mango!

street vendors in cartagena sold fresh cut fruit - delicious and definitely a step up from street meat

road to cartagena

we went to the bus terminal in santa marta trying to get a bus to cartagena. they were all sold out, so we took a bus to barranquilla, a town about half way between santa marta and cartagena. we were informed it would be easy to switch to a bus to cartagena from barranquilla.

little did we know how easy it would be to get on the next bus! we expected to pull into a bus terminal and buy new tickets to get on a bus to cartagena. instead, the bus pulled to the side of the road and told us to get in a bus behind it. clearly a random bus by a different company is just what we expected!

to continue the fun, shortly after we started on our journey from barranquilla to cartagena, we were stopped by the colombian police and everyone had to get off. they patted down a few people (clear racial profiling going on) and checked a few bags. they let us all back on except one guy who they detained as he was wanted for some crime and was carrying a gun.

the rest of the trip was pretty uneventful and once we arrived in cartagena we took a cab to our hotel so we could take long overdue showers.

tayrona park

early friday morning we headed to tayrona park, which in theory was not far from santa marta. we had the lady at the hostel call a cab. our cab driver spoke no english and spoke muy rapido (very fast). given the fact that cabs are somewhat sketchy we were already on high alert, however, about 5 minutes into our trip, our cab driver told us he could not drive us there and that we would have to switch to a cab his brother was driving. it took him about 6x repeating the same explanation before we understood what was happening even though we still had no idea why. now 15 minutes into our ride, he pulled over and another cab pulled up behind us and we did the switch with still no idea why and if we would be safe (since I am writing this after the fact you know that we survived). after a long ride to the state park, we began our hiking adventure!

quick side note: colombians are insane drivers. if the car in front is going too slowly (all one lane roads in each direction) they will just drive around next to them to pass them. while this may seem normal, they do not care if any oncoming traffic is coming - to the point to you will have three cars on a two lane road. awesome.

ok now time to describe the park. to get to the beaches, you have to go through a forest on a two hour hike. part of the hike included nice paved paths (see pics below), but most was being creative stepping over branches and up the side of hills. the scenery was beautiful; however, it was very hot. i think the combination of sun screen and bug spray made us more sweaty than usual (tons of mosquitos in the park and as you may know there is NOTHING i hate more than mosquitos).

i won't bore you with details of the hike, but i have included pics below. after an hour and a half of hiking we made it to arrecifes, the first campsite and a place to grab lunch. the fresh pineapple juice was so refreshing. after lunch we hiked a little further, expecting another 20 minutes until our desired location. this 20 minutes turned into over an hour of additional hiking; however, it was totally worth it. we rented hammocks to sleep in for the night at cabo san jan and sat by the beach for the rest of the afternoon. they actually had a restaurant and mini convenience store type thing where you could purchase drinks and snacks. i had arroz con pollo and it was delicious. not quite as good as alma's (homemade arroz con pollo i had growing up) but still very tasty.

we slept in hammocks with mosquito nets covering us (forgot to take photo so included one i found on the internet). i was amazed at how effective those nets were - i ended up with only two bites from the whole trip! truly a miracle. we woke up to the sound of coconuts falling from the trees as the locals were in the trees cutting them down - I assume or safety reasons. if I thought the bathroom situation was less than ideal at the hostel, this was disgusting. I used the ocean to shower and such.

all day sunday we hung out by the beach and went swimming in the ocean. so nice to relax! I have included several photos below. they brought the supplies for the store by mules and horses.

we found a way to get back to town by boat without hiking back three hours and it was worth every peso! on the boat ride back, i lost my hat - the boat ride was pretty rough (kinda terrifying since there were signs throughout the park saying not to swim in certain locations because of the frequency of drowning). the boat took us into the fishing village of taganga - which was colorful and full of life! a little unsafe so i did not take out my camera to take pictures.

taryn lost one of her shoes on the hike, but all things considered it was an excellent trek and great memories with bschool friends.

santa marta

we arrived in santa marta around 9pm, so we went straight to our accommodations. personally, i have come to enjoy a certain base level of accommodations, and lets just say i did not do the booking for this part of the trip. despite my promise to never stay in a hostel again after my experience in barcelona, i decided to suck it up and be a good sport (after all it was our first night and i knew it would be a long trip otherwise). the hostel was actually very cute and colorful- exceeded my expectations and the staff were super nice. it also had a drunk cat (possibly drugged up from vet visit earlier in the day) that was sprawled out in the courtyard area. the hostel had a lounge area where they served drinks and food, so we enjoyed some cocktails and beers and played some card games. there were a bunch of other foreigners hanging out as well.

the beds were fine, but the bathroom situation was unique especially after being at the Marriott the day before. cold shower and very low pressure and a curtain that fell off the wall twice. the toilet, i will reserve comment, but see the picture below.

we were at the hostel (casa del ritmo) briefly the next morning before we headed to tayrona park.

bogota

so i arrived in bogota on wednesday night.  while waiting for the airport shuttle i met a family from kansas who was staying at the same hotel.  listening to the mom pretend to speak spanish with an accent way worse than mine was hysterical.  apparently it is very dangerous to take cabs in parts of colombia as there are often kidnappings so we waited patiently for the hotel shuttle.  once we got to the hotel we were greeted by a drug sniffing dog and a man with a wand - makes you feel real safe.  however, the marriott was super nice, in fact, just as nice as any i had stayed in in america if not nicer.

the next morning i took my time getting around and then got some delicious colombian coffee.  the spanish comes back slowly - i usually just use very creative words to describe what i really want to say.  for instance i would say "not" this if i couldn't remember the actual word. kinda wish i could still remember most of my spanish.  

my friend from school, taryn, met me at the hotel and we grabbed our first colombia beers while we waited for diana, our other friend from school.

later that afternoon we headed to the airport for our first destination, santa marta.

classes finished

My classes are officially finished for the semester and I arrived in Colombia last night.  Crazy how fast time flies by!  On a positive note I still have three semesters to go.  I will try and keep you updated with photos and such over the next few weeks but it is going to depend on my access to Internet

lights

i was walking through rittenhouse square tonight and fell in love with their lights.  love this time of year.