17 February 2010
I ended up staying in Medellin for over two weeks! It's a really huge city and known for it's "eternal spring" climate. Don't be fooled into thinking this is like April in Scotland though! It's hot during the day, cooler in the evening, and rains (heavily) most days for about an hour or so. I took Spanish classes almost every day in Medellin with a really sweet Colombian girl called Yadi who's based at a Kiwi owned hostel called Black Sheep. I was staying in Casa Kiwi which is owned by an American and frequented by a lot of bikers, but not your garden variety bikers, the ones that think a good holiday is riding from Alaska to Punta Arenas.
The hostel is in the El Poblado area of the city which is the posh bit. Lots of nice restaurants and bars and the like (including some rather fab pastry shops!). I was pretty well behaved in Medellin though as I had class every day.
I said hello again to my new Aussie chums, Lee and Tanya in Medellin, only to say goodbye a couple of days later. And I met really sweet girls from Devon who I may meet up with again in central america at some point soon.
Other than spanish classes I really didn't get up to much in Medellin. Mick's friend Ricardo met with me a couple of times and bought me lunch, gave me a tour of the Botanics and pointed me in the direction of the acquarium. There's a great metro system in Medellin which includes a couple of sections of cable cars which is pretty cool just for sightseeing. And there is a plaza where there are quite a lot of Botero sculptures. So, all in all, a nice place to hang out, but not a whole lot to see!
I realised at some point that I was nearing the end of my visa for Colombia (60 days!) and either had to make a move for the border or pay to extend my visa. So I decided to head off south towards Ecuador. I was heading for a wee town in coffee country called Salento which seemed to involve taking a bus to a place called Armenia and changing. Only instead of going to Armenia I was chucked off the bus at the side of a motorway at about 530pm (sunset is at 6pm!) and told to wait for another bus. I stood by myself in the middle of nowhere as the sun rapidly went down for an anxious 20 mins before my bus came!
In Salento I stayed at a place called Plantation House run by an old, slightly mad, British guy and his Colombian wife. Met tons of people and went horseriding, on a coffee tour, on a long walk up a steep hill, and ate a lot of rainbow trout. Was a good few days! Really beautiful countryside - wax palms, mountains and coffee plantations.
I met three other souls who needed to cross the border too, an Aussie called Tristan and two lovely girls from London called Abi and Hannah. We got up at stupid o'clock and got a bus to Cali, and changed to a minibus for Popayan. It's a lovely little colonial place. Stayed in a hostel run by lovely Scots (!) and had a nice wander around all the churches and a wee feed.
Off again early in the morning for another major bus ride to Ipiales on the Colombian side of the border with Ecuador. Arrived there after dark so went off for a pizza and an early sleep. It's a bit of a strange little town and the weather was bad so didn't mind not seeing too much of the place!
In the morning we went to Las Lajas, an amazing church built out over a ravine because someone saw the virgin's face in the rock (or summat similar!). See my pics (on fb or kodakgallery) to truly understand the place!
Our taxi driver to the border got a little over enthusiastic and drove us over the bridge into Ecuador so we had to walk back to Colombia in the rain to wait for an hour for our exit stamps. Oddly there was no physical check at the border.
And that concludes my first visit to Colombia! (Second and third visits this year are already planned.)
I'll try to be a little less tardy with my Ecuador posts.
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