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Published: December 11th 2012
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Taganga and the Lost City
We arrived in Taganga last Tuesday. After the stress of the previous week, we were pretty keen to get back into the swing of traveling. As soon as we arrived we asked at the hostel for recommendations for diving and Lost City tours. By that afternoon, we had booked in a double dive for the following day (one of which was a night dive - nothing like it to get back into diving after over 3 years!) and a La Ciudad Perdida tour leaving on the
Thursday morning.
The diving here is fairly average, the water a bit murky, but we did see a sea turtle on our first dive and some decent bioluminescence on the night dive. Also, the company we went with were awesome. Our dive master went over everything with us at the start to refresh our memories and we just had a really good time. And the diving was so cheap! $60 each for two dives, including all gear.
We were picked up the following day by Expotur for our hike into the jungle to see La Ciudad Perdida (the Lost City). We chose the 5 day/4 night
tour as it was the same price as the shorter one and we didn't want to push ourselves. They piled 8 of us, including our 57 year old guide, Archie, into the most beat up 4WD I've ever seen, and drove us 2 hours into the jungle, stopping once to fill up on some cheap Venezuelan fuel from a backyard dealer.
After jiggling around in the back for an hour up the jungle track, we were given some lunch amongst a flock of chickens and we started our walk up the trail, with our walking companions, Isabelle and Colin fromCanada, Emma from Spain, and Katherine from France. It was only a short distance to the first stop where we spent the night in hammocks covered with inadequate mosquito nets.
The following day we were up at sunrise and walked through some of the wildest and lushest jungle I've ever seen. There were a few river crossings where we could take off our shoes and wade through the cool clear water, soothing our mosquito bites. Our camp on the second night was beside an awesome swimming pool created by the rocks in the river. We spent the afternoon playing
games of Shithead and drinking rum, but were forced to bed as it became too dark to see the cards. Instead of hammocks we had bunk beds that smelled like mould, and I slept terribly due to my preexisting mozzie bites. They were so incredibly itchy, it was all I could do to leave them alone.
Day three took us to the camp immediately below the Lost City, and on the way I managed to stub one of my toes so badly that I broke it! Still, I pushed on and we went up to the ruins after lunch. There are 1200 steep slippery stone steps leading up to the ruins and by the time we got there we were hot and tired. The site is pretty cool, but it was difficult to enjoy it when we were constantly fending off the bugs and the sun. The best part of the whole thing was the scenery. That jungle is one of the most beautiful natural habitats I've ever seen, the clear rivers with spectacular waterfalls everywhere. The way back down those 1200 was more of a challenge than the way up and the swim in the river at the
camp was welcome relief from the heat and my bites. There was a nice German woman at the camp who happened to be a nurse, and she assessed my toe and deemed it broken. The only thing we had to tape it with was some gaffa tape, so that's what she used whilst my howls tore through the jungle.
The next two days we made our way back to the beginning, the final day being the most difficult. Lots of steep, really muddy hills, both up and down. My favourite comment from the lovely Isabelle - "It wouldn't be "perdida" if it was a straight walk there, would it?" We returned to Taganga, smelling like old socks (nothing stays clean or dry for long in the jungle), threw everything at the nice laundry ladies and stood under the shower for a good while. Dinner and drinks with Isabelle, Colin, Emma and her friend ended pretty early and we fell heavily into bed.
Our next two days in Taganga were spent eating, drinking, sitting by the pool/beach and not much else. We said goodbye to our new friends, Isabelle and Colin, who we're now planning to visit at some point in their home town of Banff! Can't wait for that!!
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Isabelle
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Love you guys!