Taganga

After fleeing Cartagena in search of greener pastures, I ended up in Taganga, Colombia. Still not the white sand Caribbean beach of my dreams, it is quite nice in other ways. Namely, the craggy mountains that surround the (perfectly still) water bay that I get to go trail running in early (early early) in the morning when the sun wakes me up at 6:00. Also, not a 10 minute hike up and around of the the mountains is a nicer beach (the beach right near the town has a tendency to collect trash at a semi-alarming rate) with crystal clear water reminiscent of a swimming pool, albeit a little saltier. I´ve been hanging out here for the past week or so doing just about absolutely nothing. After failed attempts to find a job (there are huge fines for employing foreigners under the table, and the neighbors are known to rat you out), my days are passed very...leisurely. After the first couple nights spent in a hostel, I found a really nice apartment on the non-touristy part of town that I am renting (for $6.50 a night, same price as a bed in a dorm room) from a Belgian couple who had been living here for the past year or so. I´ve met a few other gringos who are hanging around here for a decently extended period of time, most of them passing the time getting scuba diving certified for various levels). Me? I´m spending my time getting tan, on accident. Today at the beach besides sitting in the shade under a tarp strug up between trees, and wearing 45spf sunscreen, I managed a slight burn. I must be THAT white, the UV rays can spot whities a mile away and converge on the target in a sneak attack that goes undetected until it is too late.


My typical day starts at 6:00 am when I awake to the blazing sunshine (sun is up around 5:45, Colombia´s time zone is all messed up). Go for a run, come back and make a MASSIVE breakfast and head down to the beach. By 11am it´s already too hot to be in the sun, so it´s fruit juice and siesta time. The fruit juice... Oh, my, the fruit juice. A 16oz cup of blended fresh tropical fruit heaven costs 1500 pesos, around 65 cents. Passion fruit, star fruit, lulo, mango, banana, pineapple, mora (like a blackberry)...you name it, it will go in a blender with some ice and suger and end up being the most delicious liquid experience of your life. Life becomes livable again around 3pm when the sun has slid a little further down the horizon. Maybe a sunset on the beach, maybe some time in an internet cafe...read...waste away a few hours before making dinner and going to bed around 9:30 (hey, I did get up at 6am, remember?). Then the whole thing starts over again early early the next morning. Will I get bored of this? Most definitely. I´m just hoping I can happily spend the next weeks until Angel comes to visit burning under a tarp and chatting up the gringos, occasionally finding someone who wants to toss around a frisbee with me.

Cartagena

Cartagena was...not what I expected. I was thinking beautiful caribbean beachfront, a big but compact city that centered around the beach. Turns out there aren´t really any good beaches near town, and the city is a strange geography of penninsulas and bridges. And, it was pretty pricey. Shoot, there goes my plan of hanging out in Cartagena for a month.

I did have a pretty strange coincidence happen. Way back when in La Paz, I met a couple from Seattle who were staying in my hostel. They were heading north, and I was running in circles (Argentina, Ecuador, Peru, Argentina, Columbia) I randomly ran into them again at a different hostel in Máncora (northern Peru) and hung out with them for a couple days. Not five hours after I arrived in Cartagena, I was walking on top the city walls when I hear "hey!!!" from a taxi down below. It was the Washington couple! After coffee and catching up we went our separate ways with the mention of maybe meeting up for dinner. Around 5 when I hadn´t heard from them, I decided to go out for a walk. I was on top of the city wall again when I hear "MARIEL!". It was the couple from Washington. Apparantly the wall is the unspoken meeting place. Dinner at Hard Rock Cafe for a little taste of home (okay, only appetizers, and shared, dinner was too expensive) and some seriously large glasses of pop (if they came with refills I´d have thought I was back in the states. No such luck...). The following day, after 3 hours spent on hot sweaty city buses and one failed attempt to make it to the nearby Volcan de Lodo (Mud volcano, the tallest in Columbia) made me realize that sometimes it really is worth it to just pay the money and go on the guided tour. Maybe when Angel comes.

The highlight of Cartagena was the museum of Inquisition era torture techniques, and the numerous monuments around town ripe for photo ops. Now I´m in Taganga, a teeny little beach town near Santa Marta on the Caribbean coast. This town is what I expected when I showed up in Cartagena, and I have set down roots (at least for a month). I found a really cool place to stay (I´m not there yet, the room is occupied for the next couple nights), I´ll post pictures when I have officially moved in. I´m excited and nervous to stay somewhere for that long...The longest I´ve stayed in a city not including cruises or treks was 5 days in La Paz. Hopefully this does a bit to remedy my travel-tiredness.

Uruguay take Two and the Northern Hemisphere

After Mendoza, we set off for Buenos Aires, en route to Colonia, Uruguay. After a night on a bus and a mid day ferry over those familiar chocolate milk waters, I was once again on Uruguayan soil: the land of mate, alfajores, and dulce de leche. We spent a sleepy two days in Colonia (all the museums were closed, there isnt much else to do in that town), Laurel and Tim had to head back to BA to catch their flight back home. We parted ways in the afternoon, Laurel and Tim back on the boat and I on a bus to Montevideo. I spent the weekend lounging around, hanging out with a friend I had made who was living at the hostel the last time I was in town.

Sunday morning at 115am I started my 24 hour marathon travel by bus, boat, and air that would bring me over 1000 miles away to Bogota, Colombia. The 115am bus took me from Montevideo to Colonia, where I hopped back on the ferry at 430am to arrive in BA at 730. Flight at 6pm that night, connection in Lima (Lima...again!!), and finally touchdown in Bogota at 1am. Back in the northern hemisphere once again, as I will be for the remainder of my trip. I was disappointed that my vision that all of Colombia is a sun filled paradise did not hold up in Bogota, as it is 2600m up in the Andes. One day of gray and drizzle was enough to drive me to the bus station, where I bought my ticket to Cartagena, on the Caribbean coast, which as long as the weather channel didnt lie to me (and it never does), will be a sun filled paradise.

My time in Bogota, although short, was filled with museums (okay, only two museums, but that is more than I have visited my entire trip, I think). Particularly interesting was the Museo de Oro (Museum of Gold), which not only housed thousands (and I dont think that number is an exaggeration) of gold artifacts from prehispanic civilizations, had a really interesting exhibit on metallurgy. The other museum was the national police museum, which had lots of really graphic pictures in it of dead people. One that was particularly noteworthy: an action shot of a beheading. As in, the head had not yet hit the ground when the picture was taken, and the blood droplets were still flying off the sword. Pretty graphic. I also got to see the jacket that Pablo Escobar was wearing when he was killed. At least there is one thing I can check off my list to do before I die.

Visitors

It´s been another 10 days or so since I´ve updated, and a lot has happened. Tim and Laurel arrived the morning of the 12th, on Holy Saturday. Besides the fact that Laurel and Tim were beat after the 12 hours of flying, nothing was open, so the day was spent lounging around in parks, having picnics and taking naps. Easter Sunday we went to mass in one of the famous cathedrals in the city, and then set off on foot (since the subways were closed) to explore a couple different barrios of the city. After browsing through the crafts market and seeing some tango dancing in San Telmo (BA´s tango district), we walked south to La Boca, which is famous (with tourists) for it´s brightly painted buildings, supposedly painted with the remnants of ship paint from the days when BA had a functioning port. With Argentinians, Boca is pretty much only known for its soccer team. After a run through the old port area and a brief tour of the Congresso building, we left the following day for Bariloche. After 22 hours on the bus (the 18 hour ride was delayed for 4 hours because of a flat tire, and the lack of proper tools to replace it), we arrived mid afternoon.

We planned a 3 day trek through Nathuel Huapi National Park. Before arriving, I was a little concerned what the weather was going to be like in Bariloche, which is pretty far south in Argentina´s Lake District. Luckily, the weather was absolutely perfect. The days were 65 and sunny, and the nights were brisk (okay, really cold, but it didn´t matter because we were sleeping inside). The first day of the hike we rode a chairlift up (cheating, I know, but it made the hike more difficult in the end, I swear) to the top of a ridge with a beautiful view across the park´s namesake glacial lake Nathual Huapi. Walking along the ridge involved scrambling over boulders and avoiding the steep slope covered in loose gravel that would be a quick and bumpy 400m slide to the valley...and impossible to climb back up. After about a 4.5 hour hike, we arrived at the first refugio to spend the night. These convenient rustic houses in the mountains were a lifesaver. Not only did they provide shelter and a mattress for sleeping, but they cooked dinner and breakfast for us too!! The food at the first refugio was downright gourmet (the guy working there was training to be a professional chef). Day two was a long 6.5 hour haul up out of the valley that the first refugio was in, down that super loose gravel slope I almost fell down several times the day before (I found after slipping and sliding on my butt for about half of that hill that it´s much easier not to fight the slope, but to skate down it), across that valley, up the other chain of mountains on the other side, and finally a steep drop down them and into the final valley where the refugio was. It rained a bit that night, but again, it didn´t matter because I was inside. This is how I should do every trek. No cold rainy nights in tents to wake up to stiff muscles... And it was really, really nice to only carry a sleeping bag and some clothes. The last day was one long 13km walk out along the bottom of the valley. However, since it was low season, there were no buses passing by the trail exit, and we had to walk to the nearest town. After another probably 5km of walking along the road, we flagged down a passing car to ask for directions. We were going the opposite way of town. Luckily, he offered to give us a ride back into town and dropped us off at our hostel door. Love that southern hospitality.

After Bariloche, we headed north to Mendoza. After a day of wandering the city (and a dinner of all you can eat asado), we headed out the following day to the wine district to do the bicycle tour of the numerous vineyards, wineries, and olive oil factories in the area. Laurel and I rented a tandem bike (my first time riding one, things were a bit shaky at the onset, but we became a speed machine with a little practice). After two wineries, an olive oil factory, and a chocolates/liqueur shop, samples at all, we were ready to head back. The following day we were picked up at 9 for the full day horse trek we had arranged. The ranch and beginning of the foothills of the Andes were only 30 minutes outside of town, and we were saddled up and ready to go by 10am. After a rough 4 hours of riding or so, I was saddle sore (the 5 hours on a bicycle the day before didn´t help) and exhausted. We were welcomed back to the ranch with a real life Argentinian asado, and ate some of the best beef we have had while down here. (See the trend? Wine, beef, wine, beef...That is all Argentinians eat, I am convinced. Well, that and dulce de leche.) We got to spend a little time galloping, which was one of my first experiences doing so. It was an awesome feeling, a mix between really feeling the hang time as all the horse´s hooves are off the ground and adrenaline rush of almost falling out of the saddle. Not much compares...except maybe open throttle on a motorcycle :-).

Anniversary

Today is my 3 month anniversary, I am just a week shy from my halfway point. Time flies when you´re having fun.

Here are a few halfway stats:

Days traveled so far: 90
Flights taken: 5
Bus rides (long distance): 27
Hours spent on a bus: 271 (11.3 days)
Cities visited: 26
Countries visited: 5
Stamps in my passport: 19
Money Stolen (and returned): $2002.56
Days spent trekking: 7
Beaches visited: 7
Visitors: 2 (although that number will increase to 4 once Laurel and Tim show up in just a couple hours)

Bus Marathon, and some Waterfalls

After Piriápolis, I headed out to Uruguay´s trademark tourist town: Colonia. As you may have inferred from the name, the main attraction is the cute colonial archetechture. Admittedly, I´m not very into colonial archtechture, but I couldn´t leave without spending at least a day there. The town actually was undeniably cute. The treelined streets were cobblestoned and quiet, dotted with sidewalk cafés and artesan shops, and plazas abound.

The majority of tourists in town arrive for the day from BA via ferry across the Río Plata, which is an alarming chocolately brown. This is caused by silt which is carried down from the Amazon, but it´s still a bit unsettling. After walking up and down every street in the historic bit of town, climbing the lighthouse, and eating at one of the sidewalk cafés with a couple of American girls I met, I had pretty much covered the Colonia tourist circuit. So, I headed back to my hostel to cook dinner and go to sleep early. I had a grand plan for the following day that would take me from Uruguay all the way up to Puerto Iguazu in Argentina, starting at 5:40am, via 4 buses and taking close to 24 hours. But, that didn´t exactly work out. I made it for the 5:40 bus, got off at the teeny town of Fray Bentos, Uruguay to catch a bus across the border. Unfortunately I tried to do this on Palm Sunday, and the country had pretty much shut down. The bus that was supposed to take me across the border wasn´t running that day, and as I found this out I looked up to see the bus I had arrived on (that would have taken me to a more populated border town to make the crossing) pulling out of the station. NOO! So, out of options, I was stuck in the teeny town of Fray Bentos, with nothing open. No hostels in town, I ended up at a two star hotel (living the good life...), and had myself a picnic in the nearby park. Could be worse places to get stuck, at least the weather was gorgeous. The next day I caught the bus that I had just missed the day before, and it took me to the populated border town, and I crossed to Argentina. There I picked up a bus headed for Puerto Iguazu, pretty seemlessly. After I got out of Fray Bentos, the entire ordeal took 22 hours. I could have made my 4 bus, 24 hour goal if I had only picked the right border crossing the first time...

Made it into Puerto Iguazu at 8:30am. The only thing to do in Puerto Iguazu is to go to the Iguazu National Park and see the massive waterfalls there, and so that is what I did. Me, and the rest of Argentina. The place was packed. I guess it´s always packed, just a bit more so during Holy Week. I had booked a 7:30pm bus back to BA that morning, not wanting to deal with finding a hostel. I made it to the falls at 11am, and spent the day dutifully going to every lookout point in the park and trying to dodge the crowds. The falls really were beautiful. The main attraction, El Garganta del Diablo (throat of the devil) is an impressive sight. The entire park is linked by a series of catwalks that get you out close to the falls. At times, real close to the falls. Iguazu reportedly has the highest annual flow of water. I don´t doubt it.

Uruguay

Landed in Buenos Aires at 130am the morning of the 27th. Luckily I had made reservations online for a hostel while I was in Lima, so when I showed up at my hostel of choice at 3 in the morning, I was pleasantly surprised to find that they didn´t have a bed for me. What? Apparently they thought the reservation was for the NIGHT of the 27th, although I had specified that it was for 3am on the 27th. They graciously offered me the couch in the TV room of the hostel, which was nice, as a night of free accomodation, except that the TV room was connected to the hostel´s on site bar, which was pumping drum and bass music until 5am for all 4 patrons that were there. There are times that I wonder why I carry around my heavy sleeping bag liner, until a situation comes up that I am sleeping on a dirty couch in a bar, and I don´t mind the extra weight so much anymore. My visit to BA wasn´t much to write home about, I spent just about a complete day sick in bed, the next one not feeling so good but wandering around the city anyway. I left after two nights for Montevideo, Uruguay.


I really liked Montevideo. Quiet tree lined streets and a pleasant laid back atmosphere had me convinced I could live there. For as hot as it was in BA, it was definitely fall in Montevideo. The sycamore trees had started losing their leaves, and the constant breeze had a definite chill to it. Two days wandering Montevideo, and I headed off to Punta del Diablo with some American (actually, they grew up just a few miles from my house in MI, Dearborn, for you Michiganders) friends I had made. Punta del Diablo is described as a little visited fishing village in Lonely Planet. By little visited they meant NO ONE was there. I bet it´s pretty hopping in high season, but it was deserted when we showed up. Rented a cabana for a night and spent some time exploring the rocky coast, playing frisbee on the sandy bit, and swimming in the ocean.

After Punta del Diablo, I headed to a more populated beachfront town called Piriápolis. I was lucky enough to get some beautiful weather, just missing the overcast day yesterday which I heard about from my dormmates. It´s been an action packed day so far, I was up at 745 to go running, I was climbing the third highest peak in Uruguay (all 423m of it...not too impressive coming down from the 4750m hike in the Andes just a week ago) by 11, and on the beach by 2pm. The hike was awesome. The sign at the entrance said it takes approximately 3 hours to summit. Determined to make it in under 1, I set off at a quick pace. I made really good time, until I got lost. I ended up on some teeny little overgrown trail that I guess was a water runoff, because it started going downhill. Refusing to go downhill, I thought it would be a good idea to just scale the rocks to the top, which didn´t look THAT far away. So, I ended up bouldering/free climbing the last 50m or so of ascent. The areas that weren´t boulders were covered in a prickly cactus type plant, so I ended up jumping and scrambling my way along the tops of the boulders the whole way up. 45 minutes after I passed that sign on the way up claiming a 3 hour ascent I was standing at the bottom of the cross, sweaty, scratched up and bleeding, covered in bug bites, and quite happy.