South America, it's a wrap!

After 5 days of not being able to choose what I could eat (and getting a LOT of capsicum) I was keen to head back to Santa Marta in the morning and get ourselves a good lunch. We checked out of Costeño and headed out to the roadside to wait for a bus. Not long after one came by so we flagged it down and climbed aboard. The conductor said to leave our bags up the front by the driver so we did as the buses are often too full to put them anywhere else. Along the way a policeman hopped on and had a look around which was a first for us on our whole trip but he got off again without any trouble. The bus then terminated at a big roundabout outside of Santa Marta (all the other buses we had caught, went right into the centre) and the conductor tried to say it was a 10,000 peso fare when it had been 7,000 on the way there for a longer ride. Jimmy stood his ground and refused to get off without our change and they finally gave it to him, albeit very reluctantly. Another couple had been dumped on the side of the road with us so we shared a cab back into the centre which dropped us back at Masaya where we had booked for our last night on the Carribean.

After a swim and some wifi catch up time, we headed out in search of some food. Jimmy ended up being quite the hit with the locals along the beachfront, being asked twice if people could have their photo with him. We didn't end up having much luck though, instead ending up with a pizza and beer but hey, not a single capsicum in sight. Hoorah! 

On our way back to the hostel we heard a whistle from across the road and it turned out to be a few people from Costeño who had come into Santa Marta for the Santa Marta birthday celebrations that were on that night. After a few more beers with them it was time to go back to the hostel for one last sunset dip in the pool. After a while I figured I'd go get myself ready for the night out as we thought we may as well go out who a bang with the others from Costeño. 

My phone was running a bit low on charge so I thought I'd plug it in while I got ready. That's when I discovered that my electronic bag was missing from my pack. I thought maybe it was in Jimmy's bag by mistake but had no luck so went and got Jimmy to check if I was just going crazy or it was actually gone. Sure enough, as soon as he came back, he confirmed that not only had mine gone but so had his. That's when we realised that after 3 months of travel through South America without a hitch, we had finally been robbed by the bastard bus conductor. What we were baffled by was how our locks weren't broken, but a guy in our dorm room soon informed us how they can just stab a pen into the zip, open it up, take what they like, then move the zips across it again and wahlah, a beautiful closed zip again. At first we thought meh, the worst thing gone was my hair straighteners, but then we started realizing more and more stuff was gone like both of Jimmy's pairs of shoes, my running shoes, my leather bag I got in Madrid all those years ago, first aid kit, backgammon set, sleep sack, Jimmy's new Colombia shirt, and the list goes on. But of course it's all just stuff (most of which is replaceable) and thankfully no money, photos or passports were gone as we had them on us on the bus. It's just unfortunate that Colombia had to live up to its name and give us such a bitter taste in our mouth after such an amazing last few weeks. 

As you can imagine, our spirits were slightly dampened after our discovery so instead of having a big night we decided to just go and check out the fireworks with the Costeño crew in the square then grab a bite to eat. The fireworks in the plaza turned out to be not just your usual fireworks display, instead each corner of the plaza had fireworks on a frame, with the fireworks sticking out sideways, rather than up into the sky. This meant when they were lit, the middle of the plaza would be alight with shooting fireworks everywhere. The plaza had a fenced strip so you could choose to stand inside and be shot at, or outside of and laugh at the crazy people inside the fence as they ran back and forward away from the fireworks. Jimmy was keen to join the crazy people of course and go into the middle so I humoured him and went too but stayed right at the back in order to not risk losing an eye. Being robbed was enough bad luck for one day for me! 

The next day it was off to Bogota by plane where we had about 20 hours to see the city. Unfortunately most travelers we had met along the way didn't have very good things to say about Bogota so after the recent turn of events we weren't really feeling like doing a whole lot of exploring. Especially when the hostels explicitly tell you to never take your phone or credit card out with you, only enough cash for what you will be doing. When we did go out (with a phone stuffed in my bra) the amount of security/police standing around either with semi automatic rifles, hand guns or holding onto enormous Rottweilers, didn't exactly ease our concerns either. So after our lunch it was a quick stroll around the historical centre to check out Plaza Boliviar, the cathedral and the president's home. We were then happy to head back to the hostel for a lazy night reading with no chatting as I have managed to lose my voice. I think it's still relaxing on the beach somewhere!

The photo above pretty much sums out the Bogota/Colombia vibe for us. While we might not be Yankees, we are definitely pretty excited to be heading to Yankee territory tomorrow after the last 24 hours. It's been the most amazing journey through South America but I'm really looking forward to letting go of my paranoia, speaking in English again, having seatbelts in cars, eating good cheese slash good food in general, drinking good white wine and flushing toilet paper down the loo again! And of course I'm super duper excited to be seeing a familiar face tomorrow night. None other than my big brothers face either! Roll on New York City, let's see how much of a bite we can take out of the big apple over the next 7 days.

Costeño Beach Surf Camp

A friend of Jimmy's had recommended staying at Costeño Beach Surf Camp and as we had decided that it was too hot for us to do the Lost City Trek, we had a spare four days up our sleeve. Relaxing by a beach sounded like a perfect way to use up those four days, especially since it was to be our last few days in South America. 

Arriving at the camp in the darkness we couldn't really get a good picture of what the place was like, but when we were shown to our beach hut, Jimmy announced it was his kind of place. Our beach hut was situated next to the communal area and closest to the beach with just a curtain and mosquito net between us and the sound of the crashing waves on the beach. We were close enough to the beach that the sea spray wafted its way back to our hut, giving everything the feeling of being slightly damp. 

As the camp is located in the middle of nowhere, breakfast, lunch and dinner have to all be purchased on site and we were pleasantly surprised at how good our first meal was which was served up not long after our arrival. The place definitely has a school camp feel to it with a gong being sounded at meal times, everyone lining up to get their food and all sitting around big communal tables. Plus no wifi!

The next few days were spent doing not a whole lot apart from walks on the beach, beers, reading and early nights. We did have one outing however, with a visit to Palomino which is about a 40 minute bus ride further north east, to go tubing with our Australian mate Charlie and his friend Nina. In order to go tubing we had to hire the tubes and then jump on a mototaxi whilst carrying our tubes and then be taken about 15 minutes up a dirt track. From there we had been told we walked for "20 minutes" to the river. About 45 minutes later we were starting to doubt our chosen route and then a farmer with a donkey happened to come by and tell us we had another 15 mins to the river. We trudged on, sweating ourselves silly and finally reached the river. 

The hike up was worth it though. For about 2.5 hours we cruised down the river in our tyre tubes, soaking up the sun and all the sights the jungle had to offer us whilst drinking beers we had brought along with us. The jungle had some great sights too. We got to see toucans, wild ones! And cows, horses, pigs, teeny tiny hummingbirds, vultures and a lot of other unknown birds. It was an awesome way to spend an afternoon and to top if off we managed to get straight on a bus to Costeño after we finished so a good end to a great day.

Back at Costeño the next day held more of the same for us. Although Jimmy's day was punctuated with mastering the slack line that they have up at the camp. Not surprisingly, my monkey husband managed to master it pretty quickly, bring able to walk across it forwards then back across backwards. What a guy! And I finished off my time here with an hour long massage from one of the local ladies. It was so amazing being lulled into relaxation by the waves, her singing to me and being massaged all at once. All for 40,000 soles (about $25). Another great end to another great day. Our last full day on the carribean coast though so a tad bittersweet. But I'm pretty damn excited to get to New York and see my big bro and good friend Brookie too so I can't be too sad. 

Tranquilo Minca

After breakfast at the hostel and enjoying some more time in the pool, we found that it was already check out o'clock. As we had to go back to Taganga to collect our large packs (mine now weighs a hefty 18kg!!) we figured we may as well head over there with Khalid as he hadn't been there yet. We had got chatting to an English guy in the pool who was also keen to check it out so the four of us piled into a taxi to make the short trip over the hill.

After enjoying a michelada picante (beer with lemon, hot sauce and a salt rim) on the beachfront we went back to Bonsai as a lot of other places we had been recommend were closed for lunch. Of course what we chose was full of capsicum so it was a fairly unsatisfying meal for me but it was still nice to sit in the air conditioning for a bit of a break from the heat.

Post lunch we were heading back down the beach and ran into an Australian guy Charlie we had met way back in San Pedro de Atacama. The weird thing was we had only been talking about him that morning and then there he was, hundreds of miles from where we had last seen him! Crazy. 

We enjoyed the sunshine for as long as possible before having to make a move in order for us to make it to our accommodation in Minca before dark. We collected our big bags from our old hostel then we all got a cab back to Santa Marta before Jimmy and I bid farewell to Khalid and Ri. We got in another cab to Minca for 50,000 soles which is a one hour cab ride. You can catch a collectivo or bus for much cheaper but given the time and amount of luggage we had we decided to take the 'luxury' option.

Minca is a tiny town located in the hills above Santa Marta. There isn't a whole lot to do there except go on walks and read books so we thought that sounded like a bit of us for a few nights. The other recommended hostel Casa Elemento was fully booked so we had booked the other option, Casa Loma which was also recommended to us. The only room left was the "presidential suite" for 75,000 pesos a night which was less than what we had paid for our two dorm beds the night before. The hike up to the hostel was a solid 10 mins of uphill but it was worth the trek up when we reached the balcony of our room and saw the beautiful view we had down across the valley and over the city's lights.

The next day we were all set to enjoy doing nothing but after lunch at the Lazy Cat, we thought we would go for a a small walk to one of the waterfalls mentioned on our map. The first one was only a half hour walk and was only a very small rock pool so we decided to keep on going for another 40 minutes to the larger cascade - Finca la Esperanza. Unfortunately my phone died on the way (and our camera is currently hanging out with our friend Liza as we left it at our hostel in Quito, oops!) so we had no way of showing you what they looked like but they weren't the most impressive falls I've ever seen anyway. The bamboo along the way was so incredibly impressive though! 

As we were coming back from the falls we saw a guy come out of a driveway with what we were sure was a toucan on his arm. Sure enough, when we got closer to him he had two of them hanging around him. We were super stoked to see them as I had said earlier how I really wanted to see one and now we had seen not one but two and even managed to get up really close to them. We both said straight afterwards that we thought that the guy had maybe clipped their wings though so it tainted the experience somewhat, knowing they probably weren't able to just roam free in the wild. They were still incredibly beautiful to see however, and much smaller than we had imagined. 

By the time we returned to our hostel it was time for beers and cards on our balcony as we watched the sunset. The sunset was followed shortly after by the hostel's dinner and some red wines before turning in for an earlyish night. 

We wanted to make the most of the presidential suite before checking out so had a slow morning. We the. thought we had better go and visit the other highlight that Minca had on offer, a coffee plantation called La Victoria. In order to get there we could either walk for 1.5 hours (according to our map) or catch a mototaxi. As we didn't have the whole day we decided to save time by taking a mototaxi there. I was happy with our decision when we finally reached the plantation as it seemed like the walk would have taken a lot longer that 1.5 hours to get there.

The girl who greeted us when we arrived for our tour spoke a bit of English so we were able to get an English tour around the production line which took me back to being on Taumata Orchard. Especially when I saw the big generator and its belt whirring away.. I swear my mangled finger tingled in fear at the sight of it. At the end of the tour Jimmy tried out the coffee and then we headed on our way for the "50 minute return walk". Yeah right. About 2 hours later we dragged our weary feet into Minca's town centre in search of some much needed sustenance. The first 4 places we looked at were all closed, despite it being a Friday so we ended up a cafe which specialized in brownies. So not such a bad thing I guess. We finally sampled the Bogota Beer Company (BBC) beer too which was a nice change from the crappy Aguila we have been having to drink in Colombia. Think Lion Red. 

After lunch it was time to make the hike back up to the hostel and get out bags before getting a collectivo to La Bomba so we could transfer to a bus to Costeño Beach, our next stop. Unfortunately our collectivo driver somehow forgot to stop for us at La Bomba and we ended up back in Santa Marta, adding an extra 1.5 hours or so to our journey. Annoying. Thankfully we managed to get off the bus at the right spot for Costeño Beach Camp though, and arrived just as the light was disappearing, with fireflies (or maybe they were fairies?) lighting our way.

Tayrona National Park

We awoke early due to the suffocating heat and no air conditioning in our room. Unfortunately in Colombia they have to take their security pretty seriously so our plans of going to check out the neighboring beach, Playa Grande, were foiled by the locked gate, instead having to just lay in the marginally cooler hammocks and await our breakfast. At 10am we finally bud farewell to our hosts (including the awesome dog Slinky) and headed into Santa Marta via taxi with just our day packs in order to meet Khalid as planned and walk to Cabo San Juan in Tayrona National Park. 

After picking up supplies from a local supermarket (more mango, avo, tomato, coriander wraps coming up!) due to the rumoured horrendous food prices once inside the national park, we then got a cab to the bus station area.  There was a bus waiting there so we climbed straight on. The bus was an ancient non tourist bus so there was definitely no air conditioning, instead we had over an hour bus ride in the searing heat. All three of us were dripping in sweat by the time we reached the park entrance. 

Here we had heard we would have our bags searched to confiscate plastic bags, alcohol etc but the guard didn't seem very interested in us so we just paid our entrance fee of 38,000 pesos and jumped into the waiting collectivo van for another 2,000 pesos which would take us a further 4km into the start of the walking track.

We had been advised to not stop at the first campsite but keep going walking another 1.5 hours until we reached Cabo San Juan as it is the nicest beach. After a dip along the way and a highly aggressive pelican charging us down, we trudged on in the heat until we reached the campsite by about 3pm. I don't think I've ever sweated so much while walking.

We were too late to get a hammock so instead had to settle for hiring a tent for the night and hope for a hammock the next night. Khalid ran into a kiwi guy he knew so we all headed down the beach for a swim and some beers. After not long we were getting a not so friendly welcome from one of the guards (who was casually resting his hand on his glock) after he noticed one of the guys we were sitting with had a machete (for opening coconuts). Finding that meant he thought he had better search all of our bags where he then found another guys stash of weed (and luckily missed our bottle of red wine in my drink bottle). Off he took the offender where we heard later he was asked to pay a fine of 500,000 pesos (about NZD$300) but he explained he only had 20,000 as was poor and had brought his own sandwiches for food. Instead he made them a counter offer of 0 pesos and they seemed happy with that and let him go. We all thought it was incredible that he managed to get them down from 500,000 to zero in one go but it definitely put a dampener on our arrival as it felt like we were at some kind of school camp being watched over.

As the afternoon wore on we figured we should have our first round of wraps which we ended up preparing in the dark as the sun goes down at 6:30pm here (regardless of the time of year, it always stays roughly the same). Then it was time for about all you can do while camping - cards followed by an early night.

The tents were horribly hot with zero airflow happening which meant for a long night feeling as though you were suffocating in the heavy air. Thankfully it was overcast in the morning but we still had to escape our tents by about 7am and head straight to the beach for a cooling off dip. 

That's where we stayed for the rest of the day, only moving to go for a swim in the sea. The boys managed to secure us a hammock for that night too but we had to get one of the ones out on the point that they charge a horrendous 26,000 pesos for. At least we knew it would be cooler than the tents with the sea breeze being right there. The camp grounds way of doing things was pretty backward though with them not allowing you to book two nights to begin with and then only letting being rebook after 1pm (which became 2pm) despite there being a queue from 1pm and the guy just sitting there doing nothing until 2. 

It is a shame that the people who run the campground just seem to be in it for the money rather than creating an enjoyable experience for the people staying. Luckily the beach itself is pretty damn beautiful so it makes up for the not so friendly staff. 

After another evening of wraps and cards and no beers due to our lack of money left, we headed to our hammocks to try and sleep. Try we did but not so successfully as hammocks aren't actually the greatest beds. And then the wind picked up around midnight which meant our silk sleep sacks (which had been too hot for us in the tents) were not warm enough for us in the warm, damp winds that stuck around for the night. I managed to sleep in two hour increments throughout the night and woke up to the sunrise at 5:15 or so. Tents were probably a better option in the end!

As we wanted to go and check out Minca with Khalid before he had to head off for his week in Jamiaca, we thought we would leave the beach early and miss the heat of the day while waking back. Of course we had to enjoy one last swim before the two hour walk. The boys couldn't resist doing the rock jump either, Jimmy teaching Khalid all the NZ dive specials.

On our way back we managed to see a few monkeys, an assortment of lizards and a new trail which followed the beach rather than the horse trail we managed to get on on our way there. We were pretty happy to get to the end and have a collectivo waiting which we jumped in and left straight away. Then there was a bus waiting at the bottom which we also jumped on straight away so we were feeling pretty happy to not have to spend any time waiting around in the horrendous heat.

Once we were back in Santa Marta we decided pretty quickly that we weren't up to missioning to Minca so we decided to find a hostel and just chill here for the night. And hostel we found.. One of the nicest hostels I've ever stayed in (although too expensive for privates so back to dorm rooms again), Masaya Hostel. Two pools, movie room, hammocks and bar sounded like a bit of us for the night so I doubt we will be going far tonight.