Sooooo, here´s the first post of my latest adventures here in Colombia. So far I am loving every bit of it here, apart from the weather which hasn´t been as great as I hoped, but hey.. that won´t spoil all the fun I´ve had so far. One of the things I´ve noticed is that Colombia is far more western than some of the other South American countries. Most people seem well educated and extremely helpful and friendly. The country feels quite safe too. Far safer than lets say Brazil. Especially during the day all seems quite fine. I feel confident wearing my camera around town. Yet at night it´s better to take taxi´s and not walk around the streets. Noone does actually, most streets in Bogota as well as Medellin become empty at night.
Day 1
After getting up at 5 in the morning I was brought to the airport by my parents. After saying bye I checked in my luggage and waited around in the airport. Something I don´t neccessarily like doing, but it´s all part of traveling. The plane left on time and two hours later I arrived in the capital of Spain. At the airport of Madrid I had to hurry. Between flights happened to be about 70 minutes.. Not much considering I had to be half an hour before at the gate and knowing I had to get to the other terminal too. Thankfully I made it in time and caught the flight towards Bogota.
In the airplane I sat next to a 19 year old boy from Bogota. He could only talk Spanish so it was good practice for me to get into the language again. It all came back quite quickly. He gave me some tips about where to go and what to see in Bogota. Whilst in the airplane the match of Spain versus Germany was being played. The captain of the airplane was keeping us up to date about any scores during the match. Most of the people on the plane were either Spanish or Colombian, so most where happy when they heard Spain had won the match.
Once I arrived in Bogota I was welcomed with nice rainy weather. The Colombian boy helped me getting a taxi to get on my way to the hostel. The taxi drove me through rushhour, so it took a little while to get there. Once there I checked in and freshed up. I gave my parents a ring through Skype, using the laptop of a Dutch girl who stayed at the hostel as well. She also gave me some bread and water, as I had nothing to eat. Afterwards I met a French guy in my room. We decided to have some food together at a nearby restaurant. The restaurant was more of a little bar that did food too. The food was a mixture of all kinds of things. Patatoes, rice, omelette and beans. Not specifically delicious, but it did the job and on top of that, it cost nearly nothing (6000 Pesos = 2,50 euro)
After dinner I headed back to the hostel and had a few drinks there with the French guy. Later on I went to have some sleep, as it had been a tiring day.
Day 2
The second day I went to explore the city. Bogota has got loads of museums and most of them have free entrance. I walked around the streets of Bogota and the first thing that anyone will notice is the amounts of police on the streets. Basicly every streetcorner in the city has got at least two police officers with big guns patrolling the streets. They look more like the army in their army green costumes, matching caps and army boots. After a while it started to rain and I decided to enter one of the museums. The first one I went to happened to be the army museum. It contained a lot of history of the Colombian army and the wars they had thought, including all of the guns that were used during those wars.
The second museum was the police museum. I was welcomed by a few 18 year old police officers who asked me whether I wanted to speak in Spanish or in English. I thought they were just talking about the conversation we were having, but it turned out I chose to have the whole tour one of the boys was giving me in Spanish. Eventhough I have been able to hold up conversations with my selflearned Spanish, it doesn´t neccessarily mean I actually understood much of what the guy was telling me. Yet it was cool to check out as the museum even contained Pablo Escobar´s bloody jacket he wore on the day he got killed and a piece of furniture he used to smuggle cocaine with.
After the police museum I wen to two other museums. An art museum and the museum of gold which basicly contained a lot of golden jewelry and the history of gold. After visiting those museums I chose to go back to the hostel as it was getting dark. The general rule of thumb here is to not walk the streets at night, especially not alone. A good advise as two guys in my hostel were robbed of all their stuff by about 8 teenage boys with knifes in the middle of a big square somewhere in the city around 20:00 o´clock. That night I bought me a pizza and just had a little chat in the hostel with some of the people in there. I went to sleep quite early.
Day 3
Today I was welcomed with some nice sunny weather. I decided to use the oppertunity and have a look at the summit of a mountain that overlooks the city of Bogota (Cerro de Motserrate). From there I had a great view over the whole city, especially thanks to the nice weather. After about an hour spent on the top of the mountain i headed back down and walked to a busstop. Bogota has got a good modern bussystem that connects all parts of the city. I grabbed one of the busses to the northern busstation in the northern part of the city. A 40 minute busride. The bus was packed with people so I had to stand the whole way. At the busstation I grabbed a minivan to a town called Zipaqueria. The town is about 50 KM north of Bogota. It took another hour to get to the town. Once there I walked for a good 15 minutes through the town to arrive at the touristy salt mines. Those mines were opened to the public in 1995.
The mines were converted into a cathedral. Odd you migh say? It kind of was. What they basicly did was use all the chambres they had created by removing all the salt out of the mines into a church. Within those chambres stood crosses that represented the 14 stages of Jesus in the bible. There were 14 chambres in which a cross, usually made out of salt minerals but also a few made out of marble, was positioned. The tourguide tried to explain in broken English why the miners had put it there, but to me it wasn´t completely clear whether the miners had built it for the tourists, or whether it existed all along.
A big difference between salt mines and gold or charcoal mines is the way the salt is taken out of the mines. Usually dynamite is used and the salt is being transported out of the mine by trucks, or earlier in the day by horses. So no mine karts or stuff like that. Needless to say the mine was actually really big, considering there were actually trucks driving through it. No claustrophobic stuff going on there. It felt more like a big tunnel. The whole mine was lit by colored lights, so the whole thing did feel quite touristy. They mine was 180 meters deep and even contained a bar and a cinema.
After the tour I went on another tour through the mine where we got to wear miners helmets and gloves to experience what it was like to be a salt miner. The experience was ok, but nowhere near as realistic as the mine tour in Bolivia where miners were still at work. This felt all a little fake. Especially when the guy wanted to show us what it´s like to blow up a piece of wall with some dynamite. He lit the dynamite, we had to step back a bit and eventually the sound of exploding dynamite came out of a speaker they had put up in the wall. Afterwards a smoke machine blew some smoke into the mine. The guy explained this was all just a simulation as it would be too dangerous to use real dynamite. A big difference from Bolivia, where tourists do actually have to fear for the lives when they enter the mines. Yet, felt all a bit fake. Perhaps I am just spoiled after visiting the mines in Bolivia. After the mining experience I had a look in the 3D movie theatre where a little movie was played about the history of the mine.
At the end of the afternoon I went back to the hostel. It was rush hour during that time, so it took about two hours to finally get back. On the way home I read about a place where they did shoarma. As it happened to be friday, I felt like I had no other choice than to find the restaurant and have my weekly portion of meat in a pita with garlic sauce. After walking around for a little while I found the place and ordered my shoarma. Yet not as great as I am used to at home, it wasn´t all that bad either.
Afterwards I returned to the hostel and bumped into the other people there. We decided to go out that night and see what Bogota´s nightlife had to offer. The guy at the hostel ¡told us we were able to walk to the bars as long as we were in a big group. We walked for a good hour around the city to find a bar where we didn´t have to pay to get in (most bars ask for an entry fee that ranges between 5000 to 20000 pesos = 2 to 8 euro. We finally found one with the help of a local Colombian guy one of the girls happened to know. We danced for about two hours and then headed back to the hostel as most people had to get up early the next morning to catch their bus or flight. Me included as I had seen enough of Bogota and thought it would be time to move on to the next stop.
Day 4
I got up around 8 in the morning. I had a shower, packed my bag, at a few toasts for breakfast and then grabbed a taxi to the busterminal together with two American guys who were heading to the busterminal too. The busterminal was very big and secure, it felt like an airport. There I bought a busticket to Medellin, the next place I was heading to. The bus left 45 minutes afterwards so I had some time to buy some food and go to the toilet before the 9 hour ride would take off.
The bus was a nice airconditioned bus. I read in the Lonely Planet to bring a jumper as most busdrivers like to convert the bus in a refrigerator on wheels, this one was no different. It took a good 10 hours to get to Medellin. The ride was windy and bumpy, not the best ride in the world, but heck.. Compared to some of the busrides I have had in Bolviia, this was still pretty good. Especially with the toilet in the back of the bus.
The Colombian guy next to me was eager to have a chat with me, but I felt tired and didn´t like to tell the whole bus being a tourist. As if my blond hairs and big backpack didn´t give it away.. Eventually I had a chat with the guy anyway. The guy thought I was actually Colombian, which is weird as my Spanish is nowhere near perfect. What I did have was water and empenadas for the trip. Stuff the guy next to me didn´t have. I had learned the hard way on other bustrips in South America, finding myself starving the whole way.
I had to lie to the guy too, as he asked me why I was going to Medellin. I told him I was visiting friends, as the one thing you don´t want to is tell a stranger in a country like this you´re actually on your own, while carrying all of your important stuff. I told him my friends would come and pick me up at the busterminal. He wanted to know how I met my Colombian friends, so the whole story ended up being a big phat lie. In tis case I just couldn´t be too honest, even though this guy seemed really nice and genuine.
The hostel I booked myself into was actually full when I tried to book it for the night of arrival. I had booked it for the day after. I decided to just show up anyway and hope someone would have checked out during the day. If worst came to worst, I was prepared to just go out all night and party, to return in the morning and check in. Thankfully the hostel had some beds available so I could just check in.
At the hostel I met a dutch guy who gave me a beer as soon as I arrived. We had a drink and I ended up going out and exploring the nightlife of Medellin with a group of new friends I made at the hostel. The prices of the drinks really depend on what bar you go to. The first bar we were in charged us 2500 pesos for a beer, which is about 1 euro. The place we headed to later charged a 10.000 pesos entry fee (4,50 euro) and 6000 pesos for a beer (2,50 euro). We stayed at the bar till 3 o´clock, as that´s the time most bars close. On the way back we ate some food at a foodstall somewhere in the middle of the street and then headed back home to the hostel. Unfortunately the weather was still rainy. Yet thankfully not cold. Especailly strange as July is supposedly the hottest and nicest month in Colombia weatherwise.
Day 5
I woke up around 10:30. I had a shower and a shave and got myself prepared for the big footbal finale. We decided to watch the match in a bar in the citycenter of Medellin. Me with my orange cape and 4 other dutch guys wearing orange footbal jerseys. Once in the city we found a lot more dutch people wearing orange shirts. We decided to go and watch the match all together in one of the bars, which projected the match on a big screen. Even though they had some problems getting the sound of the tv working, we were at least able to watch it. Some Colombians in the bar were cheering for Holland, while others were cheering for Spain. The match turned out to be nervebreaking. Meamwhile we were cheering for Holland and making a lot of noise by slamming our hands on the tables. Unfortuntalely Holland didn´t win. In the streets of Medellin people with Spanish flags were yelling and shouting and cars were horning. Some of them wanted to take photos with us. It was all a friendly atmosphere.
After the match I ate some food with some of the people from the hostel in a waffle bar. It turned out to be some sort of pancake pizza, which was pretty good. After the food we headed back to the hostel. We had to grab a taxi as it started to rain pretty badly again. Once back at the hostel I sat down and wrote this big first post you are reading right now.
Tonight I am probably going out again with some of the guys here at the hostel. Medellin is especially known for its vibrant nightlife, so I better see as much as possible of it. I am planning to stay here for a few more days, before I head up north to the coast where the weather should be sunny and warm.
That´s it for now. Keep checking my blog for updates of my adventures here in Colombia!
Jul 7th 2010 – Jul 11th 2010
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