice. We couldnt get to the swim hole as Vik wouldnt manage to climb up the rock face with the rope to get there (still with slightly weaker arms). We did however hike an incredibly steep path to get to an upper tier of the waterfall and it was beautiful with big blue butterflies floating about.

There isnt much to visit between this part of Colombia and the carribean coast except the town of Mompos which is remotely positioned down "backwaters and bayous" as the LP puts it. It sounds intriguing and just up our street, so we decided to take a 9 hour bus, followed by 4 hour jeep ride on crappy roads to get there. We would also need 8 hours to get out of there at the other end, so we hoped that it would be worth it! Off we went again.....

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Photos

Chesus
Its fair to say that he is popular here!

At 5000m above Colombia
Still with two broken arms in cast

Poster at the coffee plantation
The "typical" Colombian

Cowboys and girls out for a ride in Salento
Police station on the left with extra fencing protecting the outside

Billiards hall in Salento
aka The Colombian Long Bar

On the way to Mompos
Muddy little place we stopped to fix the puncture

Our jeep from El Banco to Mompos
Great place to break down, as tonnes of wetland and animals are just off to the left

Comments

[Leonard]

I'm a kiwi guy planning a trip to Colombia and Venezuala and am loving your blog. Recon I should include Venezuela? Big call I know.

[Neil and Vik]

venezuela
Im glad you like our blog. Definately definately include Venezuela. Colombia is amazing, but Venezeula is one of the most beuatiful countries ever but consider what you want out of your trip as it lacks on the culture/atmosphere side or pretty towns of Colombia. Keep your wits about you with the military, they are the biggest pain about being there. Be confident and if you get hassles say that you would like to phone your embassy before handing over any cash (this may put them off). Los Llanos is a must for the amazing wildlife, Cainaima is touristy but amazing. We heard good things about Rio Caura (6day trip), obviously Roraima is also high up on the list but is another 6 days. The beaches are suppose to be great too at Mochima. We also heard that the Venezuelan Amazon area is quite good for visiting indigenous groups and we saw one tour offering to stay with a family, learn some of their crafts and go searching for tarantulas, but by the time we saw this tour we were already heading in the wrong direction. Obvioulsy the other big hassle is the cash situation, stock up on dollars in a large Colombian city before heading over and hide them everywhere. A tour for angel falls is around $250 (at the unofficial exchange rate), 3 days, and Los Llanos is around $150 for a few days. I hope this is helpful and have a great time. Neil and Vik