Advertisement
Published: June 12th 2008
Cronosaurus!
Scale provided by MikeWe´ve now been away from home for nearly 8 months. In that time I estimate that I have lost over 75% of my worldly belongings (the recent dearth of photographs of me is due to the fact that I am reluctant to be seen in a sack cloth), packed my bag over 700 times, taken over 412 international flights, and consumed more omelettes than Robinson Crusoe on Chicken Island (the little known sequel).
In all that time, the most impressive monster that I´ve seen has to be the colossal cronosaurus - this is an aquatic beast so large it dwarfs even the hole in our bank account. This guy could scoff blue whales as pub snacks. Fortunately for our sea dwelling mamalian friends it´s also a bit dead... by roughly 110 million years. Probably a good thing for us to, as we´re currently camped out in it´s habitat. Villa de Leyva is another Town of Type Charming and Colonial, but 110 million years ago was under water. As a result, everywhere you go you see fossils, fossils and more fossils. In the pavements, in the sides of buildings, they´re everywhere. The petrified skeletal remains of the cronosaurus can be viewed
in the inevitable Museum of Fossils, which is just one of the places we visited on horseback.
We´ve been stuck here for the last 5 days. Stuck in the sense that neither of us can be bothered to pack our bags and move on to stinking Bogotá. This is one of the more lovely places we´ve been. Loveliness can be measured scientifically, simply by timing the length of time Natalie tarries in front of estate agent windows as we mosey about our business. This is definitely a place you could move in. The town is postcard pretty, the mountains are scored with rivers and waterfalls, and there seem to be more pigs and donkeys than people.
There´s plenty to do for the adventerous traveller... rapelling, canyoning, rafting, horse riding, hiking and the time honoured laying about in hamocks. We´ve mostly been indulging in the last 3, with hammocks taking up the majority of our time.
A few hikes have also been undertaken, to a waterfall, and the birthplace of humanity. At least according to the Muisca legend. Iquaque Lake looked a bit grubby to be worthy of such an accolade to me. It was also stonking hard
work to get to... 5 miles straight up, then 5 miles straight down. At the highest point we were over 3600 metres up, higher than Cusco and definitely in Altitude Sickness domain. However it was worth it for the incredible views over the Colombian highlands, and was probably the best spot for a crisp sandwich that I´ve ever been to. Unfortunately I managed to lug up our rather heavy SLR camera without the memory card in it, hence all the photos are thanks to Aussie Mike who we met here. Thanks Mike!
Anyway, we´re not much longer for Colombia. The call of the Wine Region is strong, so we´re probably heading back towards Argentina. Maybe we´ll use our new found horse riding prowess and become gauchos. Or maybe we´ll just cane the malbec. Only time will tell.
In the meantime, in anticipation of our sad farewell to Colombia (like with children, you´re not supposed to have favourites according to Nat, but nevertheless mine is Colombia), I present the anatomy of the Colombian Telly Novela (rather like a soap opera, but without all the miserable looking people drinking tea in grubby cafes):
33% Pouting woman passionately slaps man
33% Passionate clinche of people who are married to other people
33% Angry exchange between two rival glamorous and passionate women
1% Intricate plot development
Yours truly,
Simon de Bolivar Wagner Cook Jnr III
Advertisement
Tot: 0.162s; Tpl: 0.01s; cc: 21; qc: 79; dbt: 0.0904s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
El Scook Y Natalia
si and nat
Villa de leyva is amazing...could have stayed there for a long time! definitely recommend the hostel renacer if you have nowhere sorted to stay. have fun! Natalie