Boob and Bust – Chaos in Colombia.

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Colombia…. A country whose name conjures up images of dense impenetrable jungle and gun toting moustachioed drug barons. A country where every other woman seems to have had enormous breast implants. A country rich in emeralds, cocaine and coffee with stunningly diverse physical geography – from the mountainous Andean chains, to sun soaked Caribbean beaches to savannah lowlands and rainforest covered Amazon.

Colombia – my final South American country to explore (if I don’t include The Guianas!) and although it has been a tricky few weeks since we crossed the border from Venezuela, this is a country that has gripped me - more than Brazil, more than Argentina and more than Chile. Like Venezuela, its ‘western’ tourism is still burgeoning (Cartagena being an exception) and that gives it an edge. It gives me an exciting rush when it feels like you are exploring unchartered land far removed from the West coast of the Continent where every other person is ‘doing the Inca trail’ clutching their Lonely Planet and wearing their stripy gringo pants (to be honest, I own a few pairs myself !).

My sole reason for booking this trip with Toucan was that they are the only UK tour company I know of that actually takes you overland through Colombia… all others fly you from one hotspot to the next. I wanted to see this country at ground level as I have done with the rest of this magnificent continent. So, you can imagine the disappointment and frustration when we were faced with some serious impediments to continuing the journey north to Santa Marta out of the frontier town of Cucuta from where I last wrote.

Colombia for the past few weeks has seen major rains and disastrous flooding. The limited road infrastructure has been seriously affected and although we tried to drive North, we were faced with one landslide after another. Queuing in seemingly infinite jams, police roadblocks in guerrilla territory, and with no hope of making it to the coast as the land had literally come crashing down on itself, the decision was made to turn around and return to Cucuta – back on the border with Venezuela.

It was going to be physically impossible to get Rosita the Truck out of Cucuta so we unanimously agreed in a change to the itinerary and all flew to Cartagena leaving our big yellow bus behind. Unsurprisingly, as natural disasters such as these are considered a ‘force majeure’, the Toucan small print absolves all responsibility and any additional transportation costs fall onto our wallets. Flying around South American is not cheap and unfortunately my delightful travel insurance doesn’t cover me. However, faced with no alternative, if I wanted to Romance the Stone in Cartagena, the only way to do it was to get on a plane and fly there.

Cartagena is considered a fairy-tale city of romance, legend and beauty. The old town surrounded by its sturdy stone ramparts is straight off a film set with cobbled streets, leafy plazas and colourful colonial mansions with balconies draped in shocking pink bougainvillea. It is undeniable picturesque but touristifed to within an inch of its life.
Colourful, open sided buses called chivas take visitors around the city and we joined one which gave us an overview of a settlement that has repeatedly suffered invasions and attacks over the centuries due to the hoardes of treasure that was plundered from the indigenous peoples. Don’t you just love colonialism! Stored in the city until the Spanish galleons could take it back to Europe, Cartagena became a prime target for pirates and until the fortifications were built this is a city that saw much bloodshed.

There was possibly going to be much Toucan bloodshed spilt as increasing numbers of people in the Group were getting dissatisfied with the communication and organisation of the rest of the trip. Rumours were rife that due to previous budget overspending combined with the road closure difficulties, the cheapest and easiest option was going to be to terminate the Tour in Bogota. People were getting fidgety and some started to make alternative arrangements. A group of the chaps booked flights to Medellin – home of the infamous drug lord Pablo Escobar, others decided to stay on in Cartagena and checked themselves into more upmarket hotels, others booked flights from Bogota direct to Quito. Already we had missed a huge chunk of the country in the North – all of which we had paid for but were not going to be reimbursed. With an amended itinerary that saw us spending a week in Cartagena, 8 of us decided to sign off the trip and go exploring ourselves waiting to see what the onward journey plan from there would be.

I am so glad we made this decision. We had an awesome few days. Two of the group had found travel options that suited us using a minivan service to shuttle us up the rain free roads north along the Caribbean coast to Santa Marta and I found us a lovely hostel in the town for us to stay at.
After arriving and dumping bags, we caught a local collectivo (a scruffy miniature minibus that shuttles around towns packed to the gills) to the pretty fishing village of Taganga , then agreeing a price for a short boat ride around the coast to Playa Grande spending the afternoon on the beach surrounded by cacti clad terrain and sun-baked mountains. It felt exhilarating to be self-supportive again…taking local public transport, using our wits and initiative.

The following day, we walked through the early morning bustle of the Santa Marta markets – a olfactory meander through fruit, veg, fish and meat traders to the public bustop where we headed straight for the spectacular Tayrona National Park – 35kms from the town on the coastal road to Riohacha. An ecosystem with thick rainforest, beaches fringed with clusters of coconut palms against the most beautiful backdrop of jagged lushly covered mountains rising into a thunderous looking sky.

Hiking through the forest down to the coastal path, we came across huge millipedes, monkeys, red squirrels, giant blue butterflies, coconut crabs and lizards scuttling through the undergrowth. It was one of the most beautiful settings I have been in and as we got closer to the cliff edge, leaving the rainforest behind, my ears were filled with the sounds of the Caribbean sea crashing down onto the deserted white beaches. The currents are very dangerous along this stretch of coast with warnings of no swimming allowed so we walked for a few hours until we got to the bay called La Piscina where it was safe to take a dip in the salty ocean. Think Alex Garland’s The Beach and you’ve got a picture of this stretch of the Colombian coast. An isolated, tropical paradise….

Storms were brewing out at sea and annoyingly we missed the last boat from Cabo Juan xxx which left at 3pm to take us back along the coast to Taganga. This meant turning round and hiking back to the park entrance. Hooking inland back to the road through the jungle and the ruined indigenous Tayronan village of El Pueblito wasn’t an option due to the rains and mud so we belted it back along the coast. The humidity was unbelievable and I can safely say I have never sweated so much in my life. My face was dripping, the sweat running in rivulets down off my chin and soaking my t shirt. I wasn’t alone….it was an arduous hike back to make the bus but worth every painful step in air that was so thick with a stormy heat, you felt like your head might explode.

After a morning drinking fine Colombian coffee, eating street food for breakfast including the most delicious Tree Tomato juice and exploring the bustle of Santa Marta, at lunchtime we effortlessly got our air conditioned minivan back to Cartagena. Back in Bocagrande at the hotel we met back up with the rest of the Toucan Group to discover that decisions had been made on the remainder of our tour. It had been decided to abandon the rest of South West Colombia as not only could Rosita the Truck not make it to Bogota to meet us but potential road closures in the south of the country meant that even if we proceeded on public transport we wouldn’t necessarily make it down the Pan American over the border into Ecuador. We would be flying to Bogota and then given the option of flying to Quito – all, may I add, at our additional expense. If we were not happy with this option, we could agree to sign off the trip in Bogota and be given $250 compensation - the alleged cost per person of the Bogota to Quito section.

All well and good but I came to Colombia to see Colombia and much I didn’t want to be alone in Bogata , I didn’t want to miss out on seeing what is an intoxicating country which I have been totally taken with. Deeply disappointed with Toucan’s decision, we all started researching alternative options - with an air of every man for himself, it was horrible. The majority of people decided to take the money and run (many had already decided they were abandoning the tour so being offered this money was a bonus for them).

Only 8 of the 24 decided to continue the trip under the auspices of Toucan all the way to Quito.
With huge votes of confidence from friends on my independent travelling abilities and my flair for Spanish (ha!), I decided that I wasn’t going to let Toucan short change my time here and I was going to make my own efforts to see the country I came to see. Having looked at the options, Carly and Mark decided to join me on my mission to do Colombia at ground level. Hence, we are signing off the trip in Bogota and taking the rest of the country in small chunks, monitoring the road conditions and seeing how far South we can get. With tips and advice from friends who have travelled here, I am really excited to be going it alone…..I am saturated with Group Travel. It has its pros but there are so many cons I have firmly come round to the decision that I prefer travelling solo. SE Asia – watch out!

Agreeing to the revised itinerary of7 days in Cartagena was too much and so getting up to Tayrona was fantastic – something that Toucan could have re-organised for us and I will be in contact with them when I get back to the UK. However, as well as exploring the old city, taking in sunset beyond the ramparts at Café del Mar, some of us booked to go out to Volcan de Lodo El Totumo – a 15 metre high volcanic mound that instead of spewing ash and lava bubbles volcanic mud due to the pressure of gases emitted from the underground decaying organic matter.

Climbing up steps carved into the hill in our swimmers we stepped into this huge bath of thick gloopy grey mud. It felt like floating in a vat of bubbling lukewarm viscous chocolate. We bobbed above the mud line – our buoyancy top heavy so it seemed our boobs balanced on top of the mud making them look huge. Part of the experience was being massaged by guys that spend their days tending to the tourists visiting this phenomenon. Lying there with the hot sun streaming down, floating in this mud with my ears submerged so everything was a fug having some random bloke rubbing my body was slightly disconcerting. A strangely sensuous experience which culminated in us bathing in the adjacent lagoon, having the mud washed off us by ladies who insisted on whipping our swimmers off so we sat in the shallow waters stark bolock naked.

I seem to have had a lot of massaging in Colombia…perhaps that’s why I am liking the country so much! On another occasion some of us had gone down to the beach right near our hotel for sunset when we were approached by massage hustlers! For the equivalent of £5, I agreed to a full body session. This was an experience – lying flat direct on the sand whilst 2 well-endowed local women pummelled and kneaded me with aloe cream, rinsing it off with sea water. I cant say it was the most relaxing massages I have ever had but it was certainly memorable.

From Cartagena we flew to the capital Bogota and have journeyed out to the colonial town of Villa de Leyva – a whitewashed pueblo town with pretty cobbled streets and rich Bogotanos enjoying the mild climate at 3500m. Here for one night, we came via the bizarre underground salt cathedral of Zipaquira – Colombia’s number one attraction. A vast collection of subterranean tunnels and atriums with a Cathedral measuring 75m long and 18m high, it was one of the more unusual places of religious worship I have visited.

Apart from the irritation with the way Toucan have handled the inclement weather – choosing the easy option to get the tour to Quito, basing decisions on margin and revenue rather than their customer’s satisfaction, I am taking the $250 refund which covers only a fraction of the additional costs of all the flights we have taken and going to give the rest of Colombia my very best shot as it is a country that deserves time and attention. Next up, I am flying with Carly and Mark from Bogota to Armenia and we are going to explore the Zona Cafetera…. According to my research, the roads are clear and south we shall go.

My preconception that Colombia is a country full of dense impenetrable jungle and gun toting moustachioed drug barons has been proven utterly wrong. This reputation though has yet to seep through to the back-packing crowd and although one must be careful travelling here, I don’t feel more unsafe here than any other South American country I have explored so bring it on – the rest of Colombia, here I come!

Hope all is well in the May sunshine.

Han x

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