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Published: February 19th 2016
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So it was time to leave Guatemala....I absolutely loved Guatemala, the experiences and the people just really made it such an amazing place to travel! But excited for Colombia we had to make a move. Crazy but it was cheaper to fly via the states and then to Colombia, then to fly direct! Infact it was 1/4 of the price! On arrival to Florida we decided to try couch surfing for the first time! The guy we stayed with was one of those proper pimped out Americans - hot tub, sound system the lot. He turned his living room in to a club in seconds. Really enjoyed a couple of days being able to put toilet roll down a toilet, not having to scrub fruit and veg clean, hot showers and clean streets!! Simple things. However i'm pretty sure we spent most our time crossing roads, forgot how spaced out everything is in the states.
So to Colombia, a new continent South America.....That's just Antarctica to go now 😉.
Cartagena is a beautiful colonial town built by the Spanish. We enjoyed walking down the old streets, visiting the castle and watching the sunset over the sea. To make some
extra cash, some of the locals like to do performances. Similar to Covent garden, only their performances take place over the road. Yes acrobats on the trees or infront of the traffic lights! Madness.
The north of Colombia is home to some beautiful beaches. So we decided to head to Santa Marta, a good base to explore and very nice town. On our first day we hit the locals beach and it was a Sunday. It was packed!! People were selling everything from phone covers to kebabs. There were cocktail stores, waffles, ice creams you name it! Tough life for some people though making a living that way but hey least people were purchasing it 😊! We took a bus to Park Tayrona national park, it is one of the most famous and known to have some of the best beaches in the country. We had a brilliant time here and really enjoyed camping in the national park. If you are in Colombia, this place is well worth a visit.
The buses are interesting over here, they take forever and I mean forever no fast chicken bus!! On these buses locals get on to make money by djing!
They bring their beat box and sing some rap chants. One experience involved the guy singing/raping to me, infront of the rest of the bus! I have no idea what he said but people laughed! Still one way to make some cash 😉.
Another beach we headed to was Palomino. The lonely planet states that this is a 'quiet beach with just flamingos' however in the past 6 months this place has madly developed! From 1 swimming pool in the area to 21!! However we enjoyed it and especially the tubing in the Sierra nevada, this was so beautiful. When we got stuck in places the local kids and a dog pushed us. Matt did not enjoy this experience as much due to banging his backside on a rock and ripping his shorts - yes the pain he was in seemed to last days.....We decided we needed to get away from tourists, as much as the north is beautiful, it is invaded by tourism! So we headed to a little fishing village called Rincon del Mar home to San Bernado islands.
When getting a mini bus in Colombia it is important to remember exactly what your bus looks
like as there are so many of the same white buses!! This became apparent on our journey from Cartagena to San Onefre!! We put our bags in the mini bus and then quickly darted to the cash machine. When we returned we had 15 buses that all looked the same....erm what bus was ours! After checking every bus we realised our bus had left. Left with our bags!! So in a panic we contacted security and before we know it we had around 8 Colombians trying to help us find this missing bus.....turns out it was just the other bus stop next door - yes there was our bus still waiting, embarrassing!! Nonetheless we made to it to San Onefre and then grabbed a motor taxi for half hour to Rincon. Rincon del mar is a quiet fishing village on the Caribbean coast. At present there are only two hostels there so as you can imagine very quiet. Well on arrival this was the complete opposite, the locals were having some huge party, there were people of all ages dancing with their tops off (men only), music blaring and fish being cooked everywhere. But this was just an off day,
Palomino beach
go tubing here. It is fantastic! after that it was very peaceful. We took a trip to the San Bernado islands, which are very untouched by tourism. One of these islands is the most populated island in the world! A tiny island full of houses, not sure how they live so close to each other. The other islands were very beautiful, white sand and Chrystal blue sea.
We experienced our first night bus in South America - in central America these are pretty much non existant as it is just not safe to travel at night! But Colombias coaches are brilliant - nice and comofortable but freeeezziinnggg. We made many stops a long the way to pick up all sorts of things as this is one of their main routes for transporting goods to Medellin. But i'm not sure why anyone needed to bring a chicken with them for 12 hours, kind of felt sorry for that chicken stuck with hundreds of suit cases!
We are now in Medellin, for those of you who don't know, Medellin used to be the most dangerous city in the world. This was due to the drug trade. It is home to the 'dead' Pablo Escobar - biggest
drug dealer ever. Even 10 years ago Medellin was not safe to visit. But now it is becoming one of the best cities in Colombia - full of life and very buzzing.
We took a tourist walking tour around Medellin. A must do if you visit here and is free! Whilst sitting outside one of the famous churches - one guy decided he wanted to show us his 'ripped body' more like flabby man boobs. But nonetheless we listened to him, he said he was speaking Chinese. But I think if I were Chinese and heard zing, zing as speaking Chinese, I may be a little offended?!
Medellin is also home to the famous artist Fernando Botero. He produces paintings and sculptures of naked people mainly. But interestingly shaped naked people, some with their heads chopped off?!
May sound a crazy place but actually the Colombians have really tried to change things around here in Medellin and it's very inspiring to see. One place we visited on our tourist walking tour, used to be home to prostitutes, muggings and murders basically. But it is now the centre of education. That just goes to show how education can
transform a place to a better position 😉! Medellin is very cheap to live, in comparison it is 406 % cheaper than London!!
Unfortunately they seem to speak Spanish on another level here, we can't understand and when we try to speak our basic Guatemalan spanish they have no idea what we are saying! This became apparent when I needed to buy a phone sim card. After trying to explain to the women what I needed for 20 minutes she then told me she didn't understand. So out came good old google translate, which actually doesn't work a lot of the time! Finally we had got somewhere, only to then find out I still didn't have the right sim. Finally it was sorted and excited to use my new phone and sim I realised my phone was now in Spanish.......Matt's getting so much better at Spanish, the other day a lady gave me some limes (due to being sick i've been putting lime in my drinks). Matt was so happy that he knew what she had said, explaining that the limes were to make the toilet smell nice?! Don't travel here without spanish guys, adios for now 😊.
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