Colombia Day 1 – January 15, 2016
I’m on my next adventure – in Colombia!
My parents weren’t the most excited about this trip, as
Colombia hasn’t always been the most traditional tourist destination. However,
over the past five years the tourism industry has really picked up, and I know
about 10 friends who have visited Bogota and Cartagena over the past two years
from Texas who have absolutely loved it.
I am traveling with three of my colleagues from work, and so
far, it’s been an awesome trip. We departed DFW Thursday afternoon to arrive in
Colombia at midnight. The flight was actually really short – only about 5
hours! A perfect length for 2 movies and an airplane meal.
Since we arrived so late we went straight to the hotel (no
hostels this trip) and decided that we would regroup at 11 the next morning to
begin our adventure. The accommodations are really nice, and we managed having
2 rooms for 4 people, so I feel like I’m traveling in complete luxury. What
made it all the more luxurious was getting a knock on our door at 2 a.m. with a
welcome cheese platter from the front desk. WHAT? It was the most random thing
ever, but I can’t say that I complained. It was tasty.
So, it’s Friday night now and I’m sitting with my
complimentary drink in the hotel lobby super satisfied with our first day in
Bogota. We may not have seen a ton of things, but the day was fluid, exciting,
beautiful and adventurous.
We began by having lunch at a spot recommended by another
colleague from this area – Andres Carne De Res. The meal ended up being THREE
HOURS long, and it was nothing but relaxing and delicious. We were served a
platter of fruits to munch on as we perused the 60 page menu, and then enjoyed
delicious Colombian coffee with milk, followed by empanadas, a cheese platter,
filet minion, and desert. The biggest surprise was how affordable it all was.
We were undoubtedly at one of the more popular restaurants in the area, yet
after all was said and done, it came out to no more than $25 per person. The
portions were also huge. When I ordered my steak I thought that I would get a
small piece of meat, and I ended up with 4 medallions of choice cut steak. I
would recommend it to anyone visiting Bogota! The environment and music made it
all even better.
After lunch we walked around the area and enjoyed looking at
some of the street art, small shops and handicrafts being sold by the locals.
It was a very pedestrian part of town, so walking around was easy and
enjoyable. We hopped in a cab around 3:30 to head to the south part of town
where the museums are, and ended up forgetting to go to them all together. When
we arrived, we had intended to walk into the gold museum, but ended up seeing
an outdoor market with souvenirs instead that we wandered around. There were some
sick kicks in the shops – I may come home with some hand woven booties. When we
were there, one of the shop owners told us about the church on top of the
mountain – Monseratte – and we decided that we absolutely had to go. Side note
– no one speaks English here so our Spanish skills have really sharpened up
quickly! We abandoned the museum and walked up the street to where we thought
the station was for the gondola up the mountain. It was a bit of an adventure
actually finding the station… but after conversing (in Spanish) with many
university students, and finally finding some tourists (who happened to have
gone to school in Texas!!!), we made it. The ride up was really fun for me
since I’m a huge fan of heights, but some of the girls I were traveling with
weren’t as big of fans. However, it was undeniable that the view from the top
was well worth it. You could even tell how much the air had thinned.
While on top we met a couple of other travelers – 2 guys
from Austin who I had recognized from my flight, and a girl who was backpacking
by herself through South America from England. We had a wonderful conversation
about travel while watching the sun set over the entire city. It was a
beautiful sight.
After the sun set we decided to all grab dinner together. It
was a challenge to get a cab big enough for the 7 of us, so we walked through
town for a while hoping to find better luck. In the process we ended up
stopping at the girl’s hostel (!!! My favorite places), and enjoyed a beer
while meeting some of the other travelers from California, England, and
Croatia. None of us had much of a hunger after lunch for a big dinner, so we
settled for a quick Mediterranean meal and then headed back to the hotel.
Tomorrow we are departing for Cartagena in the morning for
some beach time! Until then…
Cartagena – January 19, 2016
As I write this I am sitting in the airport in Cartagena
about to board a plane back to Bogota, where we will spend a final 10 hours
exploring the city before taking off in the middle of the night to fly back to
Dallas to re-enter the real world.
We have been in Cartagena for about 3 full days. The Walled
City (old town) in Cartagena was breathtaking – and it, combined with the
beauty of the islands off the coast, makes the city one of the top attractions
for travelers in Colombia. During our stay we met people from across Europe,
Brazil and the U.S., but it is also clearly a favorite vacation destination for
Colombians who live elsewhere. Language barriers were still quite present, but
for more expensive activities (scuba diving, island tours, very nice
restaurants), we were able to find decent English speakers. However, most of
the city’s inhabitants spoke only Spanish.
Our first day in the city we spent our time exploring the
Walled City. We arrived at our hotel from the airport around 11 a.m., and after
spending a fair amount of time ooh-ing and ahh-ing at how pretty the property
was and settling in, we took off for our first taste of the city. The walled
city was only about a quarter of a mile from our hotel, and its entrance is
marked by a grand yellow clock tower. Within the walled city are many parks,
public squares, cathedrals, theaters, shops and restaurants galore. There were
also a number of street vendors and street performers – however, most
performers came out at night. There were young kids trying to start a career as
rappers, a “headless” man who would scare big groups of people walking by, a
man hovering in mid-air holding only a staff, and countless groups of musicians
and dancers. The architecture is also beautiful – each house is painted a
different color, and the balconies are all draped in a bounty of bright
flowers. The streets are narrow, and at night time they ring with the sound of
horses hoofs as they pull carriages through the town.
We struck out our first day when it came to food – our service was terrible and slow, and the food was bland. We went for dinner at a place called Café Del Mar that was perched atop the wall with a beautiful view of the sunset, but unfortunately we got our drinks slowly and the food menu was scarce. It actually took us about 2 hours to get a basket of bread. The view and environment was great, but if you ever choose to go here, I recommend drinks only.
The second day of our stay I went scuba diving. I didn’t know exactly what to expect, as I had found the dive shop online while in the states, but it ended up being a wonderful day. We met at the dive shop at 8 a.m., and I joined a group that consisted of citizens from Canada, Denmark, Holland, Germany, and Colombia. Everyone was quite friendly, and I had the opportunity to have conversations with each over the course of the day about travel, fear of the unknown, how terrorism is affecting our home countries, and how to travel with a career. It was a stimulating day both intellectually and aesthetically. From the dive shop we went to the port of Cartagena and boarded a speed boat with about 20 other people to take out to the national park in the Islas Rosaria. The boat took us through the bay and open sea for about an hour before delivering us to the Isla de Pirates, where our companions departed. The divers took a second boat to a different hotel where we got our fins and masks, then boarded the dive boat to travel out to the reefs. We did two dives, and each were very satisfying. The visibility was amazing, and the reefs were extensive. I saw lobsters, groupers, schools of bright fish, angel fish, rainbow fish, clams, urchins and more. The best, however, was being able to swim right in the middle of a school of bright blue fish. It almost felt as if I were one of them (if only for a split second). My diving skills improved over the course of the day as I figured out my balance and adjusted my pace of breathing to preserve more air. I’m convinced that there is no better form of meditation in the world than diving, as each breath is critical, and your senses are restricted to what is right in front of you. It is you, and your breath, and the sea, in a world that very few other people ever get to see.
My diving day passed as if it were a dream, and by 5 p.m. I was back at the hotel showering off and preparing for dinner. Our group asked the hotel for a reservation, and went to meet two travelers we had met in Bogota at Café del Santisimo. The food was incredible. Hands down the best meal we had in Colombia. I would highly recommend it to anyone passing through.
The next day our full group went back to the islands for a day of snorkeling and relaxing on the beaches. The water was a clear as the day before – painted with streaks of aqua, teal, bright blue, and splashes of darker colors. The boat ride out was just as relaxing, and the snorkeling proved to be almost as bountiful. The only bad thing was the size of the group – there were so many people that it was hard to avoid getting kicked in the head. I got to practice my under water dives, and frolicked below the surface with the fishies – even if only for a second or two. 
Our boat ride back to the city was a little bit more eventful – the waters in the sea had become violently rough, so we took an alternate route back, which led us through a river instead. We were able to see a number of small villages on the banks, as well as a more industrial part of the city where the oil was refined. There were small barge boats that carried motorcycles across the water, and only one bridge that crossed the expanse for about 20 miles. The bird watching on the river was incredible, and we saw many pelicans, ducks, and more.
By the time we got back we only had time for some quick shopping before heading to the hotel to prepare for dinner. Amanda and I picked up a few swimsuits, but otherwise didn’t spend much time in the walled city. We ate at Cande Restaurante, but the fare was not as good as the night before. What was interesting, however, were the dancers in the restaurant. About every 20 minutes tribal music would play, and a male and female dancer would spring into the middle of the restaurant to perform a lyrical dance. Some were beautiful, but others were frightening. The last dance began with the man wearing a scary mask and walking through the crowd “licking” them (with the plastic tongue of the mask). He then seized the woman, and appeared to abduct her. I thought it would give me nightmares, but I seemed to have escaped them. We think that the dances may have been a progression through time, and that this marked the very beginning. Otherwise, it may have had a mythical component to it that we just didn’t understand because of the cultural differences. Regardless, it was interesting entertainment for a good meal.
My time is Colombia has been great. We’ve traveled in a little bit more style than I am used to, but the currency exchange has afforded us a lot of luxury. However, there are a number of hostels in the city, and it is possible to do this trip extremely affordably. I have never felt unsafe here – at least no more than I have in any other developing country, or even in some parts of my home towns in Austin or Dallas. Through conversations with locals I have learned that the drug threat is much diminished, but that “Mexico is now what Colombia used to be.” It is the dawn of a new age of tourism for this country. The islands offer immense beauty, the country is affordable, and the cities are artistic and cultural. There are still problems in some of the rural areas, and it is important to travel between cities by air and to avoid public transportation between cities, but from our experience and that of many others I have spoken with, Colombia is a great destination for a South American vacation.
