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First of all, thanks to all of you who commented on the first Colombia blog! It´s great to hear from you guys and great to know that people are reading what I´m writing. 😊
I was trying to write the first blog with very little time, so I didn´t write about our whole experience in Bogota. We arrived late Monday night and we stayed with a guy we connected with on couchsurfing.org. His name is Leon and he lives in a nice apartment on the 9th floor of an apartment complex right smack in the middle of the city. He was very helpful, kind, friendly and his apartment was great because we got to have our own bedroom with a fold-out couch and our own bathroom.
So our first full day we decided to go to this small town outside of Bogota called Zipaquira, that is famous for it´s underground salt mine/salt cathedral. We read that it would take about 40 minutes to get there, however, it took us just that amount of time to take the public bus in Bogota to the Portal del Norte, so we could get on another small bus (called a colectivo) to Zipaquira. Let us tell you about the colectivos. First of all, they are like big, run-down vans that pile in as many people as possible. There is a driver (el conductor) who´s job is only to drive like a maniac. Then he has his accomplice (the money collector) who hangs out the bus door at high speeds yelling at people to get on the bus. He also jumps off the bus while it´s doing at least 15 mph trying to recruit more passengers. When we got to Zipaquira, we came upon an intersection where 4 buses wouldn´t get out of each other´s way and they proceeded to have something of a honk-off. All four colectivos honking at each other, just really laying on the horn until after several minutes some of them decided to move. Ryan and I have decided that people in this country just really like to hear themselves honking the horn.
So, the salt cathedral was an enormous underground salt vault, with at least 20 giant salt crosses. It was impressive in its enormity, but otherwise, Ryan and I were slightly bored on our hour and a half long tour. Ryan was probably VERY bored because it was all in Spanish! However, the town of Zipaquira is amazingly beautiful and quaint. I could´ve spent the entire afternoon roaming around the streets taking pictures of everything.
Our journey back to Bogota was full of more honking colectivos, crazy traffic, and rain. It took more than 2 hours to get back and by this time we were tired, hungry, it was dark out, and I was so frustrated with sitting on these buses that I could´ve killed someone. Ryan, however, stayed amazingly calm and collected (as usual) and kept me from going insane in the membrane. He is such a great travel partner. Don´t know what I´d do here without him.
When we finally got back to Bogota, our wonderful host Leon was waiting to take us to dinner (in his car - yay!). Yummy arepas and good company with Leon´s girlfriend Diana there as well.
Overall, our Bogota experience was good, but could have been better, perhaps, if we had gone on the weekend and had time to spend with Leon acting as a tour guide.
Today we travelled to Villa de Leyva. We took a luxurious bus from Bogota to Tunja, which was stopped by the Colombian ARMY. Ryan and all the men had to get off the bus and be patted down as they checked for weapons and who knows what else. It didn´t take more than 5 minutes and we were back on the road. Then it was onto another craaaaaazy colectivo bus for 45 minutes to Villa de Leyva. We passed some very beautiful, mountainous countryside full of cows and sheep and a few horses. The cows hang out anywhere and everywhere, right along the highway. But they are tethered to the ground so they can´t roam into the street, thank god.
Villa de Leyva is a beautiful, colonial town. It´s super tiny and because we are here on a Thursday, there are no tourists and, really, almost no people at all except the ones who work in the stores and the children playing in the Plaza Mayor. Oh, and Ryan just said I can´t forget to mention all the "mangy dogs", but I think they are adorable and I want to pet all of them (but Ryan won´t let me because I might get rabies.... that´s probably wise advice and I have decided to take it.)
So we are going to relax here for the night and then leave tomorrow for San Gil - the extreme sports capital of Colombia. Right now we both need a cerveza very badly so we´re off to a bar. Adios y buenas noches amigos.
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Kara Gall
non-member comment
Living vicariously
I am really enjoying this and will look forward to every detail.