Manizales - 5125 m high!

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So it was good that I called my friend (dance teacher) from Cali, Carlos to ask him if he knew of a good place to stay in Manizales cause he sent his good friend Hernan (chacho) to pick me from the terminal. Chacho and his wife, Mario Eugenia, were super nice! They picked me up from the terminal and offered me a place to stay at their home but I declined cause I only had about 40 hours in Manizales and the tour operator to take me to the Nevados was already scheduled to pick me up from a cheap hostel in the city center 6 am the next day.

It was about 5 pm when I arrived in Manizales but Chacho and his wife and friends had the time to show most of the city’s highlights. They invited me to the mirador, and bought me a ticket to do this extreme sport thingy that launched me in a harness flying and swinging high above a busy highway - it was great and just what I needed cause I had a lot on my mind from the eje -most of it bad.

After inviting me for a few drink at their salsa bar, they took me to the zona rosa (the party district). I was completely exhausted but I wanted to see the city and we were just going to grab a quick bite before they drop me at my hotel. They bought me tasty empanadas and albondigas (mmmmm). Then a nice Juan Valdez coffee- and before dropping me their friend Jonathan lent me his warm jacket for my trip to the mountains the next day.

WOW!! How nice they were and what special magic it was that blessed me and all my steps. To enter a new city and have everything handed to me on a silver platter with a smile. What possibly could be my problem now....

I have to say that I was also really surprised and very impressed by the mid-sized, highly attractive, well-organized city of Manizales. It was really beautiful, with a fresh climate, nestled in the middle of spectacular mountains, and had just about everything you could want. Really a hidden paradise. What a marvel... It struck me so odd that Colombia had so so many hidden gems -How were these secret being so well kept??

Exhausted I hit the sack.

The next morning the tour group picked me up at 6:30 am, and we headed off to the mountains. The plan was to drive most of the way up, and then walk the last 300 m, up to a literally break taking altitude of 5125m!!!!

I was already light-headed and breathless at our breakfast of a mere 4000 m overlooking the gorgeous rolling valleys. -How the hell was I going to climb....

As we pulled up to the foot of the Nevado Ruiz and got out of the van, the freezing 0 degree wind was blowing sand into our faces. It was COLD, but I had a LOT of jackets (hehehe). We started the SLOW hike up. It was about 2 km but took 2 hours cause of the altitude. I was last and way, way, behind. I was dizzy, weak, with headache and chest pain even before we started the hike, but I knew I wasn’t going to die, it was altitude... discomfort but one step before sickness. -I’d had experience with this and knew I would survive (after all we were going to go down by afternoon) if I didn’t pass out, lol. -but if I did a least I would get more oxygen, hehehe.

So I struggled all the way up, with chest pain and tremendous difficulty breathing, fighting the cold hard wind that pressed against my headache. I took baby steps so small I wondered if they would even propel me to the top, but after a couple hours to my amazement I did it! I was there... And the first thing I saw was a line of brown mountains, and then the two snow capped peaks of Volcan de Tolima and Santa Isabel. I was already 100 m from the snow cap of Luiz, and we were at least half a km or maybe an entire kilometre above the clouds. -They were well below. All the wind turned to silence, and all the agony from the effort turned to peace, and I knew what at that moment what it was that drove every person who every climbed any mountain. All those difficult expeditions in god knows where. Because when you reached these heights high above the heavens, but on a mysterious ground that was somehow still was on the earth you started to feel and see things that you never had before- and the world became clear, and your life went to a place where you could see it like a picture, and all religious and spiritual thoughts came together in a way that made you feel maybe you didn’t know what you thought you knew, that maybe you didn’t know anything at all, and that maybe there were mysteries beyond knowledge...

I laid in the happy sunshine briefly enough to be warmed, and then pressured by the group that had already decended to a snow cap on the other side I moved on. I climbed down and jumped across a stream coming from the melting glacier. The sun strong, I jumped on the hard snow, that reflected bits of ice with a mysterious silver colour that I couldn’t understand but seemed so beautiful, like a the ornaments of a rich palace. I jumped in the snow and thought how regular it was for me, snow. How I missed my Canada, my Toronto...

I climbed back to the top and began the decent back to our van. The group was almost a kilometre ahead by now but I preferred it that way. Plus on the decent I had gravity on my side and I knew how to use it. It my recent mountain adventure I had nearly perfected my technique of running down a mountain in almost an effortless fashion. In fact, I discovered that the time spent in the air flying down was the easiest and most fun, and the larger I could make those spaces the faster I would flow down the hill, and the more I would feel like a bird.

So I began running down the hill and caught the group in less than 5 minutes, so when I came to a soft patch of warm sand I jumped and landed on my ass, laid down and relaxed. I laid there soaking in the mountain sun for about 15 minutes, before getting up and running the rest of the way down.

At the bottom I enjoyed two delicious cup of hot agua panela before we headed off to the “hot springs”. The hot springs consisted of a regular blue concrete pool into which hot water from a natural sulphuric spring was diverted. After a terrible lunch I had a very relaxing swim in the HOT water and burned my eyes forgetting about the sulphuric acid. Lol.

It was a full day and I was tired when I arrived in my hotel around 7 pm but I still had some work to do and was hungry. Chacho called me and invited me to come to his bar, meet up with his friends and grab a bite to eat, and so I agreed.

I went over and had a bite and a dance and a couple hours later Carlos came into town (he was there on business from Cali and it was a terrific coincidence). We went out and had a delicious coffee with liquor, like only Colombia can make.

It was late so I said goodbye and until next time, it was a nice distraction seeing him and I was glad for the chance. I was flying to Bogota the next morning.

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