Photos: Cabo San Juan de Guia at Tayrona Natl Park / Scuba diving near Taganga / View from room balcony / Main drag Taganga / Playa Grande near Taganga / Fishing boats in Taganga / Cartagena / Cartagena / Cartagena-fortress wall / Police on call at Plaza Bolivar, Bogota / Inglesia Santa Clara, Bogota / Gold relic display, Gold Museum, Bogota / Plaza Bolivar, Bogota / Hamsters in Bogota / Street in la Candelaria in Bogota / Performer on street in Bogota (green soldier) / View at Cerro Monseratte in la Candelaria, Bogota.Monday, March 30, 2009 1955 hours. As I sit on the hammock on the balcony of my room overlooking the Caribbean with the breeze blowing and hearing the waves crash onto the beach below my balcony, I feel a sense of sadness at having to wrap up my 3 months in South America. Time flies. I saw again today the beautiful sunset from my balcony for the 4th day. A beautiful pinkish purple haze around 6:30 in the evening. Colombia. The people who have never been here say it is dangerous. So it is if you make it be. Sure coke is available if you look for it, but no one is forcing you to consume it. Colombia has turned out to be a beautiful country. Cheap. Beautiful beaches and more English speakers than any other South American country I have been in. Bogota is an intellectual city. I stayed in the old part of town, la Candelaria. The temperature was low, 12-13 C and rainy. It is a pretty city with its share of crime. Just got to be wise about it. The Monday following my arrival was a public holiday. Plaza Bolivar was full of protestors camped out waiting for a moment to protest. Because of the holiday the military police, tourist police, regular police and at least one other division of the police were present everywhere. Motor bike riders have to wear their registration off their plate on a slip on vest with the registration clearly marked from and back. This is the solution the authorities came down with to help identify and ride by shootings. The busy weekend saw packs of people in the streets, street performers, and bag checks by the military police near the presidential buildings surrounding the Plaza Bolivar. I had wanted to go see the Inglesia de Santa Clara, a museum converted church with wall filled paintings. The inglesia location was between 2 barricades and each time you went down the street you had to have your bag checked. I had my bag checked 4 times the 1st day. The museum was closed so I went the next day. By the 2nd day the military personnel knew my face ;) when I had my bag checked. I also visited the famous Gold Museum (Museo del Oro) with impressive exhibition on the history of gold. I learnt that the Lost City (Ciudad Perdida) was build around 900 B.C. Wow! Definitely have to make the trip in the future. Whilst in Bogota, I hung out with more Irish, English and a Canadian backpacker and we went drinking my first night and again I got an overdoze of rum ;) Bogota has instead of a metro system, the Transmilenio bus which has a street dedicated to its route. It is a long red bus which runs in what otherwise would have been an underground system but on the street. In planning a metro system, the city of Bogota scrapped the metro system and opted instead for an on surface bus system with its own dedicated streets to run on. It is pretty impressive and is also pickpocket haven. One of the interesting street performances in Bogota were the hamster bets. What it is is a guy will be taking bets from onlookers to put their money on which overturned bowl with an opening each hamster will run into. It was pretty funny when the hamster when let lose would run up to an overturned bowl, stop in front and start scratching itself and not enter. It would just stay in that location. Due to the cold weather and no heating in the room, I cut short my stay and headed straight to Cartagena. Upon arriving in Bogota, I bought my flight. Cartagena. The place where I came to learn of after seeing the movie ‘Love in the time of Cholera.” It is a pebbled street old city which is touristy just like Havana in Cuba and Old San Juan in Puerto Rico. But you have to visit it. After all it is Cartagena. I met a good group of backpackers at the hostel I stayed in Cartagena. A lot of people pass through Colombia, some stay for months, after they discover how cheap and beautiful the country is. I have met quite a few Americans. They fly to Cartagena, do the 6 day trek to the Lost City, chill for a day or 2 in Santa Marta then fly back. 10 days squeezed in. Haven’t met any yet who are doing an extended travel – anything longer than 5 months. 5 months seems to be the magic number. Everyone I meet is doing 5 months or more. Some do a year just in South America. Met quite a few people who are doing 1 year in South America. Most travelers are in their 20s and early 30s. From Cartagena, I bussed it to Santa Marta, another 5 hours up the northern coast. I bypassed Santa Marta after meeting some backpackers who said it was a dump and headed straight for Taganga, a fishing village outside Santa Marta. It is near the Tayrona National Park where there are beautiful beaches and hammocks to rent to sleep nights. While in Taganga, I ran into some people who were on the boat with me up the Amazon. They were doing a scuba course in Taganga. I did 2 dives in Taganga but found the water temperature cold and miserable and hardly anything to be seen with miserable visibility. I supposed I could have saved on the bucks but a diver I am and so I had to see what was under the waters. During the 2nd dive, another dive boat dropped anchor and it missed about 3 of us by a meter or so. We were at a depth of about 6 meters. Just plain stupidity. The boat guy could clearly see our bubbles and still dropped the anchor. Luckily there was no injury as it would have been a major one. What an idiot. As all the other backpackers, I took a boat to the Tayrona National Park. One could have bussed it in, and hiked in 3 hours to the place Cabo San Juan de Guia. But being lazy I took the boat in instead. A rough and bumpy 1+ hour ride in. I arrived with a big headache. I only spent a night in the park. The showers I found were communal so I improvised with my bathing suit on. I rented a hammock in the “tower” hammock perched on some rocks which was surrounded by crashing waves and a very strong breeze. The night temperature was cold and I had to rent a blanket from the camp store. During the day I hung out with more Irish and English backpackers. Irish and Israelis. There are tons of Israelis in South America. More in Taganga than any other place I have been. They huddle in big groups and tend to be rude. They are not always the friendliest and are rude at times, especially in large groups. Most have just gotten out of the military service. Another rough boat ride back and I had to lie down to get my balance back. Tayrona at Cabo San Juan de Guia is absolutely stunning. Surrounded by big rocks, the water is much nicer than in Taganga. You can walk a ways and find your very own beach with beautiful white sand. Unfortunately the undercurrent in the ocean was way too rough to go for a swim. I picked up a gazillion bites not from mosquitoes but from the little black flies. Those itch the most. And most of my bites are turning yellow as I write this. I am the ultimate scratcher. Repellent didn’t seem to work. Back in Taganga, I befriended another Irish who knew all about Scottsdale Arizona. A surprise! He does business in Arizona and so has been to Arizona many times. A small world indeed. This, my last night in warm by day, breezy cool by night Colombia, I feel sad as I have to leave in 2 days on a flight back to Arizona. Not and exciting time. All I can think of is getting my income taxes together. Just a ton of things to do on top of taxes. It’s back to cold freezing Bogota tomorrow for the night and I am off to LAX. Colombia. Quite the contrary to what people say. I will have to return. There are still places I have yet to visit and it is a short hop from the States, compared to other parts of South America. Yesterday, Sunday, the beach was packed outside my hostel. The Colombians really get down on Sundays, rest day. Loud music and families and children hit the beach. Today, Monday the beach was pretty dead. I went down to the beach out front to get a massage from a local lady. It was a pretty bad massage and she jeeped me on my time. But it was cheap and was glad I got a much needed massage no matter how shitty it was. The place I am staying at Casa Blanca, has the best sphagetti bolognaise in all of South America. Mario and wife Sandra, run the kitchen out front. Their son Matteo is 6 years old and learning English. There isn’t a restaurant just a long table with chairs at the entrance of the hostel. Mondays the bars, well, there is only 1 bar, close down. And the drinking and party crowd move to an adjacent beach and have a rave. I can hear the loud music from my balcony. I supposed I could have taken a boat ride and headed over to check it out. I heard lots of acid pass hands. I wasn’t crazy about the idea so I opted to chill on my final night on my hammock and gaze at the half moon and stars from my balcony. Down time. Before 6 hectic days in Arizona. Then I am off again. My computer decided to have problems today and I was busy trying to fix the operating system off the hotel internet. The fellow running the graveyard shift was going crazy from me plugging the ether cables from the lobby computers and plugging into my PC. In the end I discovered that the drivers to my SD reader and ether connection has been mysteriously removed. Windows Vista is just plain shit. It really is. But hack, I need my baby running smoothly. I guess I will fix it when I have WIFI in Bogota tomorrow. Technology. It is good to have and a pain to lug around. A bigger pain when something goes wrong. This is it, over and out, my last entry from South America. Next will be from Phoenix, Arizona.
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