Quick ride on the East side -- missed opportunities

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Still staying in hotel Kantawa, decided to do a little ride to explore east side of the region. At first, I was supposed to go to RioHacha, explore a bit the desert and then go South to completely drive around Sierra Nevada mountain range. But I changed my mind soon after arriving in Colombia. Problem with Guajira and far East, is that the desert doe snot hold many interesting attractions for me, even after looking at some blogs and read about it. So, instead, I'll stay a couple of nights in Minca after Tayrona.

The drive. Road is smooth and with not too much heavy traffic. I passed succession of banana plantations, forests, little villages and coastline. About the coastline, at one point, the road is on a cliff with many nice views, but there's no place to safely stop, apart from one spot with a vendor and some garbage. It's sad, but again, it's missed opportunities (and infrastructure). Later in the trip, I found some places with thousands of birds in marshes, but yet again, no place to stop. You know, with a small parking for a small fee, some educational signs, telescope and maybe pamphlets,this could give jobs and add to tourist interests. But this maybe in a couple of years it seems!

When I saw Tayronaka, I wanted to give it a look to see if it worth it, but the road doesn't seem to go all the way. There are some boat taxi near the river, so maybe it's the only mean of transportation to that place? But considering this, you need to leave you (rented) car unattended....hum!!!

When I arrived at Palomino, I had somehow high expectations....long stretches of empty beach..... This was a total deception. The 1km road to the beach is jam packed with hostels, noisy, dirty, is very narrow, full of people, and with a "hippie" vibe. Not my kind of place.

On the way back though, I have found some little roads that leads to small hotels near the beach, almost empty and very affordable. It seemed to be a spot for locals, completely abandoned during weekdays. Lots of little farms in the region too, so took some pictures.

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