Took the most comfortable bus ever to Bucaramanga. The seats are wide, lean back very far, and with a special foot rest that you can almost lie down. There were also about half the seats as on other buses, it was a very enjoyable ride, except that it was on the most winding road ever, and I almost got very very sick, so I had to "meditate" and imagine straight roads and stable positions, and I got better :) At Bucaramanga at 1 am, we met Geoff !!!
There was nothing interesting happening in Bucaramanga, just a big city, but with lots and lots of fruits, so we decided to cut our trip short, go to another town for a day trip, and leave in the morning. Went to a colonial town Giron. It looked like just another town, and I think I already got enough of these Colonial cities. I also figured out that the locals just LOVE talking to tourists, help them out, and solve any problems that we might have. So I with almost no Spanish, barely get the words to ask them something, and then they are trying to explain me for half an hour where exactly I need to go or to be. So just for the heck of it I'm asking them questions for their entertainment :) One girl in the internet cafe was looking and looking at us, and started asking a bunch of questions which I'm so tired of hearing ... where are you from?? do you like Colombia ??? GRRRRR but I have to keep my patience, cause for them we're the first tourists they see in months, the last tourist was like half a year ago. So we invited her for coffee, and she ended up giving us a tour of the whole city. We went to a cigar factory where they make home made cigars, so quickly it's amazing. They also sell like 20 cigars for $3 !
Now we need to get way way north, and cross about a third of a country. So we decided to try and hitch-hike. We got on the road with all the bags and 10 minutes later a truck stopped by because a driver needed to make a phone call, Geoff quickly talked to him, and we were on the truck heading to almost our end destination! The driver was super friendly, and we talked all the way. Geoff said that when he hitch-hickes, he always gets stuff for the driver, pays for his lunches, and then gives him extra money. Well not this driver. He paid for everything, and insisted paying for us as well. We had to quickly pay for his lunch when he went to wash his hands. So we ended up getting paid to ride with him :) He also kept saying that his "house" is our house, and we could do whatever we wanted. So I was sitting with my legs on the dashboard, and did some yoga in the salon :) He also lives in Bogota, and since he travels all the time, he said that we could use his apartment whenever we want if we'll ever go to Bogota. I always thought that trucks were these humongous unmovable objects, but he maneuvered it so quickly, side to side, avoiding all the bumps on the road and passing almost all the cars, even small cars. It was very funny when we got to some stop, and he was taking pictures of Eva and me with his cell phone, so Geoff says, come with us lets take a picture of 4 of us, and he's like aha, aha, and keeps taking pictures only of us :) 7 hours later, we arrived at an already reserved hotel :) You have to pay for the roads in here outside the city, so every few kilometers there are toll booth with $3.5 price for a car. That's alot !!! The truck driver says that to drive from Bogota to Cartageta it costs $200 ! That's an average person salary in here a month !!
Got to Valledupar, again, nothing interesting. The noise pollution is crazy in there. An average car will honk once in 10 seconds. Beep - move out of the way, beep - hey, I'm coming, let me go through first, beep - do you think you're really gonna cross the street while I'm driving?, beep - hey, wassup??!!? I really was annoyed quite some time, but then learned to ignore it. Eva didn't feel that well, so she went into the hotel. After lunch me and Geoff found some police guys (surprise, surprise :) ) to ask what is there to do in the town. Eva meanwhile got better and went to the street to look for us. While looking, she saw some police guys, and immediately went towards them to ask for info, she saw the guys pointing their fingers in all direction ... hey, what's happening in here, there are more gringos beside us? that can't be ! as she got closer, oh, it's you guys hassling the police :)) we wanted to watch a movie, and went to a movie theatre, which was closed, so we sat beside it and people watched. There was a popcorn stand in there, and suddenly Eva gets a popcorn, I get a popcorn, and Geoff is sitting there with nothing :) "Oh, not again, you girls get free stuff while I'm left with nothing" :)) They even came a few times asking if we want salt or anything :) It's funny how Geoff said that he can't get used to this behavior yet, because when he travels by himself, it takes him a while to get to know someone, and it usually involves a free lunch, and then a person might be of some help, but with us around him we get all the attention, and we get free lunches and information, and without him trying to do anything. So now he uses us as his weapon :)
The next destination is Maicao which is a border city with Venezuela, we need to exit to get a new visa. While negotiating with the "middle-men" about which bus to take, a guy showed up who said that he'll drive us in a car for the price of the bus. We agreed thinking it was some company vehicle. But when we got there, it was just a regular car. We were unsure if we want to get in or not, it was kinda scary, but got in anyways, figured out that there are 3 of us, and 1 of him :) It turned out to be fine. In this area there are not a lot of taxis, so people use their own cars to provide that service. Another passenger in the car was way too funny. We stopped like every 10 minutes to get him 2 bottles of beer, and he got more and more drunk by a minute :) He started talking so loud, and get really emotional. Geoff asked him a question for which we got a 10 minute story out, and when he left, he repeated like 5 times that we're friends and to give him a call if we need anything. We got into a few cars like that, and of course the more people they have, the more money they get. So at any time there were anywhere from 5 to 10 people in the car. We started to have some strange kids on our laps, and in 40 degree weather with no a/c sometimes it wasn't too much fun... although it is fun to remember it right now :) Got to some coal mine which was on the way to Maicao, and from being "tourists" for 3 months now, I think this was the most touristic thing we've ever done. I'm not sure what was the reason, but we had to wear long pants, closed shoes, and we got a hamlet. And the only thing we did is a tour around the mining community in a bus, "here is the pool, here are where the executives live, here is a golf course" ... then we got like half a kilometer from the mine and looked over it for 5 minutes and went back :( Got to Maicao which borders with Venezuela. In the guidebook it says that it's a very dangerous city because there is a lot of contraband, illegal activity, drug trading, so we got really early to finish everything and leave before it gets dark, because "stores close at 4 and streets are dangerous after 5". Got a bus to the border. I have no idea how that bus still operates, but it doesn't have a door, it's all rusty, most of the people in the bus are drunk and having some sort of party going on. Everybody's cloths are dirty, they're picking their noses, spitting on the streets, scratching various parts of their body, the streets are just filled with garbage, and everybody tries to cheat us. There was one friendly girl on the bus though who wanted to help us get the visa. So she's like, you need that much Venezuelan money, you exchange it here from that guy. Now you give me your passports and the money, and I'll do everything for you. ummmmm .... NOOOOOO !!!! We were really tough with her, didn't give her anything, and followed her closely so she wouldn't be able to get away anywhere, and just gave her a hard time. But she really ended up helping us alot ! She got it done very fast, and we saved like 80,000 pesos because we left Venezuela the same day, and they have some 24 hour rule, that if you leave before, you have to pay a fine. We literary left our bags with Geoff, walked 200 meters to Venezuelan immigration office, got the entry and exit stamp, and walked 200 meters back to Colombian office. They give new visa anywhere from 30-90 days, with 60 being the most common and 90 being very very rare. We get to the office, and of course there are 2 guys sitting there. So me and Eva put the best and brightest smile on our faces. How are you doing today? We really loooovveee Colombia, and really want to learn Spanish and Salsa (yeah right), so can we please please please get 90 days :))))))))))) (that's our big smile) :) So they're very hesitant, don't really want to give it to us, asking too many questions, but we're still continuing with please please please method. And the thing is that by Colombian rule, you need to be out of the country for 3 days before you can get back in, and not only we're violating the rules by coming back after half an hour, we also ask for 90 days after our 3rd month in Colombia. They asked us how much money we have, so we calculated how much it is, and said very little so they'll be sure that we'll get out. They also asked if we promise to leave the country at the end of the period, and we promised, so we got our 90 days !! :)) I got mine, and before they got to stamp Eva's passport, casually they asked for our phone number, we kinda looked at each other, and gave them Geoff's number :) They also took us to the office, and started talking to us, asking what we're doing in the evening, and that they could drive us to the city, and this way we don't have to pay for the toll booth, and they have a place to sleep ... so annoying !!! but we had to stay there for a few minutes cause they kinda did us a favor with the visa. Not thinking twice about staying, we make some excuse, and quickly leave the town for Uribia. The closest city to our desert adventure.
Saturday, November 28, 2009
San Gil - Gringo invasion
When Americans invaded Mexico, they were wearing green army uniforms. The locals wanted them to leave and they didn't know much English, so they said "Green Go" as in leave. Since then the term for the foreigners who look American is "Gringo". Gringo is basically something like an African man in China. You recognize him right away, he looks different, wears different cloths, can't speak the language, you could recognize him in the middle of 1000 people, and he basically looks lost all the time :) At first it was offensive, but now we call each other that and definitely most of the people in San Gil. And OMG the people !!! We've seen so many weirdos that's incredible ! "Do you speak Canadian?" was a question that I didn't really know how to answer :) One guy was travelling for a year didn't know that water in a bag costs 5 to 20 times less than a water in a bottle, didn't know that all the buses in the little towns leave from the main square, didn't know the difference between tomato and a fruit (called tree tomatoes), and didn't know how to make fruit juices. All of that we learned in first week in Cali. That's so strange how the experiences are different, and it seems that we know so much about the culture and people than most of the backpackers. For him an hour walk between cities looked like forever, and for us after 12 hour hikes it's just like a walk in a park :)
It still surprises me how easy it is to get to know people so quickly. After 5 minutes of knowing each other we already eating lunch together. I can imagine meeting someone on a subway in Toronto, having a quick talk like which station to get off of and asking the person for lunch ... maybe I will try it one day just for the heck of it :) It's also very easy to find people to travel with. In the duration of 1 week we met 1 guy, and 3 lawyers who invited us to travel together. With the lawyers, all it took is 1 trip to the cave and 1 lunch. It was a good idea, we got along quite well, but they were leaving way too early, and we haven't done all the activities yet. We also met a 75 year old man who was travelling and he did paragliding. It's very inspiring to meet people like that and to know that it's never to late or we're never too old to do anything we wish to do.
On Thursday we went to a cave. It was quite interesting. The cave was huge with very big halls, and hundreds of hundreds of bats. We turned our hamlet lights off and could feel them flying around us !! There was a place in the cave with vampire bats, and everything underneath was covered in blood ! At the end we reached a cliff where we could jump off 4.5 meters into the darkness with just a spot of the flashlight indicating where to jump ... nice !!
On Saturday we went to another cave which was by far more interesting than the first one. It was much narrower and people can actually do 3 day hikes in there. There is a river passing through out all the cave, so we were constantly in the water and surrounded by stalagmites and stalactites. The minute we got there, we had to get down on the bottom into the river and use our arms to get us through, since the height was only 1 meter. Then there were mud slides, and we had to sit in a mud bath to get ourselves fully muddy so that we could slide down. We also turned our lights off and walked in complete darkness in the river with our right leg on the edge to feel the path. There was also a spot where the water was high and the ceiling low, and only 10 cms of air in between. So we had to float with our legs forward, everything in the water, and only with nose and mouth outside, and with the help of our hands on the ceiling to get ourselves through. Another cool part was about 30 meters long with about half a meter of height, and we were just like soldiers lying down, and rolling all the way through :) Some guys couldn't do it though because they were stuck when they turned on their sides :)))
On Sunday we were thinking to leave but it was raining a lot of the time and the river was too full of water with big current, so they kept on canceling rafting. And a bunch of people stayed extra days just to be able to go. The owner of the hostel said that usually the rafting is canceled about 15 days a year, and only when we were there, it got canceled for 4 days ... just our luck. Anyway, so we decided to do hydro speed. It in a grade 3+ river, and you have a boogie board which you lie on top off and kinda cruise down the river. At the beginning it was fun because the waves were kinda big. But we were scared to go in since the current was so strong and fast, and the waves were big and there is only a life jacket, hamlet and a 0.5 by 1 meter board to save you. But once we were in, it wasn't too bad, except that there is no way of knowing the waves. Sometimes they get big, but by the time you get there, they kinda smooth down, and you pass on top of them very easily. So it happened a few times, except that one time when 2 waves from different directions converged, and I got just in the middle of it just in time to cover myself completely by a huge and powerful 2 meter wave. Immediately I lost my board, did a few turns in the water. It wasn't a big deal, but for some reason I started to panic. Good thing that the safety kayak was there very quickly, so I grabbed onto him, but still I was gasping for air since a lot of waves still were covering me by the time we got my board back and finished that set of rapids. The rest of the trip was very peaceful, with no more rapids, so we just went along with the current. The guide even told us that we finished the trip in half the time because of the strength of the river. The flip was very scary, but it was an extremely good preparation for what came next.
Since we were done so quickly with the trip, we decided to go to another town for some river. Got a bus there, and then had to walk for half an hour. It was nothing special, we just sat there for a bit, didn't even get into the water. We were so lazy to go back, and there were a few buses standing there. We asked the first one, and apparently he was going to the village. YES !!! We were allowed to get in. It turned out to be some tour bus with senior citizens. Of course he announced to the whole bus that we're Russian/Canadian tourists :) The driver was driving around showing us different places. He took us to some night club which was in a natural cave with a waterfall in front of it! Amazing !! So we thought if he's gonna charge us or not, and just in case we got out 5000 pesos, put it aside to tell him that we don't have any more money. But when we got into the town, we asked if we need to pay, and he said something like "only if you want to", and we were more than happy to give him that money :) ... Only in Colombia - hitch hiking a tour bus :))
On Monday, the rafting trip was finally on ! 18 eager backpackers hopped into the bus, got to the start point, and went through the most extensive safety procedures that I've ever been to. Grade 5+ river (the hardest river you can do rafting on) is not a joke, and everybody tried really hard to absorb and understand everything to stay safe. The guides were very knowledgeable, had a lot of safety equipment, and 4 safety kayaks patrolling the boats. The tour was fun, we got through all the big waves, mid way through the tour we stopped for lunch and played games. The tour was almost done, there was only 1 more set of waves to go through. The guide started jokingly scaring us, and almost getting off the boat as saying that he can't go through with this. But then he got very serious and told us to listen carefully to all the instructions, and repeated it a few times. FULL ATTENTION!!, POSITION, FORWARD, INSIDE, LISTEN, FOLLOW MY INSTRUCTIONS !! Okkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk .... everybody started to worry a little bit, it's the last set of waves grade 5+. Ok, here we go !!! Everything is alright, passing through them just fine, and then 1 big wave, crash, our boat spins out of control .... IIIINSIIIIDDDDDDEEEEEEEEE !!!! (the safest position on the boat, for the boat to be the most stable and safest for the riders, with us holding the safety rope on the sides). We can see the wave coming, and we're going towards it sideways (not a good position), SMASH ... OH SHIT, OH SHIT, OH SHIT !!! the boat is flipping, we've all underwater. I was under the boat right away, getting carried away with it, unable to get out, thrown from left to right, it hurts to hold the rope, the hand gets torn out of it, but I kept on holding. What to do?? trying to get out in all the directions, can't think, can't focus, can't breath. For a second I remembered the safely instructions that said that if you under the boat, just chose one direction the stick with it. Trying to remain calm, I push myself out by the rope with all the strength that I have left and 15 seconds later I'm outside, able to breath again, and moving forward with an incredible speed with the water. The guide got on top of the boat ... SWIM TO THE RIGHT, SWIM TO THE RIGHT !!!!!!! No way, I'm not getting away from the boat. It's keeping me up, and I'm holding the safety rope, so I stuck with it. They flipped the boat back, and I was the first one in. We rescued a few people, and 2 were brought back by the safety kayaks. Man what an experience. It was extremely scary!!! But overall it was fun, and we would definitely do it again!
pix at http://picasaweb.google.com/ed4330/Santander#
It still surprises me how easy it is to get to know people so quickly. After 5 minutes of knowing each other we already eating lunch together. I can imagine meeting someone on a subway in Toronto, having a quick talk like which station to get off of and asking the person for lunch ... maybe I will try it one day just for the heck of it :) It's also very easy to find people to travel with. In the duration of 1 week we met 1 guy, and 3 lawyers who invited us to travel together. With the lawyers, all it took is 1 trip to the cave and 1 lunch. It was a good idea, we got along quite well, but they were leaving way too early, and we haven't done all the activities yet. We also met a 75 year old man who was travelling and he did paragliding. It's very inspiring to meet people like that and to know that it's never to late or we're never too old to do anything we wish to do.
On Thursday we went to a cave. It was quite interesting. The cave was huge with very big halls, and hundreds of hundreds of bats. We turned our hamlet lights off and could feel them flying around us !! There was a place in the cave with vampire bats, and everything underneath was covered in blood ! At the end we reached a cliff where we could jump off 4.5 meters into the darkness with just a spot of the flashlight indicating where to jump ... nice !!
On Saturday we went to another cave which was by far more interesting than the first one. It was much narrower and people can actually do 3 day hikes in there. There is a river passing through out all the cave, so we were constantly in the water and surrounded by stalagmites and stalactites. The minute we got there, we had to get down on the bottom into the river and use our arms to get us through, since the height was only 1 meter. Then there were mud slides, and we had to sit in a mud bath to get ourselves fully muddy so that we could slide down. We also turned our lights off and walked in complete darkness in the river with our right leg on the edge to feel the path. There was also a spot where the water was high and the ceiling low, and only 10 cms of air in between. So we had to float with our legs forward, everything in the water, and only with nose and mouth outside, and with the help of our hands on the ceiling to get ourselves through. Another cool part was about 30 meters long with about half a meter of height, and we were just like soldiers lying down, and rolling all the way through :) Some guys couldn't do it though because they were stuck when they turned on their sides :)))
On Sunday we were thinking to leave but it was raining a lot of the time and the river was too full of water with big current, so they kept on canceling rafting. And a bunch of people stayed extra days just to be able to go. The owner of the hostel said that usually the rafting is canceled about 15 days a year, and only when we were there, it got canceled for 4 days ... just our luck. Anyway, so we decided to do hydro speed. It in a grade 3+ river, and you have a boogie board which you lie on top off and kinda cruise down the river. At the beginning it was fun because the waves were kinda big. But we were scared to go in since the current was so strong and fast, and the waves were big and there is only a life jacket, hamlet and a 0.5 by 1 meter board to save you. But once we were in, it wasn't too bad, except that there is no way of knowing the waves. Sometimes they get big, but by the time you get there, they kinda smooth down, and you pass on top of them very easily. So it happened a few times, except that one time when 2 waves from different directions converged, and I got just in the middle of it just in time to cover myself completely by a huge and powerful 2 meter wave. Immediately I lost my board, did a few turns in the water. It wasn't a big deal, but for some reason I started to panic. Good thing that the safety kayak was there very quickly, so I grabbed onto him, but still I was gasping for air since a lot of waves still were covering me by the time we got my board back and finished that set of rapids. The rest of the trip was very peaceful, with no more rapids, so we just went along with the current. The guide even told us that we finished the trip in half the time because of the strength of the river. The flip was very scary, but it was an extremely good preparation for what came next.
Since we were done so quickly with the trip, we decided to go to another town for some river. Got a bus there, and then had to walk for half an hour. It was nothing special, we just sat there for a bit, didn't even get into the water. We were so lazy to go back, and there were a few buses standing there. We asked the first one, and apparently he was going to the village. YES !!! We were allowed to get in. It turned out to be some tour bus with senior citizens. Of course he announced to the whole bus that we're Russian/Canadian tourists :) The driver was driving around showing us different places. He took us to some night club which was in a natural cave with a waterfall in front of it! Amazing !! So we thought if he's gonna charge us or not, and just in case we got out 5000 pesos, put it aside to tell him that we don't have any more money. But when we got into the town, we asked if we need to pay, and he said something like "only if you want to", and we were more than happy to give him that money :) ... Only in Colombia - hitch hiking a tour bus :))
On Monday, the rafting trip was finally on ! 18 eager backpackers hopped into the bus, got to the start point, and went through the most extensive safety procedures that I've ever been to. Grade 5+ river (the hardest river you can do rafting on) is not a joke, and everybody tried really hard to absorb and understand everything to stay safe. The guides were very knowledgeable, had a lot of safety equipment, and 4 safety kayaks patrolling the boats. The tour was fun, we got through all the big waves, mid way through the tour we stopped for lunch and played games. The tour was almost done, there was only 1 more set of waves to go through. The guide started jokingly scaring us, and almost getting off the boat as saying that he can't go through with this. But then he got very serious and told us to listen carefully to all the instructions, and repeated it a few times. FULL ATTENTION!!, POSITION, FORWARD, INSIDE, LISTEN, FOLLOW MY INSTRUCTIONS !! Okkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk .... everybody started to worry a little bit, it's the last set of waves grade 5+. Ok, here we go !!! Everything is alright, passing through them just fine, and then 1 big wave, crash, our boat spins out of control .... IIIINSIIIIDDDDDDEEEEEEEEE !!!! (the safest position on the boat, for the boat to be the most stable and safest for the riders, with us holding the safety rope on the sides). We can see the wave coming, and we're going towards it sideways (not a good position), SMASH ... OH SHIT, OH SHIT, OH SHIT !!! the boat is flipping, we've all underwater. I was under the boat right away, getting carried away with it, unable to get out, thrown from left to right, it hurts to hold the rope, the hand gets torn out of it, but I kept on holding. What to do?? trying to get out in all the directions, can't think, can't focus, can't breath. For a second I remembered the safely instructions that said that if you under the boat, just chose one direction the stick with it. Trying to remain calm, I push myself out by the rope with all the strength that I have left and 15 seconds later I'm outside, able to breath again, and moving forward with an incredible speed with the water. The guide got on top of the boat ... SWIM TO THE RIGHT, SWIM TO THE RIGHT !!!!!!! No way, I'm not getting away from the boat. It's keeping me up, and I'm holding the safety rope, so I stuck with it. They flipped the boat back, and I was the first one in. We rescued a few people, and 2 were brought back by the safety kayaks. Man what an experience. It was extremely scary!!! But overall it was fun, and we would definitely do it again!
pix at http://picasaweb.google.com/ed4330/Santander#
Friday, November 6, 2009
San Jose and La Macarena pix
this pic is taken without a zoom. This bird doesn´t move when it´s scared, it´s a kind of a camoflaj
this monkey looked so smart, with expressions of a human
On the army boat ! :))
our canoo back to La Macarena
cano crystales
cano crystales
cano Crystales
cano crystales
cano crystales
cano crystales
cano crystales
cano crystales
Cano crystales
cano crystales
Landscape around the river
Starting our hike to cano crystales
taxi in La Macarena
La Macarena, with interent service accross the street :)
La Macarena after the rain
View of Villavisensio from the plane
Our private Jet to La Macarena
rock formations from the earthquake
Geoff the tarzan
in the rock city
in the rock city
A bunch of tunnels with bats
Climbing the rocks in "the rock city"
Beef cooked the Llanero way
Sunset in San Jose
Feeling important with our police officer guide
Village of San Jose
On the bus to San Jose, with this beautiful landscape throughout all the trip
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Live & Learn
Went to town of Villa de Leiva. There are no natural resources beside that town, and when Spanish conquared Colombia they left the town alone since they couldn't get anything out of it. It is now declared as a national monument, as it remained untouched since the 15 hundreds. The construction or alteration of buildings is not allowed so it's very preserved. It was alright. Geoff and Eva didn't like it that much because it's too touristic, but for me it was a nice change after all the muddy villages that we've been too. It's very neat, clean and cozy with very nice dessert places :) All the houses are very looked after, have lots of flowers and little details, and each house differs from the other one. We finally went to eat in a nice restaurant, although still "fast food" which means food that's pre cooked for a few hours, so you don't have a choice of stuff, but it's pretty good, big and cheap. It was a fine restaurant quality, and for a $1 more I couldn't wish for anything better. The hotel was also the nicest hotel we've stayed in. As a backpacker you don't have much choices as you try to save every dollar, so staying in a sh*thole with no doors to the washroom, half rooms furniture broken, bed bugs, freezing water is a normal thing already.
The next day we went to a day trip around the city. Started our day with a Gaudi like house. The whole house is made out of mud, have weird shapes of rooms and hallways, there is really no sense to the structure, and it's not yet finished, yet it's already falling apart :) We continued our journey to the land of large stone penises, but when we got there, we thought that it's not worth spending $3 on these stones, so we took a few pictures with zoom, and went on. The next destination was a monestary, that was like 15 kms away. Geoff introduced us to the idea of hitch-hiking, but every car that passed by, my arm just froze and I just wasn't able to lift it up. "Come on girls, lift that hand up" was a constant reminder, but I guess I wasn't just ready yet. 3 hours later on the blazzing sun it came up by itself :) One truck stopped, and we took a ride in it, it wasn't as scary as it looked, some people are just willing to help. There was nothing interesting in the monestary except that there were 3 very angry dogs on the way without a leash barking at us like crazy, so we learned a new trick, you have to just bend down very fast as though you're picking up a rock, and right away the tail goes between their legs and they're trying to hide somewhere very quickly. Those country/city dogs are very used to the kids throwing rocks at them, so they've learned that lesson and better be safe than sorry, they lose their pride and get out of the way. It's really cool. Now we're using it every time ! :) On the way back from the monestary (15 kms back), obviously we tried to hitch-hike again. But so many cars passed by, and none of them stopped :( So Geoff said that we need to "meditate" and imagine that we're getting a ride, and cars are stopping, so I've tried that for 5 minutes, just sitting there quietly with my eyes closed and trying to imagine that situation. When I was ready, I put that hand up, and what do you know, the first car stops ! Although when we got to our next stop, they said that we need to pay them. We argued and argued, paid them at the end, but Geoff said that it was his fault, because he didn't tell us to imagine that the ride would be for free, and we need to be precise ... ok ... next time ... We went to the fossil museum. It was pretty cool. That area was once filled with a huge lake (millions of years ago), and then plates collided creating a hole, and all the water got drained. And so in this area are so many fossils and skeletons, just 8 years ago in 2000 a huge skeleton of a dinasour was found, and it's the largest and the most preserved skeleton in the world which we saw in the museum. At first I didn't think much of it, but a day later while we were having dinner it suddenly hit me "holy sh*t it was a huge dinasour !!!" :))) After that museum we went to the ostrich farm. It was pretty cool except that I didn't understand anything of what the guide was saying about them. But at least we got to interact with them, feed them and pet them. It was quite scary to walk between them, considering that they're not that smart, double our size and kick harder than a horse! We got on the last tour of the day, and on the way back it started to get dark very quickly. It was 2 kms till the main road, no lights on the road, and every step it got darker and darker. I could really feel my sense of smell, hearing and vision improving as we were walking, which I thought was pretty cool ! When we were approaching the road, Geoff told us to concentrate on getting a ride, because at that hour of the evening, it was dangerous to walk on the main road, there are no buses or taxies, and 4 more kms left to the town. So we started to concentrate, and again, the first car that went by stopped and gave us a ride! p.s. all of these things (visualization and energy) are described in a movie "the secret", so to people who are interested, I really really recommend it.
There were 2 things that we were supposed to do around the town. 1 was to walk to near-by attractions, and the other one to go on a hike. So after travelling for a long time, I chose the attractions first so I could relax a bit for a day. But after 10 hours and 25 kms of non stop walking in the sun, I wished that I chose the extreme hike first :)
The next day was a hiking day, and we cought a 7am bus to get there. There are so many farms in that area, and I always wished to try fresh milk. I was constantly talking about it, and again, what do you know, on the way to the hike there were farmers standing with fresh milk, and we bought 2 littres of it for 25 cents. It was nice, it was still warm. Eva's stomach was hurting, but after drinking the milk it stopped. 3 kms to the actual park, and for me it was more than enough, I did my part of the hike even before starting it :) But when we got there, it was very nice. It's a cloud forest, so the clouds pass very very low, and we had breakfast while enjoying the green mountains covered with clouds passing by just a few meters away from us. The entrance fee to the hike was divided into a Colombian and a non Colombian tourists. For Colombians it was $6, and for non Colombians $ 16. That it was too much for the hike, especially with our budget of $20/day. So we told them that we don't have that much money, and if we couldn't get a better price, then unfortunately we wouldn't be able to go. So they checked us in as Colombians, nice ! The hike was very pretty and very intense. 2.5 hours straight up, I learned that I need to work on my cardio. Eva and Geoff were flying up, meanwhile I needed to make like 50 stoppes to get there. But according to the guide book, it did take me 2.5 hours to get up, so maybe I'm not in such a bad shape after all :) We didn't see any animals, which was very dissapointing, but to walk along the clouds was well worth it. We could also see how the landscape changed on the way up. First there was a rain forest, then we reached the cloud level, and couldn't see anything, since it was all white, and then it was kinda deserted with bunch of flowers, small plants and clouds underneath. It was so quite on the top, there were no people, no animals, no birds, so I could hear Eva and Geoff talking very clearly 100 meters away from me. Amazing !!! On the top of the mountain is a sacred lake. It's believed that a 3 year old boy was born in it, and that how the whole civilization started. So indians sacrifized a lot of gold and threw it into the lake. Years later, there were a lot of attempts to try to get the gold out, companies invested 4 million dollars to get the gold out, but only found $20,000 of it. Some even tried to drain the lake, 100 of years and 10s of attemps later, the government prohibited further extortions of the lake, and now it's left in peace. The minute we got to the top it started raining, and with 5 degree weather it was pretty cold ! We thought that the way down would be so much easier, man were we wrong ! With the rain, now all the ground became mud, and we involuntary started practicing a new sports named mud sliding. The shoes although made for tracking didn't help at all, we fell numerous times going down, and after hours of being frozen, wet, dirty, bruised and scratched, we realized that we are late for the last bus to town, and that we have half an hour to walk 3 kms till the road. Almost running back, we barely made it, the bus was just passing by! As we've constantly heard that Colombia is dangerous, we don't really feel it, and definitely didn't feel it on the bus, when parents were putting their 3-4 year old kids on the bus with no supervision, a bunch of kids that age are going to the school/kindergarden all by themselves.
Next morning we left to another town Iza to relax in hot springs. The town with population of 2000 is really cute, but the problem is that it's not touristic, and a few hotels that are there charge a rediculous rate. We even thought to camp, but were not allowed since we didn't have a tent, and thank god for that, because in that region the difference between day and night temperature is huge! Eva took the initiative into her own hands and went from house to house to ask if somebody will host us. After a short time we found an owner who was willing to rent us a room in their house for a resonable rate. We changed and went to hot springs. The village is really cool because there is no separation between the houses and the farms, they all mixed together, and to see donkeys/horses/sheeps on the road is not uncommon. In the hot springs we were bathing along the locals, and giving each other mud massages and facials :) All the locals in these towns are not used to tourists, and simple questions with a 5 second answers usually lead to long and deep conversations :) not to mention that whenever we go there are people who just stear at us for hours. And if somebody of us is lost, we can always ask the first person on the street where our friend is, and the answer is almost 100% guaranteed :) In the evening we noticed that the light doesn't come on. Yep, there is a power outage again ! Yet nobody seems to be concerned about it. Everybody's happy, got their candles out, nobody knows what happened, what time it will be on again, or if it will be on at all. It's a bit inconvinient, but we love it, it adds something to the experience! On the main square of the town, the local tradition is to make home made desserts. There are stands of endless choices of various cakes with all the sellers trying to shove the desserts in us so we could taste them. And even without buying anything we were already full from all the samples. But they were so delicious that we found any excuse to go back and buy more and more until I became completely sick! Not a good feeling at all, but everybody seems to take care of me. People that I don't even know offering me pills and teas and giving me suggestions on how to get better!
We were supposed to leave, but after a talk with the locals discovered that there is a town nearby that has a nice hike to the lost city, and also the town (Mongui) is considered to be the most beautiful town in the province, and yes it was! It also makes footballs, and during FIFA matches, they export 100,000 footballs, and it seems like that's all that the stores sell. The town again is very clean, nice, and friendly, but cold ! Days and days later and our cloths are still wet and dirty, with no laundry service we don't have a choice but to wear them ... oh well ... asked some couple on the street where to find cheap hotel, and they ended up helping us for an hour, walking around, and calling their friends for help with accomodations. It took us a while to find a place to stay (roughly 2.5 hours). In the process found a guide to take us to the lost city, and he too ended up walking with us for 2 hours trying to find a hotel, and helping us buy food for the next day. The room had 5 beds, but we got all the blankets that we could get from the other beds that when we went to sleep we couldn't breath under the load :) but it was freezing so we didn't have much choice. I decided not to go for the hike because I was still feeling weak. So I spend the day sleeping for 12 hours for a change, and went to walk in the town by myself. It was nice, since I had to talk spanish without Geoff's of Eva's help, and I got by just fine ! :) When we were getting ready to leave, Geoff suddenly announced that he feels bad energy that we try to save money and that we negotiate too much with people, and that's not his theory on life, so it's time for him to leave. hm ... ok then ...
Next destination San Gil - the extreme sports town. Got on the bus, and the only seat for me was beside the driver, sqeezed between him and another person. It was nice. I tried talking with them with my broken spanish, but they were very eager to listen and help me out. They were all very worried about my well being, and kinda everything I needed was provided with. A guys winter jacket to warm me up, a/c was changed to heater, music was turned down, I got some space to sleep, and when we got into San Gil, they dropped us off instead of a terminal, in a hotel zone. And in the middle of the night with our bags, it was a huge help ! We just went to the first hotel, and it was sooo cheap, $8 for night, and it was quite descent. But in the morning we decided to find a hostel because it's such a touristic place, so after 2 weeks of being by ourselves, we wanted some interaction with backpackers. Now we're paying double the price as in the hotel, but it's all worth it. The first night, 20 of us went to hang out in the main park, and then off to nightclub with karayoki. Everybody's extremely friendly, and it's nice to hear some English for a change. We found out that most backpackers don't travel the way we do. We go to little towns, try to find way off the beaten track, interact with local people, do local things ... but most backpackers just go to the biggest cities, and do like 5 cities in a country in like 2-3 weeks and they're off to their next destination. We like our way better, it's way too much fun, many more interesting experiences, and we get to learn the culture much much more! Oh, right now the light went off again, and somebody's running around in a mask growling and scarying people :))) poor Eva, she's just went into the shower :)))
We went rapelling today, it was pretty cool ! We went down 60 meters in the waterfall. Wasn't scary for me and Eva, but a bunch of people got freaked out. It was cool though! On the way back, we were just shown the way, climb here, cross the river there, take the rope and go down these rocks, and we went half an hour back by ourselves without a guide ... typical Colombian attitude !
Next on the agenda: caves and water rafting ...
The next day we went to a day trip around the city. Started our day with a Gaudi like house. The whole house is made out of mud, have weird shapes of rooms and hallways, there is really no sense to the structure, and it's not yet finished, yet it's already falling apart :) We continued our journey to the land of large stone penises, but when we got there, we thought that it's not worth spending $3 on these stones, so we took a few pictures with zoom, and went on. The next destination was a monestary, that was like 15 kms away. Geoff introduced us to the idea of hitch-hiking, but every car that passed by, my arm just froze and I just wasn't able to lift it up. "Come on girls, lift that hand up" was a constant reminder, but I guess I wasn't just ready yet. 3 hours later on the blazzing sun it came up by itself :) One truck stopped, and we took a ride in it, it wasn't as scary as it looked, some people are just willing to help. There was nothing interesting in the monestary except that there were 3 very angry dogs on the way without a leash barking at us like crazy, so we learned a new trick, you have to just bend down very fast as though you're picking up a rock, and right away the tail goes between their legs and they're trying to hide somewhere very quickly. Those country/city dogs are very used to the kids throwing rocks at them, so they've learned that lesson and better be safe than sorry, they lose their pride and get out of the way. It's really cool. Now we're using it every time ! :) On the way back from the monestary (15 kms back), obviously we tried to hitch-hike again. But so many cars passed by, and none of them stopped :( So Geoff said that we need to "meditate" and imagine that we're getting a ride, and cars are stopping, so I've tried that for 5 minutes, just sitting there quietly with my eyes closed and trying to imagine that situation. When I was ready, I put that hand up, and what do you know, the first car stops ! Although when we got to our next stop, they said that we need to pay them. We argued and argued, paid them at the end, but Geoff said that it was his fault, because he didn't tell us to imagine that the ride would be for free, and we need to be precise ... ok ... next time ... We went to the fossil museum. It was pretty cool. That area was once filled with a huge lake (millions of years ago), and then plates collided creating a hole, and all the water got drained. And so in this area are so many fossils and skeletons, just 8 years ago in 2000 a huge skeleton of a dinasour was found, and it's the largest and the most preserved skeleton in the world which we saw in the museum. At first I didn't think much of it, but a day later while we were having dinner it suddenly hit me "holy sh*t it was a huge dinasour !!!" :))) After that museum we went to the ostrich farm. It was pretty cool except that I didn't understand anything of what the guide was saying about them. But at least we got to interact with them, feed them and pet them. It was quite scary to walk between them, considering that they're not that smart, double our size and kick harder than a horse! We got on the last tour of the day, and on the way back it started to get dark very quickly. It was 2 kms till the main road, no lights on the road, and every step it got darker and darker. I could really feel my sense of smell, hearing and vision improving as we were walking, which I thought was pretty cool ! When we were approaching the road, Geoff told us to concentrate on getting a ride, because at that hour of the evening, it was dangerous to walk on the main road, there are no buses or taxies, and 4 more kms left to the town. So we started to concentrate, and again, the first car that went by stopped and gave us a ride! p.s. all of these things (visualization and energy) are described in a movie "the secret", so to people who are interested, I really really recommend it.
There were 2 things that we were supposed to do around the town. 1 was to walk to near-by attractions, and the other one to go on a hike. So after travelling for a long time, I chose the attractions first so I could relax a bit for a day. But after 10 hours and 25 kms of non stop walking in the sun, I wished that I chose the extreme hike first :)
The next day was a hiking day, and we cought a 7am bus to get there. There are so many farms in that area, and I always wished to try fresh milk. I was constantly talking about it, and again, what do you know, on the way to the hike there were farmers standing with fresh milk, and we bought 2 littres of it for 25 cents. It was nice, it was still warm. Eva's stomach was hurting, but after drinking the milk it stopped. 3 kms to the actual park, and for me it was more than enough, I did my part of the hike even before starting it :) But when we got there, it was very nice. It's a cloud forest, so the clouds pass very very low, and we had breakfast while enjoying the green mountains covered with clouds passing by just a few meters away from us. The entrance fee to the hike was divided into a Colombian and a non Colombian tourists. For Colombians it was $6, and for non Colombians $ 16. That it was too much for the hike, especially with our budget of $20/day. So we told them that we don't have that much money, and if we couldn't get a better price, then unfortunately we wouldn't be able to go. So they checked us in as Colombians, nice ! The hike was very pretty and very intense. 2.5 hours straight up, I learned that I need to work on my cardio. Eva and Geoff were flying up, meanwhile I needed to make like 50 stoppes to get there. But according to the guide book, it did take me 2.5 hours to get up, so maybe I'm not in such a bad shape after all :) We didn't see any animals, which was very dissapointing, but to walk along the clouds was well worth it. We could also see how the landscape changed on the way up. First there was a rain forest, then we reached the cloud level, and couldn't see anything, since it was all white, and then it was kinda deserted with bunch of flowers, small plants and clouds underneath. It was so quite on the top, there were no people, no animals, no birds, so I could hear Eva and Geoff talking very clearly 100 meters away from me. Amazing !!! On the top of the mountain is a sacred lake. It's believed that a 3 year old boy was born in it, and that how the whole civilization started. So indians sacrifized a lot of gold and threw it into the lake. Years later, there were a lot of attempts to try to get the gold out, companies invested 4 million dollars to get the gold out, but only found $20,000 of it. Some even tried to drain the lake, 100 of years and 10s of attemps later, the government prohibited further extortions of the lake, and now it's left in peace. The minute we got to the top it started raining, and with 5 degree weather it was pretty cold ! We thought that the way down would be so much easier, man were we wrong ! With the rain, now all the ground became mud, and we involuntary started practicing a new sports named mud sliding. The shoes although made for tracking didn't help at all, we fell numerous times going down, and after hours of being frozen, wet, dirty, bruised and scratched, we realized that we are late for the last bus to town, and that we have half an hour to walk 3 kms till the road. Almost running back, we barely made it, the bus was just passing by! As we've constantly heard that Colombia is dangerous, we don't really feel it, and definitely didn't feel it on the bus, when parents were putting their 3-4 year old kids on the bus with no supervision, a bunch of kids that age are going to the school/kindergarden all by themselves.
Next morning we left to another town Iza to relax in hot springs. The town with population of 2000 is really cute, but the problem is that it's not touristic, and a few hotels that are there charge a rediculous rate. We even thought to camp, but were not allowed since we didn't have a tent, and thank god for that, because in that region the difference between day and night temperature is huge! Eva took the initiative into her own hands and went from house to house to ask if somebody will host us. After a short time we found an owner who was willing to rent us a room in their house for a resonable rate. We changed and went to hot springs. The village is really cool because there is no separation between the houses and the farms, they all mixed together, and to see donkeys/horses/sheeps on the road is not uncommon. In the hot springs we were bathing along the locals, and giving each other mud massages and facials :) All the locals in these towns are not used to tourists, and simple questions with a 5 second answers usually lead to long and deep conversations :) not to mention that whenever we go there are people who just stear at us for hours. And if somebody of us is lost, we can always ask the first person on the street where our friend is, and the answer is almost 100% guaranteed :) In the evening we noticed that the light doesn't come on. Yep, there is a power outage again ! Yet nobody seems to be concerned about it. Everybody's happy, got their candles out, nobody knows what happened, what time it will be on again, or if it will be on at all. It's a bit inconvinient, but we love it, it adds something to the experience! On the main square of the town, the local tradition is to make home made desserts. There are stands of endless choices of various cakes with all the sellers trying to shove the desserts in us so we could taste them. And even without buying anything we were already full from all the samples. But they were so delicious that we found any excuse to go back and buy more and more until I became completely sick! Not a good feeling at all, but everybody seems to take care of me. People that I don't even know offering me pills and teas and giving me suggestions on how to get better!
We were supposed to leave, but after a talk with the locals discovered that there is a town nearby that has a nice hike to the lost city, and also the town (Mongui) is considered to be the most beautiful town in the province, and yes it was! It also makes footballs, and during FIFA matches, they export 100,000 footballs, and it seems like that's all that the stores sell. The town again is very clean, nice, and friendly, but cold ! Days and days later and our cloths are still wet and dirty, with no laundry service we don't have a choice but to wear them ... oh well ... asked some couple on the street where to find cheap hotel, and they ended up helping us for an hour, walking around, and calling their friends for help with accomodations. It took us a while to find a place to stay (roughly 2.5 hours). In the process found a guide to take us to the lost city, and he too ended up walking with us for 2 hours trying to find a hotel, and helping us buy food for the next day. The room had 5 beds, but we got all the blankets that we could get from the other beds that when we went to sleep we couldn't breath under the load :) but it was freezing so we didn't have much choice. I decided not to go for the hike because I was still feeling weak. So I spend the day sleeping for 12 hours for a change, and went to walk in the town by myself. It was nice, since I had to talk spanish without Geoff's of Eva's help, and I got by just fine ! :) When we were getting ready to leave, Geoff suddenly announced that he feels bad energy that we try to save money and that we negotiate too much with people, and that's not his theory on life, so it's time for him to leave. hm ... ok then ...
Next destination San Gil - the extreme sports town. Got on the bus, and the only seat for me was beside the driver, sqeezed between him and another person. It was nice. I tried talking with them with my broken spanish, but they were very eager to listen and help me out. They were all very worried about my well being, and kinda everything I needed was provided with. A guys winter jacket to warm me up, a/c was changed to heater, music was turned down, I got some space to sleep, and when we got into San Gil, they dropped us off instead of a terminal, in a hotel zone. And in the middle of the night with our bags, it was a huge help ! We just went to the first hotel, and it was sooo cheap, $8 for night, and it was quite descent. But in the morning we decided to find a hostel because it's such a touristic place, so after 2 weeks of being by ourselves, we wanted some interaction with backpackers. Now we're paying double the price as in the hotel, but it's all worth it. The first night, 20 of us went to hang out in the main park, and then off to nightclub with karayoki. Everybody's extremely friendly, and it's nice to hear some English for a change. We found out that most backpackers don't travel the way we do. We go to little towns, try to find way off the beaten track, interact with local people, do local things ... but most backpackers just go to the biggest cities, and do like 5 cities in a country in like 2-3 weeks and they're off to their next destination. We like our way better, it's way too much fun, many more interesting experiences, and we get to learn the culture much much more! Oh, right now the light went off again, and somebody's running around in a mask growling and scarying people :))) poor Eva, she's just went into the shower :)))
We went rapelling today, it was pretty cool ! We went down 60 meters in the waterfall. Wasn't scary for me and Eva, but a bunch of people got freaked out. It was cool though! On the way back, we were just shown the way, climb here, cross the river there, take the rope and go down these rocks, and we went half an hour back by ourselves without a guide ... typical Colombian attitude !
Next on the agenda: caves and water rafting ...
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