memyaccountantsandi.com

After nursing our insect bites (which involved burning a tick off Kieran’s leg with a lighter) in Santa Marta, we headed to Palomino, a beautiful beach close to the border of Venezuela. We stayed in a grass covered cabana, which had a loft type thing filled with matresses. Although the first afternoon, it bucketed, and we spent ALOT of time playing 45 and ace to kings, the next morning it was beautiful weather and the water was actually warm at nine in the morning! We spent the day swimming and sunbathing before I said goodbye to the boys and got the bus back to Santa Marta.

Our House:

Ten steps to the beach:

The next morning I took a flight to Popoyan, via Bogota, which is about 8 hours from the Ecuadorian border. I didnt do much as it was raining heavily when I got there so I just strolled around for the afternoon and prepared to get up at five the next morning.

From Cali, I left the girls going to Ecuador to do their Galapagos trip (blog post to follow I’m sure!!!) and flew back up north with Kieran and Ciarán to Santa Marta. The flights were a nice change from the long bus journeys we’d been taking.

We booked the tour to start the next morning and going on others advice and the state of their legs coming back from the trek, we stocked up on sun cream and insect repellant.

We left about nine the next morning to meet our group (turns out we were the entire group) and first drove about four hours by jeep to a small town at the start of the trek. There we had lunch and then headed off with Omar, our guide and Luis, his 15 year old nephew. The first day there was quite a bit of walking uphill, but also 2 swims in natural pools which was lovely, before we got to our campsite for the night, where we slept in hammocks in an open air wooden cabana.

Next morning, we started walking around 7.30am and woke up quickly with a nice walk through the river – water up to mid thigh, there was no point even trying to save the shoes as we would be walking through more along the way. We got to our next campsite around 12.30pm and relaxed for the rest of the day.

This was our pattern for most of the trip – walking in the morning, then relax in the afternoon. On the third and fourth day, there was a ridiculous amount of rain in the afternoon so this made total sense. Below a photo of us crossing the river and below it the same river later that afternoon once the rain started.

On the fourth day we got to the Lost City itself. Although the ruins are not as impressive as Machu Pichu, it was still quite impressive to see and worth the walk. The Tayrona people built the Lost City around 700 AD, but by 1600 they had been almost wiped out by the Spanish. It was discovered in 1975 by people looking for gold and then excavated in 1976.

Decendents of the Tayrona still live in this region and we passed some of their villages on the way. They wear long loose white clothing, have really long hair and the men look remarkably like the women. Our guide informed us that the indigenous people own the accomodation that we stayed in along the way and they have access to free medical care and education. Unfortunately, very few actually go to school and many are in bad health and many die young. They often don´t recieve medical attention till it is too late and the use the money they receive from the accomodation to buy modern processed food which they find hard to digest.

Me at the Lost City below:

What I had heard about Cali from otheres was that it was a great place for Salsa but not much else!  So we stuck to that advice, stayed two nights in the Pelican Larry Hostel (very good) and went out for some salsa the first night – oh we were like locals by the end of it! And then had a barbeque at the hostel the next night. Kieran and Ciaran had already arrived there the day before so it was nice to catch up.

After Medellin, we headed to Salento by bus to stay in the Plantation House hostel. This small town is in the coffee region of Colombia with another totally new landscape. The next day, we got a jeep from the square to take us to Valle de Cocora, where we did a four hour walk. There was some beautiful scenery, especially the wax palms we saw on the way back.

The following afternoon, we did a tour of the coffee plantation belonging to the English owner of the hostel. He showed us the different types of coffee plants – Robusta and Arabica. The coffee beans are red when they are picked first and then put through a grinding process and then fall into a vat of water. Grade 2 beans float to the top and grade 1 beans stay at the bottom. These are then dried out in the sun or in the oven. After we got to taste the coffee (really good – no need for sugar or milk) we walked around the plantation before seeing a great sunset on the way home.

We arrived on Halloween so we got dressed up. Myself, Steffi and Anna went with feather masks on, Elaine went as a punk and Carmel went as someone from the jungle. There were only a few people going out in the hostel because the main party had been on on the Friday night and people were still hanging two days later!!! We went to a couple of bars in the Zona Rosa which were okay.

Next day we were pretty hungover so we just got the Metro out to this cable car and then went up the cable car and went back the way we came. Its all part of the public transport system so all for 50 cent a great way to see the city. The neighbourhood under the cable car reminded me of a better version of the favelas of Rio. The are totally right on top of each other but just a bit nicer and bigger. Then we went to the Barefoot Park which has all these pools and things that youre meant to walk barefoot in. It was totally meant for kids so when we got there of course the place was crawling with them because it was a national holiday here like at home.

Our third day, we got up really early and went into town to the Museo de Antioquia (or some spelling like that).  Botero (the artist who draws all the fat people) is from here and so donated a lot of his works and his collections to the museum and it was in a gorgeous building. Then myself and Steffi went to the post office which you would think would only take 10 minutes max when there was nobody else in the queue. Firstly they dont sell envelopes so had to find a shop that did sell them. Steffi was sending stuff to the Chartered Institute so was thinking about sending it express post so we got a 5 minute explanation of the pricess. They were going to charge her 50 euro for two letters for express!!!!! She chose normal which worked out at 10 euro. Then we had to fill in a form with name, passport number and a finger print…yes a finger print and sign it so that we were agreeing that we werent sending drugs or explosives! Hilarious.  Then myself Steffi and Anna went to this cafe that was recommended to us for lunch. It was soo good. It was filled with old local couples who packed the place out. Great for people watching. We got banana juice (Actually lovely), gorgeous soup with fresh bread from their bakery, a main course of steak with rice, chips and a salad, a little bowl of ice cream and a coffee for about 11,900 which is less than 5 euro. Unbelieveable!
In the afternoon we did the Pablo Escobar tour. I hadnt really heard of him before but ye probably know him well. He was the biggest drug dealer to ever come out of Colombia. The first stop was up to Roberto Escobars house. Hes the brother of Pablo. Only a month ago there was an attempted kidnapping of him and there was a shoot out at the house but he had been tipped off about it so the poice showed up on time- still 3 people died! In the house are loads of photos of Pablo and a lot of momentos. Roberto is semi blind and deaf because when we was in jail a letter bomb was sent to him and exploded. So funny- he wrote a book about his life and its called “The Accountants Story”. it will be totally biased but going to read it when I get back. You should look up about Pablo. He was unbelievable. He built his own “prison” and stayed there for a year whilst still running his empire but then just got bored and left it. It wasnt a prison but was just a really fancy holiday home I think. The driver of the bus we were in today was his old body guard whose nickname was “Plaque”. The bodyguards of Pablo worked 2 weeks on then 2 off and when Pablo was actually killed it just happened to be his 2 weeks off.

Photo of Carmel below before Roberto took her into his secret room behind the book shelf!!!