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Published: October 29th 2007
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POPAYAN
The beautiful buildings of Popayan After saying goodbye to Christian in San Agustin there didn't seem like any reason to stay any longer, so the following morning we headed off to our next destination. After walking into town with all our bags we decided to take a car to the crossroads out of town to catch the bus heading to Popayan, by doing this we would save ourselves a bit of money. After making it to the crossroads we saw our bus heading into San Agustin to pick up other passengers before stopping for us....the bus was already full so we hoped that most of those people would be getting off and we would actually get a seat. Once the bus arrived Sharyn got on the bus to secure some seats for us but was only able to get one because as expected the bus was full. Luckily after the other people boarded the bus one seat that was taken by a young girl was available to me, kids always have to move to sit on their parents knees if there is no other option for adults to sit, and this meant that I didn't have to stand the whole 7 hours to Popayan. After squashing
POPAYAN
The beautiful buildings of Popayan in and barely getting my knees behind the seat we were off on another windy road and leaving San Agustin behind. At this stage we also realised that after paying we didn't save ourselves much money at all and Christian had told us this was best because he gets local rates which are far cheaper, unlike us. From the start I thought that it was going to be a long trip......squashed in with minimal air flow, other passengers squashed in and using cushions to sit on the floor and to top it off a windy and bumpy road to travel on.....one of those roads that using a 4x4 on wouldn't have hurt. All I could do to pass the time, because there is no way of sleeping on these trips, was to put a bit of Midnight Oil on my MP3 and play it really loud. Finally after seven hours of bouncing around at the back of the bus we drove into Popayan.
After finding ourselves a hostel we walked around this beautiful city, again I was amazed at what I was finding in Columbia.....I just never imagined it would be like this. Popayan is a beautiful old town
POPAYAN
The beautiful buildings of Popayan with amazing buildings but it hasn't been changed for the tourists.....instead there is many students there which give it a great feel and the whole time we were there it seemed that people were out and being active. A little bit of history......the city was founded in 1537 and it quickly became an important political, cultural and religious centre where people used to stop over on their way from Cartegena in the north and Quito in Equador. Wealthy spanish settlers from the sugar haciendas of the hot Cali region further north were attracted to the areas climate, with this many imposing churches and monastries were built in the 17th and 18th centuries and still remain today. Unlike many other Columbian cities, Popayan didn't get caught up in the race to become industrialised and as a result has maintained much of it's colonial feel. Many of the beautiful colonial buildings were actually damaged seriously in an earthquake in 1983, but restoration work continued for nearly two decades and most of the buildings still look great.
Basically all we did while in Popayan was wondering around its beautiful streets, drink good coffee at a number of cafes and find good places
POPAYAN
Visiting the fire station in Popayan.....just to check it out for all the men in my family to get breakfast from. The main thing that happened while we were there was that I was bitten by a mysterious creature in the middle of the night! I awoke to feel bites on my face and arms and thinking it was mosquitos just got my bug spray and lathered myself in that. Over the night they continued to itch and I am sure that I irritated them even more......as when I woke I found my eye swollen and my wrist and hands as well. This caused great amusement for Sharyn and at this stage I was thinking it was pretty funny and hoping that they would go down soon and that I wouldn't have to walk around in public looking a bruiser. Unfortunately that was not the case and I am sure that I scared a few small kids and their parents that day....tried to do the old sunglasses trick but was also not appropriate indoors.......some of the looks I got though made me smile and made me glad that I don't have an obvious defect all the time (some may argue against this statement!) That day we had planned on heading up to some thermal springs out of
POPAYAN
Visiting the fire station in Popayan.....just for Dad, Mark and Andrew town a while........so after finding some anti-histamine we were off on another adventure. On the way to the bus station we had to pass the fire station, for those that don't know I come from a family of fire fighters, so I thought that it was only my duty to go meet the firemen and take some photos for my dad and brothers. We ended up getting a tour of the station and taken around to see all the vehicles, training facilities, sleeping quarters, change rooms and my favourite - the old fireman pole but with an alter situated just behind, very rare in Australia. After our tour of the fire station we headed off towards the thermal springs. We arrived in a small town and started the walk up hill to these thermals. On arriving we found man made pools, quite different to the natural ones I was hoping for, and we arrived just in time for a torrential rain shower. Luck I guess as we were not caught in it, but I really didn't want to get into the pools in the pouring rain.......by this stage my face had got worse and the anti-histamine was making me really
POPAYAN
Visiting the fire station in Popayan.....the pole but with an alter behind it...something you don't see in Australia drousy....enough for me to fall asleep sitting up. I did manage to get in for half and hour or so and thought that this was not the best idea, after doing it of course, and once Sharyn told me that she felt that she needed to take my home going by the way I looked I decided it was probably the best thing to do. After a few more photos of my swollen face we started back for the walk down the hill to town.....along a dirt road which gave great views of the green valley that we were in. After another bakery treat we boarded our bus back to Popayan and as the day continued my face got worse, more photos were taken and more stories arose as to what we could say was the cause of it. The following day after a lazy morning we jumped on our next bus and headed further north, on a paved road to Cali.
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