Colombia- north

My journey through South America began with a whopper of a city. Cartagena. Wow. The beauty, the history...Perfect start to an amazing continent. To give a brief history, Cartagena was founded in 1533 and became the main Spanish port on the Caribbean and after a ton of pirate attacks, the Spaniards constructed elaborate walls all around the town and a chain of forts to protect it. The walls are still intact today (you can walk all over them), and within is the very amazing old city. We stayed in a sweet, real chill hostel(casa venecia) in the historic part of town and really enjoyed walking around and seeing all the beauty and history this town had to offer. Cartagena is a beautiful city and a lot of time can be spent walking through the city and enjoying the beauty.

A sweet side trip to Playa Blanca was in order after a few days of cartagena... It lived up to the name. White Beach. Sweet little dollar camp spots, fresh fish and overpriced beer kinda sums up that place. Also it has to be said that we didnt take the "tourist boats" and took the long, long way riding on motorcycles and local buses (john´s moto flipped on the way...), which was way more scenic and saved us a few dollars (not john).

After Cartagena and Playa Blanca the four of us (Aussie, English, Spaniard ) headed north to Santa Marta. After we had gotten off our bus and were looking for another to take us to our destination fate helped us out. A business man from Spain, Juan, was catching a bus to Medellin to do some "business" there and had a farm in the country near Santa Marta that was vacant. Since Raul is from Spain he felt like helping out a fellow Spaniard and gave us the farm to stay in for free while we were in town. INSANE.

Last week Jess and I took a day trip to nearby little farm town of Minca. Minca is a tiny little village way up in the worlds tallest costal mountain range.... The Sierra Nevadas. Beautiful views, great waterfalls and as always super friendly people. Also it was a nice break from the almost unbearable heat of Santa Marta.

The farm has been incredible. About 15 min by motorbike on a lonely crappy road outside of Bonda, Colombia. So remote and peaceful. Sweet setup too. We each have our own room and bathroom and a massive living room and kitchen. FREE. There is a little shop about 10 min down the road from us that sells all the necessities we could want (rice, eggs, water haha). We are still in the farm at time of writing and have stayed there for 11 nights now. We have enjoyed many nights hanging around a neighbors billiards shack chatting with the locals and enjoying 60 cent beers. It has been a great time and definitely couldnt have had this kind of connection anywhere else but Colombia. The locals are the nicest people you would ever meet, treating you like family just after just hanging out with them one time. Colombia is amazing.

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