Dog bites and racing stripes

It is with irony that Tom, one of my fellow travelling companions, got bitten by a dog whilst we were visiting Medellín which used to be considered one of the most dangerous cities in the world for its size. Fortunately for Tom, he and the dog had both been vaccinated. Unfortunately for the dog and the cow (I mean this in the satirical sense) on reception, they both received the brunt end of Toms anger at having been bitten and then told off for petting a dog "he didn't know" that was wandering around in a public place (?!) Only in South America...


Despite this initial drama, our stay in Medellín, the second largest city in Colombia, was enjoyable, although regrettably we didn't get to do the Pablo Escobar tour due to it being an Easter holiday. For those of you wondering who Mr Escobar is, he was an elusive cocaine trafficker who by the mid 1980’s, was one of the most powerful men in the world. Amazingly Forbes magazine listed him as the seventh-richest man in the world! His empire included an army of soldiers and criminals, a private zoo, mansions and apartments all over Colombia, private airstrips and planes for drug transport and a personal wealth reported to be in the neighborhood of $24 billion. He could order the murder of anyone, anywhere, any time. To the people of  Medellín  he was a modern day Robin Hood who saw him as a local boy "done good" who was giving back to his community in the form of parks, schools, stadiums, churches and even housing for the poorest of Medellín’s inhabitants. In December 2003, Escobar was killed during a shoot-out with Colombian security forces on the rooftop of a home in the middle class area of Medellín. Botero, the Colombian artist I mentioned in my previous blog on Bogotá, depicted this scene in one of his paintings:

Botero´s depiction of the death of Escobar

There is certainly a lot more wealth in Medellin than in Bogotá, this was evident in the expensive cars, motorbikes and grand looking houses we saw whilst staying in the El Poblado district. The city also came across as much cooler in terms of its bars and shops. I shall certainly be going back in the future to explore it some more as I felt we didn't really see that much. This was mainly due to the rainy weather we had and also due to socialising too much!

A casino we passed in the bus station - I think they meant to write Aces...

In search of better weather we headed up to the Caribbean coastline of Colombia to the city of Cartagena. Whilst staying at the coffee plantation in Manizales we had met a lovely German girl called Katrina who lived in Cartagena who said we could stay in her apartment in the Getsemani district whilst she wasn't there.  Being that it was Easter weekend and also the run up to the Summit of the Americas and most hostels were booked up we agreed immediately!


In future I have learnt not to let the boys book my bus ticket as the end result ended up little something like this...

They gave me the surname Bugbite from the initial insect bites I got back in Cali...

The weather in Cartagena certainly didnt disappoint, although it was a little too humid for my liking but then I am the milky bar kid and any heat makes me melt : D


The city itself is very beautiful, colonial in style with all its buildings painted in different colours and surrounded by exotic plants and flowers creeping up and around the doorways. The buildings immediately reminded me of a scrubbed up version of Havana in Cuba (as and when the Americans get hold of it). There is also so much wealth here, much more so than in Medellin. It really is the St Tropez of Colombia with all its expensive restaurants and boutique hotels. 

Typical street in Cartagena

Milk bottle legs

The Medieval city walls

The apartment was lovely and had a pool albeit a small one but a blessing in the heat. It was in an up and coming area called Getsemani which we later discovered used to be the red light district and had some really cool bars. My favourite bars were Bar Havana and Bazurto Social Club - both of which had live music and great atmospheres. 

Bazurto Social Club

G&Ts albeit not Hendricks or Tanqueray :(

Bar Havana

There was more legroom behind the bar than in front!

Walking around the city on our first day, we couldn't work out why there were so many police everywhere - they were literally on every street we went down. We then realised that it was all in preparation for the Summit of the Americas which was taking place in the city over the next week. Amusingly outside the clock-tower in the centre of Cartagena, we stumbled across a display of flash cars and motorbikes (Ferraris, Hummers) all with police branding on them. It turns out that they were all vehicles which had been seized by the police from drug traffickers and as no one had claimed them the police had kept and personalised them! Again, only in South America...

Big police bike = happy Thomas

Its like a toy car!

The next day, bright and early, we set off to the nearby Playa Blanca (White Beach). Getting the tickets for the thirty minute motor boat ride turned out to be more of a chore than the actual journey itself which was choppy but quite entertaining. The ticket touts were irritating and everywhere, not to mention unwilling to negotiate on price. We did what seemed like the best idea at the time and bought tickets that didn't include lunch (cheaper) and then amended the writing on the ticket itself to say we were having lunch. Just as well as lunch turned out to be very tasty fresh fish with coconut rice and plantain. 


The beach itself was a bit of a let down as it was hugely overcrowded and there were speed boats and jet skis landing on pretty much every stretch of the beach amongst swimmers. All pretty scary stuff. Regardless, we were there for the day, so we made the best of it and hired a shelter and some chairs and then got accosted (once again) by touts selling everything from shrimps, to necklaces and massages. One masseuse offered me a rub down with coconut oil so that I would "go the same colour" as her. She was black. Somehow I don't thing coconut oil is going to make me go that brown...

Boca Grande in Cartagena - Little Miami is my nickname for it : D

Amazingly an empty piece of beach

The port in Cartagena - resembles Venice if you squint!

Annoyingly despite wearing factor 50 (which everyone seems to find amusing) I still managed to burn my shins (?!) and my shoulders and two parts of my back where my top had holes. I now look like I have wings and racing stripes on my legs. Nice. 


The boat ride home was hilarious as the sea was even choppier than before so those sat at the back of the boat - namely my other travelling companion Kieran - got soaked. At one point we had to pass Kieran some snorkelling goggles as his face was constantly being hit by water. Poor guy. 

Kieran with his face protector!

During our stay in Cartagena we discovered a lovely restaurant called Le Bistro so we proceeded to eat breakfast, lunch and dinner there most days. They made the most delicious Caribbean prawn dish:

Check out the pyramid rice!

Wanting some more beach action we headed further north up the coast to a place called Taganga which is next to the town of Santa Marta. Taganga started its life as a little fishing village but it has since seen its tourism boom and whilst still charming it isn't quite so quaint.  It reminded me of a Mediterranean coastal town, not at all like how I imagined coastal Colombia to be. We stayed at a hostel up on the hill overlooking the harbour. We arrived late at night after a bus journey which involved our bus breaking down and then us having to get off and catch another - I don't why Im still surprised by all the events which seem to happen to us whilst travelling on buses in South America...

Fruit juice anyone?

One of the side streets off the main road in Taganga

Afternoon tea in Taganga - jasmine tea if you must know

Fishing boats on the shore and obligatory stray dog

The beach 

Whilst there we ate dinner on the beach pretty much every day, enjoying the local fish that had been caught in the harbour.  My favourite dish was a fish taco:

Tacotastic!

I would have enjoyed my time at Taganga more had I not have been eaten alive by all the mosquitoes that there were. Id been bitten already whilst on Playa Blanca and with these existing bites and sunburn my milk bottle legs were beginning to resemble lumpy strawberry milkshake :(


This unsightliness and constant itchiness from existing and new bites combined with the heat (our room was a hot box with a fan that made more noise than air) meant I was irritable and unhappy much to the dismay of my travelling companions.


I wanted to continue further up to Tayrona National Park and then onto a beach called Palomino which Id heard was meant to be stunning albeit a mossie paradise. My physical and mental state however had different plans so it was back to my beloved Cartagena we went. 


Since we left Cartagena the last time around, the police presence had multiplied and was now verging on ridiculous. There were security guards / police every ten paces. We ended up playing top trumps trying to spot all the American countries in attendance at the Summit.  Despite the heavy police presence we weren't really told not to walk anywhere, in fact they were more concerned with vehicles so most of the narrow streets were blocked from cars. Several times whilst we were walking past a boutique hotel (of which there are many)  a convoy of vehicles would suddenly pull up (the level of car brand depending on the country - Dominican Republic didn't have such flash cars compared to Canada for example) and then the representative from that country would get out and walk in front of us. We started to pretend we had microphones in our wrists and collars as though we were security guards just to make the situation more interesting. Unfortunately the local police didn't see it that way and just gave us funny looks...


I am currently sat in bed writing this blog as once AGAIN I have an upset stomach :( 
We've narrowed the culprit down to either a chicken sandwich, a McDonald's quarter pounder (I was hungry and we were on the road and there were no other eateries!) or a seafood paella...either way being ill and in a hostel is not an enjoyable experience. Im hoping it improves quickly as I have something exciting happening early tomorrow morning...I´ll let you know what in my next blog entry : D

Big bulbous cup of Nescafè Gold Blend

Having consumed our weight in food and alcohol at the Andres Carne de Res restaurant, we felt the need to walk off the richness from the night before. Our first stop was the Museum of Gold in the centre of town. Normally I wouldn’t be interested in such a place but we had read it was meant to be good and given it was a Sunday it was free to get in.

Surprisingly it was really interesting and as far as museums go in South America it was well laid out and really informative - did you know that there are 84 indigenous groups in Colombia who speak 65 native languages? no? neither did I...

GOLD!

Is this not Buddy Pine a.k.a Syndrome from the Pixar film The Incredibles?!

Museum of Gold!

Bamboo car that was outside the museum!

Next up was the Fernando Botero art gallery. Botero was a Colombian born figurative painter and sculptor whose works depict women, men and life in general all with exaggerated and disproportionate volume.  Once again we had lucked out with the gallery being free to get in and you were even allowed to take pictures of the art works, albeit without flash. Needless to say I went a little trigger happy papping at the art work. There is something quite intriguing about his paintings that I couldn’t resist capturing.

Botero´s version of Ms Mona Lisa

Does my bum look big in this?

Gimme five!

Big bird

The courtyard of the gallery

This pic made me smile

Our final visit during our time in Bogotá was the Montserrat Monastery which can be found on a hilltop overlooking the city. To get there you catch a funicular train up and normally a cable car down but unfortunately for us the cable cars weren’t running until 2pm and seeing as we had been super keen and got up early that morning we didn’t get to ride them down. 

Funicular train

View of Bogotá from the top - its HUGE!

Hoof water bottle anyone?

The monastery

Bogotá is a funny city, I wasn’t expecting to like it all that much given that many people I know who had been hadn’t taken to it due to its ugliness, but actually we had a great time and I think we did manage to unearth the nicer parts of the city, especially the cool graffiti:

How cool is this? its graffiti advertising the release of the film Drive!

This is my favourite

Foxy

Bogotán Banksy?

Our next stop was Manizales which is known as the coffee region of Colombia. We stayed at an active coffee plantation called Hacienda Venezia just on the outskirts and off the beaten track – literally as our taxi driver didn’t even know where it was and ended up doing lots of illegal car manoeuvres including reversing on a dual carriage way to eventually find it! We finally arrived there at 3:30am in the morning after the most arduous bus journey to date. This one truly beat all the other bus journeys hands down in terms of lack of comfort and incidents. Upon boarding the mini bus (no big bus apparently on this route) my seat turned out to be directly behind the drivers chair screen above the wheel arch so my legs were unable to stretch themselves out and my face was pretty much touching my knees the entire journey. It was probably just as well it was me sat there as anyone taller than 5ft 5" (on a good day minus heels) would have seriously have had issues. Lack of leg room aside, the real delay on our journey was the fatality that occurred on the road we were travelling on. Basically a local Colombian had tried to cross the road and was hit by a huge truck (think the American kind) and was killed instantly. In the UK I imagine the ambulance services would arrive and move the body so that the road could be cleared by the police. However in Colombia there is a special police force which has to show up at the scene of the incident before any bodies or cars can be removed. This meant that neither our mini bus nor any of the other vehicles on the road went anywhere for almost two hours whilst the police made their way from the nearest big town. Not great when you have already had a long journey and can see a dead body minus any blanket to cover it from the bus window. There were so many locals (including some passengers from our bus) that were gawping at the body which we all just found really distasteful. 

After such a long and eventful journey we all slept like babies. The next day we awoke to the most stunning views from our bedroom. The building had originally been a plantation and had recently been converted into a hacienda for travellers like us to stay there. It was all very colonial and the setting reminded me of Cuba. Each bedroom had names of famous coffee plantations around the world, ours was called Blue Mountain Jamaica. We were given a tour of the plantation and shown how the coffee beans were picked (they are green to start with and when they turn red then they are picked), shelled and then dried and roasted. It is only then that the beans change colour to brown as per our usual perception of the colour of coffee. We found out that Brazil currently produces the most amount of coffee in the world - mostly picked by machine. This is followed closely by Vietnam of all places where lots of cheaper coffee is grown to be mixed in with other types. Colombia then comes third with all of its coffee being 100% Colombian and not mixed with any other beans. Coffee beans in Colombia are pretty much all picked by hand due to the terrain of the country being so hilly it prevents machines from being used effectively. Not being the biggest coffee drinker, I personally found the free coffee we were given way too strong for my liking but I was assured by fellow travellers that it was the tastiest they had drunk.

A Coffee sack framed. I bought one to do the same and then about ten other people on the tour followed my lead!

Free caffeine hit

Hacienda Venezia

The pool : D

The plantation. Spot the coffee bean pickers...

Pink pineapple! Who knew they grew in a bush?!

No these aren't grapes, they're ripe coffee beans!

Spot the English rose amongst the coffee plants : D 

Old school coffee bean shelling machine

Where they store the beans before drying them

The machine that roasts the beans

Sacks of pre-roasted beans - they go brown after roasting

Our ride from the plantation to Manizales the next day!

Amusingly our tour guide at the plantation, Alex, asked whether we had visited Cartagena (a town on the Caribbean coast of Colombia with hot tropical weather) to which we all replied not yet. He said he could tell as I was still so white and had obviously not seen the sun since I had been in Colombia! Embarrassingly I had to admit that I had in fact been travelling around South America since December last year and that I just don't really tan (with the exception of freckles) and that actually for me I was quite brown! I didn't bother telling him that my mother is Spanish and just goes black looking at the sun as that would have just made him laugh even harder...