Parque Nacional Tayrona

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Getting to the park was not as easy as we thought ad we ended up having to stay a night in Santa Marta which was a bit dodgy. We arrived at night and to be honest all we could see were a few men who looked like drug dealers, a few prostitutes and some questionable looking street vendors. So lets just say we wanted to get out of there at the first available opportunity. We did just that the next morning and got an early bus to the National Park. The bus ride to the Park was pretty horrific as it was boiling hot outside, the bus had no air conditioning and the bus driver packed the bus full to within an inch of its life. I couldn't wait to get off and i was so happy when we arrived (or so i thought). For some reason it doesn't mention in the book that there is a hour long walk through the forest to get to the beaches. For some reason we took a wrong turn somewhere and ended up on a path knee deep in mud and dodging horses the whole way. For some reason i thought that there was a shuttle bus to bring us to the camp sites and neglected to think about the fact that it was actually a National Park. Silly me!!!!!! Anyway when we made it, it was more than worth it. The camp site was beautiful, its a huge field filled with hammocks underneath mango and avocado trees. The first beach we got to was spectacular, it was like something out of a film set, it didn't look real. The sand is a dusty white and it looks like there is a layer of mist constantly. The beach is set against a backdrop of lush green forest and mountains with huge boulders scattered throughout the beach. We walked to a smaller beach, horse shoe shaped with bright yellow sand and deep blue water. It was truly beautiful.

On our second day we were woken up early to the sounds of frogs singing in unison at 3am, donkeys screaming and birds squaking. It was interesting to say the least. We walked to the two furthest beaches from the campsite, the first called La Piscina which is a beautiful long stretch of white sandy beach surrounded by huge boulders and palm trees. Then we walked on to Cabo San Juan De Guia which is probably the most stunning beach i have seen so far. The beach is a beautiful white and the water is crystal clear blue water surrounded by hammocks over looking the ocean. We suprisingly spent the day on a nudist beach, this was not intentional but it was the quietest beach so we decided to stay. We only spotted two nude people so it wasn't that bad and they seemed suprisingly at ease in the buff. The nights were really quiet as it is lights out at 11pm, so we mainly spent our time reading, playing cards and chilling out. I felt totally chilled out by the last day however that was before the hour long trek back out of the park. Luckliy we befriended a local; man who showed us a short cut through the park however this involved climbing over huge boulders, shuffling along cliff edges and generally risking our lives for the sake of saving 30 minutes trekking.

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