We left Bogota on saturday around lunch time.  This way, we knew we wouldn’t encounter extra traffic.  We had 341km/211mi of traveling to get to Salento, in Colombia’s zona cafeteria.

Anik, my directionally impaired navigator, assured me we’d pull into Salento in time for a nice dinner in the van.

It took us 2 hours simply to get out of the city.  Bogota’s infrastructure leaves much to be desired.  The highways still have traffic lights, which causes traffic congestion and amplifies the poor air quality.  The numerous outdated buses and the diesel and gasolina they use, produce a brownish gray haze in the horizon, which would cause them to more than fail North American emission standards.

By 3:30, with all of us starving, we stopped just outside of Bogota for a plate of meat, meat, and a bit more meat.  The kids and I loved it.  Here, the owner of the restaurant advised us to be very cautious on the road because it was the night before Colombia’s big election.

Back in the van, and just a few hours of non technical driving away (as per Anik), we came around a curva peligrosa and were flagged down by the policia.  The reason for our being pulled over was obscure at first, as we were simply following traffic.

At this point in our trip, we’ve been pulled over by many gun carrying muchachos, but this one came around like he was the new sheriff in town.  By now, we have the routine of pulling out the copies of our SOAT insurance, passports, and license down to a science.  When he came to my window, I politely handed our paperwork over with a smile, the universal language.  Apparently, muchacho didn’t speak smile.  In the midst of interrogating us, when he came to the question of where we were headed, he digressed to the big, beautiful, pink trout we had to eat when we got to Salento.  After the small talk was out of the way, he pointed out that we had incurred the “infraction” of speeding through dangerous curves.  As I repeatedly told him that I was just following the cars ahead, the policia kept pointing out the “infraction”.  He started asking what the speed limit was in the US on highways, through curves, on dangerous roads etc…  He then asked “what do you do in Los Estados Unidos when you feel sorry for something (compadecer), when you’re regretful”.   At this point, we realized that he was fishing for a bribe.  We immediately decided to start playing the “No entiendo” card.  He seemed a bit confused and kept repeating himself “what do you do when you get pulled over and you feel sorry for your infraction?”.   After a while, we answered “we get a warning”.

At this point, he asked me to get out of the car and follow him to the radar gun and camera.  He showed me that I had been going 84km in an 80km zone.  I responded that it was only 4km/2mi over and that I was following everyone else.  He got the ticket pad and showed it to me.  I told him “no entiendo” and pointed to the van as I walked back to it.  He let let us sit there a few minutes, at which point he came back to the window and told us that just this once, he’d give us a warning.  I shook his hand and smiled, and we continued onto our non-technical drive.

This surely won’t be the last time we get pulled over.  For now, playing the dumb gringos with the innocent gringo children seems to work just fine.  Note: if traveling abroad, bring children.  They’ll save your ass many times over.

At this point, the drive was on nice smooth, straight, flat, easy roads, just as Anik had predicted.  By 5:30 (getting dark), we reached Ibague and Anik stated “we have 60km…one hour left, I say we go for it”.  This is the point where Anik’s navigation skills failed us utterly.  Luckily, we filled up our 1/4 tank of gas, just in case.

Just as it was getting dark and a thunderstorm was rolling in, the road started winding at an incline not seen in the United States.  Once again, trucks and buses were playing chicken with each other, blind passing around sharp curves.  Half an hour in, and six kilometers later, I asked Anik to look at the GPS on my phone.  At this point, I informed her that the curves were numerous and that this would take much longer than an hour.  It was obvious that we were past the point of no return, no camping, no stopping.

The road went on and on and up and up to 11,000 ft, passing dozens of broken down, smoking tractor trailers with their hoods raised.  Now, remember, this is a two lane highway with steep sharp curves and sheer cliffs, with zona geologica (landslides).  By 9:30pm, we still hadn’t had dinner and still had 40km to go.  With the kids eating crackers, and ours bodies stiff with the breathtaking curves and passes, we drove on.  We arrived in Armenia at 10:30 and decided the 25 km drive to Salento was too much.  We found a hotel on Lonely Planet and drove to that part of town.  Everything in the neighborhood was barred up, including our hotel…

Across the street from the hotel was a food cart called Hamburguesas Caliche’s which turned out to be an indigestion producing, soy sauce laden, giant burger patty, with ham, bacon, cheese and a quail egg, all atop an arepa.  It was really good.

We finally made it to Salento by 11:30, and woke up the following morning in Paradise.

The rain in this regions isn’t rain, it’s as Simon would say “a nightly deluge of water”.  At 2am on the second night, I was awaked by a steady drip of water in the face caused by one of two leaks the van had sprung.  Anik and I shared half of the twin sized bed to make room for the bowls and towels to catch the leaks.  Although the bowls were effective, with our tight quarters, I rolled onto them twice, making for a very moist sleeping bag.

I woke up the following morning, unable to move due to some undefined sickness…aka…diarrhea from a bad piece of fruit or from the soy sauce laden hamburguesas.  I sent Anik into town for silicone to repair the failed silicone in the rain gutter.  Problem solved.

The roads, the leaks, the policias, and the tight quarters have so far made this trip less than dull.   This past week in Salento, having not moved the van, makes me ready again for our push to Ecuador.  I sure hope the van starts.

Daily Spanish lessons in Salento!

Bogota

Driving into Bogota is definitely not for those asleep at the wheel.  As we approached the city of 13 million people, the smog seemed to hang over it like a curtain.  Motorcycles were zig zagging around cars, which were swerving around trucks and everyone was honking to make themselves heard through the hazy confusion.

We knew we wanted to be in the Candelaria neighborhood.  This funky, young and hip neighborhood appealed to us the second we saw it.  Finding a secure parking spot for the three days we’d be there was very challenging because of vehicle height restrictions.  We found a sweet couple, who were very excited to have our white space ship parked in their lot.

We walked around for at least an hour trying to find a place to stay.  The sidewalks in Bogota, with their random large and deep holes, would make an american personal injury attorney very happy.  The hostels were dingy, some smelled like incense to mask the stink, some had severely leaky roofs, dripping onto the computer area and beds.  We finally found one that suited our needs and we settled in and decompressed.

We took a long cab ride which only cost us 2 dollars and ended up at a Taperia, where the boys had their first taste of a true tapas bar.  They dove into the patatas bravas and tortilla de patatas.  The live flamenco was hard to beat and brought about slow wine drinking and snacking as the kids slept on our laps.

We spent some much needed time getting haircuts, buying new shoes, and eating pastries.

We climbed up to Monserrate, the 10,341 foot mountain that looks down onto the city of Bogota.  Once at the top, we had a view of the city, which spanned as far as the smog allowed.

To keep our children happy, we took the Funicular back down.  I always thought of funicular as some sort of weird intestinal growth, but here, it’s a rail cable car that’s meant to travel up and down mountains.

We walked many kilometers to the centro to Author’s bookstore, a two story english bookstore.  Here, we bought one of two copies of Lonely Planet’s Ecuador book.  Somehow, we overlooked this one before we left.  We were surprisingly happy to have found it but nearly fell over at the $45.00 gringo price tag.

Palacio de Narino

Like the other few places in Colombia that we assumed wouldn’t be our favorite, Bogota pulled us into it’s urban charm.  Despite its’ poor air quality, Colombia’s capital left us looking forward  to the idea of returning some day.

We’ve spent the past few days mostly relaxing and getting some essentials like laundry done.  The quiet and comfortable hostel that we’ve been camping at allows us to use all the amenities while still sleeping in our van, which is very economical.

I have to say that this trip so far has taught me a thing or two about hostels and how they get pigeonholed as dirty, bed bug ridden, stinky backpacker capsules.  Our experience thus far has given us a glimpse of the hostel as a clean, inexpensive, laid back place with communal areas to share information with other travelers.  The kids love them because most have games, tv rooms, and large outdoor areas for playing.

Over the past few days, we’ve enjoyed some simplicities that back home we take for granted.  Darin gave Simon a haircut this morning, now Simon looks even more like Darin as a kid.  We’ve done a lot of cooking with the use of the full sized refrigerator and cooking appliances available to us.  At the hostel in San Gil, I watched a guy make the most amazing looking thai coconut lemongrass chicken soup, I couldn’t get it off my mind.  I replicated it two nights ago and we all had several helpings.

Last night, we made a chorizo, mushroom, spinach lasagna in this wood burning that we’re envious of (I think Darin should build me one).

We took a bus 45 minutes out of town to the colorful artisan town of Raquira.  The boys each got a traditional poncho, which are surprisingly versatile.

Marco face timed his class, which for him, took a lot of courage.  He said all of about 9 words, six of which included “hi”.  I’m thankful for his teacher, who seems to understand him quite well.  It was precious.

We’ve enjoyed some excellent restaurant food in Villa de Leyva as well.  Last night we had some Mexican food that could go up against anything in the Yucatan peninsula.  My mind has  swapped the thai soup obsession with the salsa verde that came over my enchiladas.  Darin had five small pork tacos that were indescribable and probably impossible to replicate.

For lunch today, we went to Arte Gourmet for burgers, which are a novelty here.  I had the most amazing veggie burger, which was covered in oyster sauce sautéed bean sprouts, fresh tomatoes and lettuce.  The bread was probably made that morning and now, I can’t get it off my mind either.  Simon said his chicken burger was “no offense daddy, the best burger I’ve had in my life”.

Today, we traveled about 6 km out of town to “El Fosil”.  It was definitely a trip for the kids but Darin and I found ourselves with curiosities peaked.  A very understated entrance fee and step through a rotating gate led us to an intact, 7 meter water dinosaur, a Kronosaur that dates back 120 million years when this valley was under water.  Marco kept saying that it was a fake painted decoy…

On the way back into town, we hitched a ride on a microbus, which is a typical way to secure a ride here in colombia.

We’ve been here for 5 days and we haven’t used our van at all.  This town is lovely to walk through, we’ve done miles of walking everyday.  Darin and I still maintain that our morning runs allow us a glimpse of new towns and cities like no other.  It gives us time alone, with the newness of the day, while the roosters are still giving a shout out to the rising sun.

At 3:30 this morning, we were shockingly awakened by the loud thump of Marco falling out of bed head first.  We found ourselves doing a full neurological assessment to make sure we could move him, it was another night spent with hearts racing.  Thankfully, with the help of a chiropractic adjustment, he’s completely fine this morning.  That kid is one tough cookie.

Once Darin gathers what he needs to build an upper bed gate, we’ll be leaving Villa de Leyva today, with some rock climbing, hot spring dipping, and city bustling ahead of us.  We’re learning to take things as they come and go with the flow more than we ever have.  We thought that by now, we’d be in Ecuador but Colombia has so much to offer.  We’ll eventually make it across the border.

Warning: some explicit content

We left San Gil on saturday, after Darin and the boys had a blast white river rafting the Rio Fonce.  We weren’t sure how long the trip to El Cocuy would take,  but our last glimpse of WiFi for what would be a week, told us that our window of opportunity for nice weather was limited to monday and tuesday (error #1).

A few hours into the drive, we were (legitimately) pulled over by the policia for speeding.  After verifying our papers and asking us a dozen questions about where we came from, where we were going, how long we were planning on being in Colombia, they wanted details about our experience so far in Colombia…the police officer shook Darin’s hand and advised us to “control our speed”.

We pulled into the pueblito of Tuta at around 6:30pm with the intention of finding a camp and cooking dinner.  As we rolled in on the town’s one and only main road, we found ourselves part of the saturday night festivities.  Poncho wearing men with cowboy hats and horses were in the streets drinking beer, all while big slaps of beef were being smoked next to severed cow heads for sale.

We felt like we’d arrived in an alien ship and needed to at least announce that we came in peace.  We parked and wandered down the main road, looking for dinner and a recommendation on where to make our camp.

Within 5 minutes, we were sitting at a small plastic table for 4 on the sidewalk in front a a family’s house.  We were served a whole cold chicken, delicious boiled potatoes, and yucca, all of which we ate with our fingers.

We were quickly surrounded by drunken men who kept hugging Darin and calling him “Compadre”.  They sang us songs and told us jokes which we couldn’t understand.  Darin gave his new compadre his baseball hat as a “regalo”.

Apparently, with Colombia’s recent turmoiled past, camping has become a novelty.  Even when we explain to people that our van is meant for camping and that all we need is a flat spot, somewhere quiet and ideally secluded, it’s like we’re asking to sleep on water.  Most of the time, we’re sent to a hotel or the town plaza, which is usually in front of the church, next to the police station,  under bright lights, with no seclusion whatsoever.

In Tuta, however, when I said secluded, they understood.  The friendly woman whose table we sat at, sent her two boys ages 14 and 15 in our van with us so that they could show us the ideal place.  We drove straight up for 15 minutes on a gravel road and found ourselves at the highest point around.  The boys stayed with us for a while, they caught bugs that become dormant at night, they watched part of a movie with Simon and Marco on the laptop, and the oldest boy gave me his beaded red, blue and yellow “Colombia” bracelet.  Eventually,  someone showed up on a motorcycle to pick them up.  We had a great night and spent the morning doing yoga and eating breakfast with a panoramic view of the valley below.

On our way out of Tuta the following morning, we stopped in to thank our hosts and say goodbye.  A few hours into the windy drive, we found ourselves driving through a few towns which, not long ago were part of the FARC red zone.  As always, we got many looks, but this time, the only plan was to pass through without stopping.

We drove over a total of 5 passes, each road, more washed out than the one before.

We got to the town of El Cocuy at 7:30pm, at 2700 meters,  in the pouring rain, tired and hungry.  We found a cozy room, had a typical dinner of rice, potatoes, and chicken and went to bed.  We woke up refreshed on monday morning to an incredible view of the surrounding mountains.

I mentioned that according to our online research 3 days prior, the weather would only hold up for us on monday and tuesday.  From this point forward, many mistakes were made, which became dangerous and could have been disastrous.  I share this turn of events to clear my mind and to share “what not to do”…

After our breakfast of potato soup and eggs, we headed to the Parque Nacional El Cocuy office to pay the entry fee and to register our route.  On the way out, they require you to un-register, otherwise they send a search and rescue team.  Being efficient and goal oriented as always, we chose a strenuous route which would take us to the Laguna Grande de la Sierra, a high lake.  The park official told us that this 4 km hike would take 4 to 5 hours one way.  This seemed feasible, it sounded like something we’d done over 100 times, plus we’d be camping at the lake and descending back the next day.  The park official couldn’t tell us anything about the forecast and the only map available had no detail and no topographical information.

We drove up for an hour on a less than graveled road with ruts and pot holes that made our average speed less than 10 mph.  By the time we got up to the trail head (which was actually a farmer’s hacienda), we were at 3600 meters.  It was 11:30am and we felt pressed for time.  We packed our food and camping gear in our backpacks and started straight up (error #2).

The first part of the hike was lovely and gradual through a farmer’s land, surrounded by cows and sheep.

At 0.7 km, we started hiking straight up through trees until we reached a beautiful, large meadow of Frailejon, at 4000 meters.

We welcomed the leveled .5 km through this meadow and started straight up once again, this time through nothing but rock.  We climbed and climbed with no change in scenery.

At around 3:30pm, Simon started complaining of a headache.  We took a third hydration and food break and continued on (error #3).  By 4:30pm, we were exhausted and still far from our target.  There was nothing but rock straight up and very few water sources.  Behind us, the sky was almost black and roaring with thunder and lightning.  The old man whose house we had parked at, had mentioned that that there was some sort of large rock shelter on the way to the high lakes.  He must have known the forecast.  Our goal became to find this rock shelter.

At some point about 45 minutes before we found our camp, Simon continued to complain of a severe headache and dizziness.  We stopped at a small stream to have some electrolyte tablets in a water filled nalgene bottle. Darin’s eyes were blood shot, he was pale, and looking exhausted.  We felt a bit crazy and in our delusion, we laughed at our current situation, which we would find out wasn’t funny at all.  With Simon and I crying with fatigue, Marco, strong as a bull, led the way to the Cueva de los hombres.  As soon as we saw it, we knew this was the cave the man had talked about.  We climbed up to it, feeling saved for the night…not quite.  Our elevation was approximately 4400 meters.

Somehow, we felt like once we stopped and had some hot soup and tea, we’d feel fine and get a great night’s sleep before finishing out hike the following day (error #4).  The thunder continued, and it began to rain.  As Darin filtered water, Simon was feeling and looking awful.  I put all the clothes we had on the kids, including their down booties, inflated their mats and stuffed them into their sleeping bags.  It was 5:45pm and they were out.  Darin and I set up camp and we proceeded to make the soup, still thinking somehow that this would solve everything.

Cueva de los hombres

Darin had borrowed our friend Mick’s multi fuel camp stove, which, unlike ours,  can burn fuel at high elevations.  Having not found white gas, Darin had filled the canister with dirty unleaded gas.  The orifice for the burner kept getting clogged, Darin changed it for a larger one.  To ensure the continuation of the flame, Darin apparently over pressurized the tank to try to clear the jet.  The stove and tank caught fire and Darin managed to throw it 15 feet away as we ducked and screamed at the kids to get behind a rock for fear that it would explode.  It never did explode, but continued to burn for a few minutes as I stood there shaking.

Luckily, before we burned up all of our fuel, Darin had managed to boil a pot of water.  I threw in our soup and let it sit until it became edible.  We got the kids out of the tent so they could eat, hydrate and feel better.    Within having a few bites of soup, they were both vomiting.  That’s when it hit us…What the f*#@ had we done?!?

We did manage to get the kids to eat and drink a bit but all they really wanted to do was sleep.  By 7:30pm we were all in the tent, the kids sleeping and Darin and I trying to focus through the headache, nausea and shortness of breath.  I felt panicked and wanted to descend immediately regardless of the dark and fatigue.  Darin convinced me that it would be very dangerous to descend but that if things became very urgent, we’d leave all our gear in the cave and descend with headlamps.  Sure enough, within an hour we were heavily clouded in and couldn’t see a foot ahead of us.  We spent the night waking the kids up every half hour to hydrate them, check their vitals and to make sure they were coherent.

At sunrise, Darin packed our stuff as the kids and I sat watching, dizzy, sick, and with bluish lips.  The descent took about 3.5 hours.  The dizziness got better fairly quickly but the headache and nausea took several hours to go away once we were back in the town of El Cocuy.  We ate and slept our way through the afternoon and night. On the following day, feeling defeated, we anxiously headed out of El Cocuy.

About one minute out of town, Darin stopped the van and said “I think we need to stay here a few more days and we need to do another hike”.  The kids and I sat there and stared at him open mouthed.  He proceeded to explain that if we didn’t do it, we’d forever feel disgusted with our El Cocuy experience.  Having spent the entire previous night reliving our experience in the cave, I knew exactly what he meant and I agreed.  We promised the kids that this time, we’d have a beautiful experience.  Being incredible boys, they agreed, with the condition that we’d watch a movie together that night…the deal was sealed.

We went to the town market and gathered all the necessary ingredients to make a chicken rice soup from scratch.  We headed back up the difficult road to a different park entrance, where we were told we could find an easy 8km round trip hike to the Lagunillas, a group of three lakes.  We drove down a horrific road for about a kilometer and ended up in spot that was completely deserted, except for the local sheep and horses.

Our 11,500 ft high camp was so remote that we felt like we were in the backcountry but camping in our van.  We spent the entire day reading, playing with the horses, gathering water form a nearby spring, and cooking our soup.  We watched the movie Rango and had many servings of our amazing soup.  We slept like babies…well, actually, I once again relived every moment in the cave.

camp robber

The following morning, Luis Alejandro Herrera, a local gaucho arrived, as scheduled, arrived with 2 horses for the boys.  He enjoyed a bowl of granola and a coffee with us in silence, as we marveled at the day before us.  We were acclimated to this elevation and we felt great.

Luis Alejandro and I hiked the 8 km while the boys enjoyed the cozy ride on horses.  The scenery was magnificent, the weather was beautiful, and the 12,600 foot elevation felt perfectly fine.

Darin took a different route and climbed to 16,000 feet to the El Pulpito glacier, which helped get the ants out of his pants.

El Pulpito del Diablo

We met back at the van in the early afternoon, where Simon and I climbed down to the beautiful river below us to fly fish.

With no fish to eat for dinner, and the road back up on Darin’s mind (he had spent the previous night up, with sweaty palms, fearing the road back up), we left camp and started the crazy climb up the road.  For fear of falling off a cliff, the kids and I got out of the van and watched it gyrate and slide backwards 5 times on a switchback on it’s way up the road.  When we made it to the top of the hill, Darin got out of the van, was very red in the face and had a look of pure exhilaration and relief.

We headed back down to the town of El Cocuy, which by now was very much growing on us.  The town of El Cocuy brings about “what if we moved here and made cheese for a living” kinds of conversations.

We spent a third night in the hostel that we came to equate with warm showers (rare in Colombia) and comfort.  We had our daily granola with fruit breakfast in the van and shared our coffee with a police officer who seemed to cherish every sip.

a plug for REI?

We went to the weekly friday market and bought the kids “fresh” cotton candy.  It was as though we’d taken them to Disney Land.  We left El Cocuy feeling fulfilled and much better than we did on our first attempt at a departure.

friday market in El Cocuy

Having had time to digest our experience, we’ve come to the realization that everything came down to the notion of a time constraint. We’d driven nearly 3 days to get here darn it! We’re so use to being goal oriented, to getting the job done, to being in “go” mode.  We’re so wrapped up in the idea of a plan and a schedule. We should have spent an extra day in the town of El Cocuy, a full day and night at the trail head, and then we should have turned around immediately at the first sign of Simon’s symptoms.

This was a learning experience which has rendered us embarrassed, humbled, and grateful.

On the way toward Villa de Leyva, we stopped for lunch and were unknowingly fed tripe soup thinking it was chicken.  We still feel a bit queasy thinking about it.  We spent yet another night at the hill top in Tuta, where I made burritos and the kids amused themselves by burning long blades of grass, which they pretended were hobbit pipes.

We’ve made it to Villa de Leyva, and it’s a bit of a warped dimension, coming from the poncho wearing, horse straddling, formal speaking town of El Cocuy.  We’ve already eaten chicken wings, tofu, and Arugula pizza.  It’s a welcomed pampering for us all and we’re going to revel in it for a few days.