Giant rocks, big parties, much love - Medellín part 2 // 19 July - 4 September

Guatapé’s beautiful thousand-island view was so breathtaking
(...or it could have been climbing the 740 steps to the top of La Piedra Del Peñol)

But...isn't Colombia like super dangerous? 

I got that all - the - time - when I came back from my travels and told people where I had been. 

And not to mention the facebook or instagram comments I got making references to Narcos and Pablo Escobar and drug cartels whenever I mentioned Medellín.

Of course, crime still exists - as in any large city. And yes there used to be very dangerous and violent areas, and yes the wages here are relatively lower than other countries, and with the rise of tourism comes more opportunists and robbers. But it isn't nearly as dangerous as it used to be, or as it is portrayed in TV dramas, or it is imagined. But more importantly, it's about being sensible and exercising caution and being a bit smart - like not walking around with your phone in your hand, especially after dark, and not looking like you're clueless or lost, and not walking around at night by yourself if you are female. 

But I think I was also very lucky not to have lost a single thing during my time in Colombia - not even my phone, any money, watch, nothing. 

That said, there was one time when caution left us for a wee while, and cost us a bit more than a few more Colombian pesos...

Marvellous Medellín - 4.5 weeks here was still not enough, Part 1 // 19 July - 4 September

I don’t even know how I’m going to write this. No words can do justice to what was quite possibly my most enjoyable time of this entire Latin American journey. It’s such a highlight that it has almost all become a blur, a bright, colourful, high-in-the-sky blur, with flashes of scenes emerging from the mist of nostalgic contentment. But I made notes so here's an attempt to assemble those into somewhat meaningful sentences...

What made it so great - In a short word-vomit summary - were the people, the city, the climate, the classes, the landscape, the school, the salsa bars, 3-weeks-of-staying-in-a-home-and-not-needing-to-pack, the magnificent stories of the city, the food, the affordability, the festivities…

I was lying in a hammock in Palomino one day in mid-July, recovering from the long arduous journey to La Guajira and back and I realised I was not at all satisfied with my limited Spanish knowledge and was thirsty for more. I also realised - shockingly - I was getting tired of travelling. But I was also really looking forward to visiting the legendary city of Medellin - the city made famous in the Netflix series Narcos, but the overwhelmingly positive impressions I got from fellow travellers and blogs. So I came up with the idea of marrying rest, learning and exploring, and decided sign up for Spanish school there. I brought my laptop back to said hammock and started researching schools in Medellín that I could start attending in 2 weeks' time. Googled ‘Spanish school in Medellin’, opened a few tabs on my browser of different schools, read one, when a friend Nicola messaged me to go hang out at her hostel, where I met Steffie, who had just done 4 weeks in Colombia Immersion (CI) in Medellín and who then managed to persuade me in the space of 2 minutes to sign up. 2 weeks later, I was sat in a CI classroom ready to devour more Spanish. 

The lifestyle I had for those wonderful 4.5 weeks was exactly what I needed.

The long trip inland - from coast to capital // San Gil, Bogota, 13 - 19 July

1. Palomino to Santa Marta - 1.5 hours (note to self / pro tip: the availability of bus snacks are dependent on the time of the day. Daytime buses have more variety - like chips, nuts, popcorn, whole fruit or fruit nicely cut in cups - like sliced mango in cups with lemon juice and salt! But on this evening bus we only had ONE lady selling banana bread and brownie, which turned out to be pretty dry even though when she asked how it is Nic and I both smiled and…didn't say it was bad.)

2. Santa Marta to Bucaramanga - 8 hours, overnight, freezing cold (tip: buses in Colombia are usually cold, but not always, but quite often. Always be prepared.) I also realised here that I sleep better with a podcast on.

3. Bucaramanga to San Gil - was supposedly 3 hours but delayed by an hour because they oversold the bus. But I made a Colombian friend on the bus who showed me photos of his toddler and his own music videos on Instagram. 

San Gil - conquering fears!

II wasn’t actually planning on coming to San Gil at all. San Gil is often labelled 'the adventure capital of Colombia' and honestly I didn't have that much interest in adventure sports, but Nic told me about beautiful towns that are easily reachable from San Gil by day trips, and Nic and Stef were going to San Gil on their way to Bogotá, and I had time to kill before starting Spanish course in Medelliín, so rather than being a loner again I decided to join them. Because it’s (almost) always better to travel with people, especially when you have the time.

(Nearly) Nothing gone to plan // Tayrona, Palomino, Punta Gallinas, 6 - 12 July

This was the week where nothing really went according to plan.

Well, my plans were so vague and flexible (it was pretty much just 'go from north to south, with some detours'), that it was so easy to alter or interrupt. That was the beauty of this trip - that I had the capacity to decide on the go. This was completely new to me, since whenever I went on vacation in the past it was never more than 10 days, because vacation days were so limited, so pretty much everything was planned weeks beforehand to maximise the use of time.

But with much more time on my hands, priorities are different. Seeing places is fun, but rest is also important. And even more so, people. In fact, people has been the number one reason for changing my plans.

And the beauty of this place is you'll always be able to find somewhere to stay.

Firstly, I wasn't intending on staying in Minca for 6 nights, as I mentioned in my last post.

In Minca, the Germans (Uli and Jana) and I decided to travel together for the next few days as we were heading in the same direction. So I joined them on a sailing trip they had found on Airbnb Experiences, and we travelled to Tayrona together.

Wasn't planning on going sailing

This is where I wish I had actually made use of my super-underutilized GoPro and taken some footage to capture the day. The short video that I could have compiled would have looked something like this: excitement as we hop onto a sailboat on a fabulously beautiful day, relaxing, eating, chatting, lying in the sun in our swimsuits and sunglasses and straw hats, a bit of being tossed around by the waves, a bit of captain-Sam-attempting-to-sail, jumping off the boat, swimming to and from the beach (one of the beaches in Tayrona), and finally ending with an unbelievable sunset as we head back to the Santa Marta Marina.

6 nights in Minca, instead of the 2 that I had intended // Minca, 30 June - 5 July

5 reasons

1. My airbnb and the host - it was nice to have a proper home to relax in, a kitchen to cook in (not that I did much), to stay as long as I want, in a quiet neighbourhood. David also cooked us breakfast every morning - arepas (with his secret ingredient - honey) with scrambled eggs and brewed good coffee from local farms. And we’d sit at his little gazebo in the garden watching the dog chase the butterflies, looking at the fruit trees blossoming in the sunshine, and talking about our travels and food with the other guests.

By the end of the week my host and I became such good friends he (attempted) to teach me how to drive a motorbike. His manual motorbike. I managed to drive it...but only once he put it in the right gear :P

We get all sorts of visitors at the Airbnb

Colombia: football and grafitti nation // Cartagena and Santa Marta, 26-30 June

Beers on the seawall, deserted beach hostels and an unbelievable discovery…

The sun feels closer here on the coast in Colombia. It is sizzzzzzzling hot. A couple hours of walking around already got me a watch-tan.

After the iphone debacle in the morning and a nice lunch of ceviche tostada to tame my mind and cool my body, I venture out in the afternoon-day sun for a 4pm walking tour. A free walking tour is my must-do whenever I visit a new place (usually a city), without fail, and is almost always the very first thing I google and then go and do when I arrive. It’s the most effective way to get to know a place, the people, and meet fellow travellers.

Camilo from Free Tour Cartagena was excellent - his story-telling of the history of Cartagena was informative and entertaining, gave us pop-quizzes, was really patient with us, and gave us lots of great recommendations for food, bars and salsa clubs. Charlie, one of the guys in my tour ended up going to one of those recommended restaurants 3 days in a row for lunch!

Cartagena

From the volcano to a pawn shop // Panama and Colombia 19-26 June

While I still can’t get over how beautiful the Pacific Coast sunsets at Nosara were, I think I’m still more of a mountain person than a beach person. I find comfort and tranquility in the terrain, the greenness, the cool air that comes with each fresh breeze.

In the morning I met up with Aiko again for breakfast, together with the rest of her yacht crew, for breakfast at Kwang Chow Restaurant for DIM SUM - YES I never thought I’d have DIM SUM for breakfast in Central America. To be fair it wasn’t great. The owner even gave me some recommendations for better Chinese food in the city, maybe because I talked to her in Cantonese. She said her restaurant is more for the ‘gwai lo’ tastes. But still it filled a craving for me.

The minibus to El Valle De Anton had 2 gears - death speed, or dead stop. It stopped several times along the way to wait around to pick up passengers, sometimes we waited for ages for just a few more passengers; the only consolation was seeing all sorts of bus snacks being sold by snack-sellers popping into the bus during those stoppages - cups of cut up fruit with condensed milk, plantain chips and nuts, churros…If I didn’t already have so many snacks with me I would have bought them all. When we were in motion, the bus would be going at full speed along the Pan-American Highway.

I stayed at the Bodhi Hostel - a nice simple hostel with a huge kitchen, huge garden and smoothies from heaven. I’m normally not one for dorms but they didn’t have private rooms and thought I could give up a couple nights of quality sleep and catch up when I’m back in my air-conditioned room and double bed in the 10th floor apartment in the city. More on sleep later.