la costa

I should have posted this a week ago

I don't know why I haven't been wanting to write about my last week in Colombia, but now (I knew it would happen) I'm kicking myself because I want to write about what's going on right now and am going to end up writing a choppy account of my vacation instead.

Two Tuesdays ago was the start of my sun time. My friend Chris and I took a bus to Santa Marta (a short 17 hour trip... no big deal) and ended up not staying in Santa Marta as originally planned, but rather in the nearby fishing village of Taganga. I'm all for spontaneity, but I learned on this trip that I much prefer to know where I am staying before I actually get there, so I am not wasting time wandering around with my backpack looking like an unorganized tourist. Plus, planning to me is a pretty fun part of traveling. Anyway, planning was not the case in Taganga, or any stop on our trip for that matter, but everything worked out fine with no hiccups even.

Taganga is really tiny... it's really only two small beaches separated by a mountain. But it has a lot of character and is perfect for laying out and just relaxing. To get to Playa Grande (the big beach) we had to walk over the small mountain covered in cacti, which I found to be odd as we were right next to the Caribbean. The beach is lined with restaurants covered in palm branches where fish is pretty much the only food that is served. They basically show you their fresh catch, you pick out your fish, and that's that. It was delicious and served with salad, fried plantains, and coconut rice and the meals are still super cheap... $4-5 for all of that and the fish were not little. So that's what we did for two days. Beached and ate fish.

The next stop on our trip was Tayrona, a national park further north of Santa Marta. Every place we went to on the coast was beautiful, but Tayrona is BEAUTIFUL. The park goes mountains, jungle, beaches, and to get to the beach, we had to walk an hour through this jungle-forest which was far from easy with flip-flops and a backpack. But the hike was definitely worth it. Tayrona is made up of a ton of beaches and coves, all separated by gigantic boulders. We only made it to three beaches in the two days that we spent there. We slept seaside in hammocks which actually got a little cold once the wind starting blowing off the water. There's a ton of wildlife in the park too... I was hoping for a monkey sighting, but instead was in the restaurant when the poisonous snake decided to drop from the roof beams and was standing next to Chris when he found a tarantula-like spider in his hammock. I am surprisingly much more composed when seeing bugs in the wild than I am when they are in my bedroom. I could have stayed in Tayrona for at least a few more days, or have spent my entire vacation there.

The final destination was Cartagena. To get to Cartagena from Tayrona, we had to change buses in Barranquilla. Not usually a problem, except this was by far the most sketchy part of the trip. I thought we would just go to the bus terminal and switch there, but instead we were dropped off somewhere in the city underneath an overpass. When we got off the bus we were swarmed with offers to go to Cartagena, but none of the four buses seemed legit. We somehow picked the oldest, crappiest bus ever and the whole ride everyone kept the curtains closed which made me nervous to not even see where we were going. But two hours later we made it just fine. We spent the first day on the beach, but spent the night wandering around El Centro. Cartagena is surrounded by huge concrete walls, which were built about 500 years ago by the Spanish to protect the city from pirates. The downtown is super pretty, and significantly different than the surrounding areas of town. It is all Spanish colonial architecture and narrow streets. Two days is not nearly enough time to spend in Cartagena... there is a lot to see.

After a week of perfect weather, I was more than ready to return to Bogotá. Really the only reason for this was that returning to Bogotá meant returning to the States. But I was not ready for the 23 hour bus ride that would take us back.

Since then, my burn has turned to tan, which is fading fast thanks to this wonderful weather. But I've already made it to Madison and back which was glorious. Sadly I did not document the event but I got to see some of my favorite people. It still doesn't really feel like Christmas to me, but coming home really isn't as weird as I thought it was going to be. And even though it's basically freezing and snowing like mad, it's good to be back.

tranquila

I feel like my mood has turned a complete 180 since my last day of work. I haven't cried once this entire week. (I have been strangely emotional the past three and a half months.) And despite being a little bored as all of my friends have jobs or are in the middle of finals week, I have truly enjoyed myself the past 10 days.

I had an interview on Thursday for a new job and it went really well. Pending papers/documents my first day will be January 15th. It will be a good change of pace and I'm looking forward to starting. It also looks like I will be moving to a new apartment in January. Nothing is finalized yet, but I have two options as of now and both will allow me to get to places without it taking over an hour. And to prepare myself for snowy Wisconsin, I am peacing out of Bogotá on Tuesday and traveling to the coast for a week. Hello tan!

As excited as I am to come home for Christmas (I have a lot of sweet gifts that I want to keep for myself...) I am looking forward to coming back to Colombia in January and starting again on page one.

fotos

Zipaquirá

This past weekend was filled with more touristy travels, of which, of course, I am a fan. One of Scott's good friends from home was visiting so on Saturday we toured the Centro a little bit, but it pretty much rained the whole day so we spent most of our time eating lunch and sitting in a café.

Sunday was our big day trip to Zipaquirá. It is a small town north of Bogotá and it's big tourist attraction is the Catedral de Sal aka the Salt Cathedral. It sounds cooler than it actually was, and unfortunately the night vision on my camera didn't help me take any solid pictures. But basically the "cathedral" is located in these underground salt mines, where the floors, ceilings, and walls are all salt rock. They have guided tours, where every twenty feet there are different stations that are supposed to represent parts of the Bible. To me they all looked the same, but I guess you have to use your imagination.

The best part of the trip was not the cathedral, but rather the train ride we took to get there. You can take a bus to the town, but apparently to take the train is the thing to do. It is incredibly slow... it took us over three hours to get there. But we got the scenic view of the east side of Bogotá, food on the train, and musicians to entertain us. And with 8 of us along for the trip, we were in good company.

There are a ton of pueblitos close to Bogotá that are really cute and make for good day/weekend trips and I think for some of the upcoming puentes (holiday weekends... there are a lot in Colombia) we are going to plan to get out of the city a little bit more often.