Colombia - Carneval and Cartagena

6 February 2010

So, headed south with the Australians to a town called Valledupar which is a local capital. We stayed at the only hostel in a town that isn't so much small, as quite off the tourist trail.
The first day the hostel owner, Miguel, very kindly gave us a lift to a river about 40 mins drive away and we spent the day messing about at the river and watching the local kids jump off very high rocks into narrow and shallow sections. Completely crazy, but amazing. There was also a river in town so that's where we spent the majority of the rest of our time. The water was really cool (the town was pretty hot!) and on my first day I wore a beige bikini which along with my very fair skin and the lack of gringos in town attracted quite a lot of attention. I had to be saved by my Aussie friend bringing me my sarong! We met a lovely family at the river and despite not being able to communicate at all we managed to take lots of photos of each other and I was even forced to kiss a baby for a photo!!

Food in Valledupar involved a lot of icecream and there was a BBQ so the Aussies grilled stuff on a couple of nights. We also managed to find an amazing seafood place (most of the food was grilled chicken) which was great.

From Valledupar we headed up to Barranquilla on the coast. It's an industrial city and home to Shakira and not much for tourists to do EXCEPT when it's Carneval. The Carneval is UNESCO listed, is the biggest Carneval in South America outside Rio and goes on for the 4 days before Lent. On the first day there was a massive parade with all sorts of floats and dancers and famous Colombians and we got foamed and floured a little (it's a tradition apparently!!). In the evening we went to a Daddy Yankee concert. He's a big player in the Reggaeton music scene. It was really good, and we bought into a "beach bar" by buying a case of beer with some other people so we could sit and had a good view of the stage.

On the second day I was a touch hungover so didn't make it out to the parade (it's really hot and sweaty in Barranquilla and there's no point leaving an air conditioned room if you're not feeling up to it!). Luckily the parade that day wasn't that exciting according to all my new chums! Though they had the excitement of an attempted pickpocketing on them, facilitated by foam being sprayed in their faces. Luckily the police noticed and hauled the culprits away with no harm done.

On the third day there was another big parade but this was more about dancers than floats. The police were great and ensured we got a good spot. We ended up speaking for most of the parade to a young policeman called Ricardo who had lived in NY and spoke great English. He even arranged for us to be escorted to a taxi as one of the Aussies had a big expensive camera.

That night we ended up in a bar with a Swedish friend, his new Colombian girlfriend and her parents! Her parents were so kind and they invited all of us to their house for the last day to have a massive water fight. We arrived in the neigbourhood (looked poor, but quite clean and safe) at about 11am and started in on the beers. It only took about 1 min before the local little kids ran up and soaked us through. The rest of the day was spent having water fights, being given mud baths, being taught how to dance (it's impossible!) and generally larking about. When it got dark we thought we were being offered a lift home by the family, but instead they took us to another town where there was a massive stage set up and a big party going on. It was fantastic! I think we were given our lift home eventually at about 2am! It was absolutely the best day of the trip so far - just so great to hang out with a Colombian family and take part in all the madness!

After recovering I took the bus by myself to Cartagena, another town on the coast, but this one with ancient defences including a fort and city wall. I checked into a hostel called Media Luna (half moon) purely for the fact that it had been held up at gunpoint only 3 weeks earlier and therefore was guaranteed to be the safest place in town!! The robbery turned out to be an inside job and there were police about outside all the time so it was absolutely fine. The hostel had a rooftop terrace and a pool so I managed to stay almost a week there without getting bored! Managed a touch of sightseeing but me and my fellow members of the "rooftop gang" (mainly Swedes) figured that you could see all the main attractions from the roof so there wasn't much point venturing too far in the sweltering heat!

I've just taken a flight down to Medellin (it was the same price as the 14 hour night bus) and will probably take language classes here, but it's a little cool (just 18 degrees!) and apparently there's not a whole heap to do, so might head back north again and just hang out on the coast. My tan is coming along nicely and it would be a shame to give up on it....!

Currently thought is that I might head north from Colombia. Two reasons - might want to wait until Argentina decides what action it's going to take over Las Malvinas, and if I head south now I'll reach the bottom in the middle of winter which is no fun.
Thinking therefore of heading north through central america, then possibly take a road trip through some of the southern states (or head up and visit Nancy, Mick etc) and over through to Florida. Then fly back to Bogota and see what bits of south america I can do before the money runs out. South America is just such a vast place and I'm not sure I want to spend my life on a bus!

We'll see. Plenty more investigating and thinking to be done!