Ipiales, Colombia

Unfortunately, the only way out of San Agustin was back out through the horrible road I came in on. This meant another 5 or so hours on the bus, after which I didn't dream of spending the night on another bus to Ipiales, so spent another night back in Popayán.

I was back at the bus station early the next morning, and again spent the whole day on a bus to Ipiales. Thinking I'd be safe in shorts and a t-shirt during a day bus, I was unpleasantly surprised to find the air conditioning on full blast. I grew colder and colder as the trip wore on, and finally arrived in Ipiales in the early evening. To make matters worse it was freezing in Ipiales when I got off the bus, and I couldn't stop myself shivering as I waited for my bag. I picked the first hotel I saw, which was conveniently located across the road from the bus station, and booked a room for the night.

Hotel Metropol was everything you'd expect out of a hotel located across the road from a bus terminal. It seemed like the place you'd go if you'd had an argument with your wife and got kicked out of the house. The red neon sign out the front flashing 'agua caliente' got my hopes up, only to be torn straight down as I hopped under the shower - a metal pipe protruding from the wall - to receive one thick stream of lukewarm water.

Yet, I spent the night here in order to see the spectacular Las Lajas Sanctuary. And it was worth it.

Las Lajas Sanctuary

Cali, Popayán and San Agustin - Colombia

It's been a while since my last post, partly due to endless late nights in Cali, and partly due to being sick of late. The first of which probably caused the latter.

Known as the world capital of salsa, I thought it would be rude to not sign up for some classes upon arriving in Cali. This was probably my best opportunity to try to improve my dancing skills, and since almost every nightclub in Cali is a salsa club, I didn't really have too much choice if I wanted to go out. Yet, after heading out to a popular salsa club one night, I lost any smidgin of confidence I had in my abilities after my first class, from watching the locals fly through all different kinds of moves at a million miles per hour. I ended up taking a few more classes and improved somewhat, yet still have a lot of work left if I'd ever want to mix it with the latinos.

When in Cali ... 💃🏿

A video posted by Cameron Yorke (@camyorke) on

Unfortunately after leaving Cali I started to become ill, which involved a dodgy stomach (probably from the food/water), and a sore neck (probably from bad hostel beds) which I'm still getting over. It seems as though later on in this trip, its taking longer to shake these kind of things.

On Sunday I took the bus to Popayán, and joined in with the newly started city walking tour the next day. The highlight for me of course being a restaurant we stopped by to try out some local delicacies.

It seemed everyone in the dorm room in Popayán was sick, so I wasn't keen to spend much time there. But unfortunately, the road to San Agustin is underdeveloped to say the least, so I felt every bump, twist and turn in my stomach and neck. Luckily the hostel, Casa de Nelly, was a great place to spend a few days recovering.

Salento, Colombia

I took advantage of another cheap VivaColombia flight to save myself the 8 or so hour journey by bus to Salento. 

Salento is a sleepy little town in the Quindío department, in the Zona Cafetera region of Colombia, where tourists and locals alike stop by to appreciate the incredibly scenic landscapes of rolling green farm paddocks, and the famous 60 feet tall wax palms found in the Valle de Cocora (Cocora Valley).

Cocora Valley

Luckily, I was reunited with part of the gang that made Bogotá so enjoyable in Maria and Jake, and along with Marsy whom I met in a diner during dinner, we set out on the at times arduous trek of the Valle de Cocora. We (Maria) complained all of the way up the "Wall of Pain", a 40 minute or so uphill trek, but the views at the top were well worth it, and some of the most picturesque I've seen in my travels around South and Central America.

Marsy, Maria, Jake and I, with the Cocora Valley behind us

In the afternoon, Marsy and I went on a tour of the Don Elias coffee farm, a small family run farm that undertakes the entire process without the aid of automated machinery. We learned about the coffee process from picking the beans to roasting and grinding, then were treated to a fresh cup of coffee from the farm's produce.

Maria, Jake and I shared a few bottles of wine at Marsy's hostel in the evening, where a Colombian band played some very Peruvian sounding music until midnight. Then we bid each other a final (and slightly tipsy) goodbye as again the gang was to be split up the next day. Fortunately, we're likely to bump into each other again as Maria and Jake have plans to make it to Australia this year, however in the meantime it's a brief bus ride to Cali, the apparent Salsa capital of South America and the next stop on my way towards Quito, where I plan to enjoy my 27th birthday.

Bogotá, Colombia

I arrived in the country’s capital just after lunch on Sunday, and spent the afternoon wandering around the suburb of La Candelaria, stopping by the Botero and Gold Museums. La Candelaria is part of downtown Bogotá, and between the many dive bars, backpacker hostels and cafes, the walls are plastered with some fascinating street art, albeit surrounded by graffiti. Unfortunately, after sunset the area becomes pretty sketchy and whenever I was walking back to the hostel at night with friends we would always be approached by a couple of shady characters.

Monday was a public holiday in Colombia, and I quickly realised how frustrating public holidays are whilst travelling as almost everything worth seeing is closed. So, I took the opportunity to get some exercise in and took a run along one of the main roads which was closed for Ciclovia, a feature of Bogotá where people can run, bicycle or skate along many main or secondary roads in the city.

In the afternoon, Aaron, Satu and I joined up with the Graffiti City Walking Tour, where a guide walked us around La Candelaria, giving us a bit of a history lesson behind many of the impressive murals that surrounded us.

Street art in La Candelaria

On Tuesday I began to wonder whether I am heavily addicted to caffeine, or just appreciate a good cup of coffee, as I went to the effort of taking the Transmilenio bus 25 minutes uptown just to sample some of Bogota’s best coffee at Azahar cafe, a sea container which has been transformed into a hipster coffee shop. Funnily enough after I’d had the coffee I stopped wondering.

Back in La Candelaria, we had now formed a small group of fellow solo travellers from around the world, so whilst Aaron stayed in bed recovering from a dodgy lunch the previous day, Satu, Maria and I had some beers at the Bogotá Brewing Company, and then embarked on a mini pub crawl, which ended with us sharing a bottle of tequila at the only pub open near our hostel and crawling into bed at just after 1 a.m.

The beds at the hostel didn’t lend themselves to a good night’s rest, so after about 5 hours sleep I hopped out of bed and went to the gym (I must have still been drunk). Later on that day, Aaron and I took the funicular (I had no idea what it was either), up Cerro de Monserrate to get a nice view of Bogotá.

Bogotá from Monserrate

We backed up the partying for another night, this time with Aaron joining us, and after several drinks at the hostel bar we found ourselves at the strippers. Satu had never been to the strippers before and well, I didn’t need any more convincing. 

Sometimes, good company can just creep up and you and before you know it, you’ve spent the last couple of days with the same people and haven’t had an awkward silence, argument or even a disagreement on where to eat. The only odd thing was that it wasn’t til we were all sat around a table inside the strip club, and the stripper was in the middle of one of her impressively flexible routines, that it hit me (the thought, not the stripper). The fact that we all got along so well was what made the next day possible.

We met up at the hostel at around 11 a.m., all hungover and surprised at each other for making the previously agreed appointment of visiting the famous Salt Cathedral. Being a full day trip in itself, we caught two buses to the nearby town of Zipaquira and then walked up what was nearly too many stairs to explore the salt mines and visit the underground cathedral. On the way back we were caught in traffic, which added another hour to our journey, and in total we probably spent around 5 hours in transit, for about only 1 hour actually visiting the cathedral. Yet, the good company made an otherwise enduring day surprisingly enjoyable.

Zipaquira Cathedral

Unfortunately, the group was split up that night, as Aaron and Satu took the bus to Medellín, and I moved out of the hostel to the upscale neighbourhood of Quinta Camacho, which is much more approachable than La Candelaria, and full of nice restaurants, bars and cafes.

On my last day in Bogotá I met up with Lily, a Bogotá local (Rola) whom I met off Couchsurfing. We met in the neighbourhood of Usaquén, which feels kind of like a separate downtown for the surrounding upscale neighbourhoods. The streets are littered with bars, cafes, restaurants, and street markets. And unlike La Candelaria, you can let your guard down and soak up the atmosphere.

After a beer and some waffles, we headed to the popular Andrés Carne de Res, a mind-blowing multi story bar-pub-restaurant-nightclub rolled in to one, exploding with an in-your-face (yet not tacky) party atmosphere, all sorts of surreal decor and impressive shows. All the while maintaining a traditional Colombian feel. We had some empanadas, a few refajos (beer mixed with soda), and hit the dance floor where Lily taught me how to dance salsa and meringue. It could've been the tequila shots that Maria and her boyfriend ordered for us, but it was probably the least retarded I have ever felt while trying to salsa at a nightclub. Or maybe I'm just getting better.

Colombia is the gift that keeps on giving. I'm continually meeting incredibly interesting and generous people who are more than happy to give me a genuine into their country and culture, and each city I visit just reinforces that feeling. Bogotá didn't come as highly recommended as Medellín, but it's a place I will leave with many fond memories, and certainly a city I'd like to visit again.

Santa Marta, Colombia

I arrived in Santa Marta via the budget airline VivaColombia, which is proving handy in allowing me to avoid many arduous bus journeys around the country, and at a decent price. Yet, you get (or don't get) what you pay for - the check in lines are always huge and you aren't actually assigned a seat on the plane, it's just a free for all.

Yet I did arrive, in one (albeit bigger) piece following the excessive drinking and eating in Medellín over the festive season. Now in 2016, I was about to kick off the year with a 4 day trek to Ciudad Perdida (The Lost City). A good way to burn off those extra calories.

I could perhaps take the easy way out and describe the Ciudad Perdida trek as a poor man's Inca Trail. Let that create the picture for you, but it was much better than that. The trek wasn't as technically difficult, nor exhausting, but still tough. The humidity added a different type of discomfort, and in trying to pack light most of us wore the same pair of clothes (that never dried) each day. As it was high season, almost all of the villages along the way were overflowing with fellow trekkers, so we were resigned to sleeping in hammocks for all but the final night, where we were afforded the luxury of a bed. I say bed, yet mine was merely some planks of wood underneath a mattress the thickness of a slice of bread. Surprisingly, I enjoyed better sleep than I had had in the first 2 nights in Santa Marta. But that's another story.

Along with my ability to sleep in the most uncomfortable of positions, I discovered something else about my body - my bowels have a mind of their own. The sight of the not so welcoming toilets along the trail seemed to render my bowels inactive. I became a bit more forceful after it reached day 3 without a "movement", yet they remained stubborn. And it wasn't until I was back in Santa Marta, with some bathrooms I could actually relax in, that everything returned to normal. Well, I hope I was able to explain that as eloquently as I think I did, but to clean your mind of that image, here's the view we were treated to after reaching The Lost City.

Day 3 - Ciudad Perdida

Following the trek, I arrived back in Santa Marta on Thursday night. I had to make a few trips around the city to pick up my backpack, and my laundry from the previous hostel I was at, then I took a cab 20 minutes out of the city to The Dreamer Hostel. Only to dump my bags at reception and find out that I'd screwed up the booking. Not an ideal situation to be in when every other place in town is booked out, as I learned, as Colombians flock to the coastal towns for vacations during January.

I searched for hostels on my phone and found only one in town that had a bed free. So, I called the dive shop to rearrange my pickup for the next day's diving, then took a taxi to Color Hostel. Upon arriving I was promptly told they in fact had no beds available and HostelWorld was incorrectly displaying availability. Almost resigned to spending $80 on a hotel for the night, I sat down and, whilst playing with the hostel dog, searched for something cheaper on my phone. After about 10 minutes, Veronica, the owner of the hostel, came up to me and offered me a bed in their house at the back of the hostel, an extremely kind gesture that lived up to the reputation of Colombians and saved me a lot of time, money and frustration.

I spent the next day diving in the nearby town of Taganga, which, compared to the amount of incredible diving I was able to experience in Central America, was disappointing. I dabbled with some nice restaurants, cafes and ice cream shops around Santa Marta in the little time I had to relax in the city, but now it's time to tighten the pursestrings a little. Starting with foregoing a VivaColombia flight to spend 16 hours on a bus to Bogotá tonight.

Medellín, Colombia

Medellín's reputation preceded my arrival, as for months prior to last Tuesday I was constantly told by other travellers, "You'll love Medellín, you'll want to move there". Often I take these recommendations with a pinch of salt, yet I never once heard a bad, nor even a mediocre word about Medellín, and Colombia in general. They were all right.

The unique sculptures of Colombian artist Fernando Botero, in Botero Plaza

I made changes to my roughly planned trail through Colombia, as I wanted to spend Christmas in Medellín. I'll admit I was a little nervous about Christmas and New Year approaching - being a solo traveller around the festive period does make you miss your family and close friends, so I wanted to make sure I still had a good time. Luckily however, Sara put me in touch with Alecxa, a girl from Medellín (a Paisa) who was incredibly welcoming in not only making sure I had a great time during my stay here, but also inviting me to a Christmas party at her boyfriend Craig's house in the suburb of Envigado, the same suburb where the famed drug lord Pablo Escobar lived.

I flew in from Cartagena on the 22nd, and on the bus to my hostel I met a few other solo travellers from Melbourne and the USA. After checking in to our hostels, which were conveniently located next to each other in the upscale neighbourhood of Poblado, we shared a few pizzas, some travel stories, and our plans for Christmas and New Year's Eve.

It was going to be a little more difficult to fit in some sightseeing around the festive period, but before Christmas arrived I wanted to check out the Real City Walking Tour of Medellín. It's a little odd that a walking tour comes with such high praise, yet many people had urged me to do it. Again, their recommendations were spot on. We were fortunate in being assigned the owner of the company, Pablo, as our tour guide, and for the next 4 hours he proceeded to deliver an incredibly enthusiastic, engaging and heartfelt performance in telling us the story of Medellín, and it's transformation from one of the most dangerous cities in the world to a friendly, safe, culturally rich and diverse tourist destination.

Pablo delivering one of his many animated stories

The tour ended after sunset, where I braved the chaotic crowds of downtown to buy a Secret Santa present for the Christmas Eve Dinner at Craig's house. I made it back to the hostel in one piece and with all my belongings, so after a shower I took a walk around the nearby Parque Lleras. Often the starting point of many nights out, Parque Lleras is only a few minutes walk from where I was staying at the Purple Monkey Hostel, and surrounded by cafes, restaurants, bars and nightclubs and is often full of young people hanging out and enjoying many a cheap drink (less than AUD$1 for a local beer!). Funnily enough, I bumped into Alecxa and Craig there, so we hung out in the park for a while then shared a bottle of Rum at a nearby bar.

On Christmas Eve I first had a beer at the rooftop bar of the hostel with the owner Mark, who I met in Rio de Janeiro during Carnaval back in 2012. Then along with my Secret Santa Present, a bottle of Rum, some bags of ice and two take-away pizzas (my contribution to the pot luck dinner), I took a taxi over to Craig's house to spend Christmas Eve as it should be spent - eating, drinking, and as a bonus - making a bunch of new friends in the process. This continued well into the early hours of the morning where I waited until 6 a.m. to catch the Metro with Alecxa's friend Paula, back to Poblado, as the sun rose over Medellín on Christmas morning.

Christmas Eve at Craig's house

The first half of Christmas day was spent catching up on some much needed sleep. Then in the afternoon I hung out with Jehan (the guy from Melbourne I met on the bus) and some friends at the hostel BBQ with a bottle of red wine. I was also able to finally open the Christmas card from my parents that I'd been carrying around for a couple of months. I went to bed early to get some rest before the day trip out to Guatapé with Alecxa, Craig and a few others the next day.

Christmas Day at Purple Monkey Hostel

With Christmas and Boxing Day over, I had a couple of days to do some more sightseeing. I visited Pueblito Paisa (a reconstruction of a typical village of Antioquia, the state in which Medellín is located), walked around and people watched in Parque Berrío, saw the Christmas lights in Plaza Mayor, took a ride on the MetroCable, visited the Museum of Modern Art, and treated myself to a traditional local dish - Bandeja Paisa. This plate will make your arteries quiver in fear as soon as it's put down on your table with a loud thud, as it's overflowing with all kinds of fried, but oh so tasty food.

A very hearty Bandeja Paisa from the excellent Restaurante Hacienda

Falling more and more in love with this charming city nested within a valley, it's delicious food, great coffee, incredibly nice people, year-round spring-like weather and unbelievable abundance of beautiful women, I wasn't ready to leave, so I decided to stay for New Year's Eve. The night started in it's usual manner - drinking at the hostel with friends and moving to Parque Lleras, then heading to a rave and finally ending by crawling in to bed with a bottle of water and a packet of jerky at 4 a.m.

I'm still not ready to leave, yet I don't think I ever would be. Medellín simultaneously lived up to and surpassed all expectations I had of this place, and I owe a lot of that to Alecxa and Craig, who I'm extremely grateful for having met, and who helped make it a Christmas and New Year's to remember. At times spent in cafés in Poblado, I found myself daydreaming of a life where I did decide to move here, get a job, learn Spanish (properly), and marry a Paisa. It might happen one day, but on the 10 month anniversary of the day I left home and with only 2 months remaining, I'm looking forward to delving deeper into this captivating country that's fast catching up to Brazil as my favourite.

Medellín from Pueblito Paisa

Cartagena, Colombia

It was a late night last night, and a long day, and it's late, so I really can't be bothered writing a lot right now. But, I don't want to do the beautiful city of Cartagena, my first stop in Colombia (which so far has been amazing, just like everyone told me), and injustice. So Instead, just like I did in high school, I'll make it look like I've written a lot more than I really have through the use of pictures, graphs and anything else I can think of.

First of all, Cartagena was HOT:

Cartagena Temperatures °C

Well, that's what it felt like anyway. I didn't check the actual temperatures. It was hot and humid the entire time, but early in the morning or late at night, it was a beautiful city to walk around.

The famous Torre del Reloj, or Clock Tower.

Cartagena's old city is undoubtedly it's main attraction, particularly the inner "Walled City". It is a real gem of colonial architecture, packed with churches, monasteries, plazas, palaces and mansions with their overhanging balconies and shady patios. The old town is surrounded by Las Murallas, the thick walls built to protect it against enemies since the 16th century.

Inside the Walled City.

The weirdest activity of Cartagena (and the whole trip thus far) was the volcano "mud bath" we hopped into yesterday afternoon. I don't know how, or why this is considered a thing to do here, but it is. And so me, Marc and Finna (whom I met on the San Blas Islands cruise) stripped down to our undies and jumped in. With a bunch of strangers.

It supposedly has some healing qualities for your skin and bones, although I'd bet those benefits are questionable at best. There are bits of debris all in the mud, which you don't know (or want to know) what they are, and there are tens of other and legs touching you all at once. There are locals sitting in the mud all day that offer massages - oddly enough they're all men. Then, after you've enjoyed your time in the mud (and we dipped our heads in for the full experience), you hop out and get wiped down (by another man), then walk down to the river, which is about 50 metres away. This was probably the best, and funniest part of the entire experience. You pay a local old lady at the river to wash you down, and it must be said she does a bloody good job. She managed to get 99% of the mud off of me, and I had mud EVERYWHERE. Yes, she saw my penis.

On my way to a wash.

The San Blas Islands

For the past 5 days, our lives on the mainland quickly became a distant memory. The trivialities of day to day living that you usually concern yourself with didn't matter anymore - the time, your plans for the day, or the WiFi password. We were out at sea on La Gitanita, a small sailboat which, along with the 15 passengers onboard, gently meandered it's way through the paradisal islands of San Blas before heading to Colombia.

After spending most of the morning on a Jeep, I, along with hordes of other backpackers arrived in Port Carti, where speedboats were on standby to take us to our respective sailing boats. After I'd made it on to La Gitanita (little sister of the catamaran El Gitano del Mar, which was making the same journey), it became clear quite quickly that we had a good group, which is always important when spending so much time together with strangers, especially when you're confined to such a small space. However, the old saying of "there's one dickhead in every group" was about to reaffirm it's cliché status as we found out there was one more passenger still to join us.

The first two days were spent in and around the San Blas islands. There's no other way to describe them than paradise. Coconut Tree filled islands dotted the deepest of blue waters around us, which we hopped to and from and used as a base to swim, snorkel, or just relax in the water with a beer. Kuna people (indigenous people of Panama and Colombia, who inhabit many of the San Blas islands) came by our boats during the day, offering freshly caught fish, lobster, and octopus which we cooked up for dinner, and in the evenings we anchored down and caught a dingy to one of many party islands.

It was on the second night that the last passenger to join us emerged as the group dickhead, spiralling into a drug and booze fuelled craze which resulted in him being evicted from the boat and sent back to Panama. As he abused and threatened the rest of the group, and finally proceeded to cry, it became obvious the drugs were the least of his problems in life.

Following that fiasco, our captain Jonathan made up for it by offering us an extra night anchored in the San Blas Islands, for us to relax and get a good nights rest before beginning the journey to Colombia. As there was no running water on board, we had to resort to pirate showers (jumping in the ocean), and using a manual pump toilet. Couple these conditions with a group of 14 people sleeping in an overheated cabin for 2 days and you can imagine how fresh we felt when we finally arrived in Cartagena.

Our living quarters, to be shared by 2 people and conveniently located next to the engine

The journey there was relatively smooth sailing (pun intended), we encountered no problems and had the sun on our back the entire time. It became difficult to tell whether I was tanning, already tanned, or just accustomed to seeing my skin burnt, but I did manage to avoid getting sea sick. Packs of dolphins drew us out from a slumber a number of times to put on a show, as did the odd cargo ship or oil tanker in the distant horizon, but for the most part we were the only ones out there, with nothing else in sight. It's amazing how much you slow down in situations like this, with nothing to bother you or interrupt your thoughts. It makes you realise how distracted you become when you're constantly surrounded by TVs, phones and radios. 

Having completely recharged, I won't lie, it was nice to see land again. The view of Cartagena was spectacular as we celebrated, pulling into the harbour and looking back on what was by far the most incredible, relaxing, and easiest border crossing I've ever completed. The best of all rewards was waiting for us on land - a nice shower, some air conditioning and a decent meal out together with the crew and passengers of La Gitanita.

Celebrating our arrival in Cartagena