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.
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