today we made our way to the new airport in Santa Marta to catch a flight to Medellín.   Avianca Air was the carrier, which was very nice. lots of leg room, comfy seats and complimentary entertainment, wow.

once in Medellín we were picked up and dropped off at our hotel, La Compana Hotel Boutique.  we were a bit spoiled by having a suite in Santa Marta for a week, so the room here feels small, but it’s a nice place. (except there is a serious lack of hooks.) the shower water pressure is fantastic, and they have a lovely garden and breakfast terrace, plus the largest avocados ever!

after settling in we decided to get a bite to eat and as soon as we left the hotel we were caught in a downpour.  thankfully we had our jackets, but we showed up at the restaurant looking like drowned rats.  they didn’t care because they weren’t open.  we quickly realized that most places don’t serve dinner until 6 PM, and we were eating at early-bird special time since we had been travelling and missed lunch.

so we ended up at our now favorite, yep…..Crepes & Waffles.  open all day and never disappointing, although the wine pour was a bit on the small side.

tomorrow, we will try a highly rated vegetarian restaurant, Verdeo, and Friday we have reservations at Carmen, which is supposedly delicious.  there is no lack of good food here.

we’ve spent a week in Santa Marta, and now the time has come to say goodbye. thankfully, my legs are almost back to normal, just a few small patches of rash left.

our time here has been relaxing and enjoyable, and i have no complaints. i suppose sometimes it takes a rather large, and in this case itchy and expensive, wake-up call to make you stop, slow down and take time to breathe. not something i do very often……

Sunday was a quiet day in town.  maybe because it was Sunday and people were spending time with the family or maybe because it was Mother’s Day and more people were places like the beach or park. or a nice air conditioned cafe.

we took the opportunity to visit the Museo del Oro Tairona Casa de la Aduana.  this originally was the Customs House that Simon Bolivar stayed at for six days before he went to the plantation home where he passed away.  the photo above is the view he would have had from his bedroom window, minus all of the modern day additions of course. the museum was really interesting, providing a history of the Pre-Hispanic societies, the people of the Magdalena Province, stories from the Casa de la Aduana (the house itself) and of course, of Simon Bolivar.

Monday held a visit of a totally different kind, to the local dental clinic.  note: never have dental work done the week you leave for a three week vacation.  i must say, Dentix was a lovely clinic in Santa Marta, with some very friendly staff.  through my passable Spanish, their little bit of English and Google Translator, we were able to diagnose and remedy the problem.  needless to say i need to call my dentist while here and schedule an appt. for when i return.  the issue?  my new crown has a high spot and it is hitting on the lower tooth in just a way to make it painful to bite & chew.  not ideal.

today was spent relaxing, wandering, repacking and a massage.  we booked the massages last week in anticipation of needing them after the hike.  why cancel because the hike didn’t happen?  you never need a reason for a massage!  then there was a rain storm.  a BIG rain storm.  the streets were flooded, the power was out, thunder & lightening……it was just like home 2 months ago.

tomorrow we’re off to the airport, headed to Medellín, where we will stay for three nights. they say it’s cooler there.  right, where have i heard that before?!

so long Santa Marta, it’s been fun!

cooler my ass……..there were about 5 seconds of cool.  that was at 7 AM.

the legs are getting better, slowly. the rash on my thighs has gone away, but the calves are still red, blotchy and very itchy. and this morning something very small with a stinger decided i was in its path and stung me on the walk back from the village.  i just can’t catch a break.

as you might have gathered from the previous post and the picture of Minca, it is really quite small, so there wasn’t a lot to do today.  breakfast, a walk around the property, a walk into the village, a cool drink at the Lazy Cat and back to the hotel. we then made our way back to Santa Marta.

Santa Marta now feels like home.  it’s really not a bad place to be for a few days, again the hotel is well situated, the room is spacious and there is A/C and a ceiling fan.

if my legs get better and i can stand being outside for more than 10 minutes, we may go see a couple more sites before we leave on Wednesday. if not, you may not see a post for awhile.

no Lost City. so much disappointment. there were some tears yesterday while nursing the rashy legs, but nothing a little pizza, beer and pain killers couldn’t make better. what can you do?  in our case, we packed up and took a trip to Minca for the night.

Minca is a village in the Sierra Nevada  mountains 30-40 minutes above Santa Marta. it is famous for its organic coffee and has “cooler” temperatures than Santa Marta. cooler, bah, that is a matter of opinion.

the village is small, but in the last few years has become quite the destination for birdwatching, they have over 300 species of bird in the area.  actually, they say tomorrow the area will be packed for some big birdwatching event, not being a big birdwatcher myself, i’m just looking forward to the slightly cooler temperatures.

before lunch we took a tour of a family coffee farm called La Victoria, where surprisingly they also make beer.  Happy Jaguar and Happy Toucan are the beers made in this little brewery.

La Victoria is a small farm founded in 1892, and they generally harvest the
ir coffee in October, but due to the climate changes, this has varied over the last couple of years. this past year they started harvest in October and ended in December.  they roast and sell coffee from their farm, and if we understood correctly, they also sell unroasted beans to various companies.  the coffee was delicious and we ended up with a couple of bags of beans to take home.

we had lunch at a little place called Dona Ana, and then made our way to the Sweet Harmony Hotel.  this hotel is owned by the same people as the one we stayed at in Santa Marta, so we were welcomed by familiar faces.

the rooms aren’t as spacious as Casa del Farol, but they have balconies with lush views and some of the river.  the river, on a sunny day can be crystal clear, and you can swim, but today the current was strong due to the rain, and it was pretty muddy.

after a rest and a cool down, we walked back into the village (the hotel is about a 20 minute walk) for dinner and ate at Sierra’s Sound right on the river.  we we
re the only people there, and the host/waiter/cook didn’t seem overjoyed to see us, but said they were open, so we we sat down.  it was super quiet, we were the only people there (all evening), but the food was good, and the owner showed up as were finishing.  she was lovely, in from Cordoba, which is a 7 hour drive, for a long weekend to check in on everything.  she took the time to show us around her guest house as well, which has 7 rooms, all with their own baths, A/C and some have decks over-looking the river.  had we not had a play to stay i would have been tempted to stay for the A/C alone.

Minca is the perfect spot for a little time away from the hustle and bustle of Santa Marta,
and hopefully the cooler temperature will help my legs heal sooner.

side note: the guide that took us to Minca said, that she thought it might be good we didn’t do the Lost City because if was raining here, it was REALLY raining there. it made me feel a little better.

this blog is the “travel journal of my experiences, the good, the bad and sometimes very ugly”.  that’s what it says, right there in the title.  welcome to the swollen, red, itchy and very ugly part of the trip.

sadly, my heat rash only got worse throughout the evening, and we ended up deciding not to do the Lost City hike.  by the time i went to bed, i could barely walk and my legs felt like sausages stuffed into ever-so-tight casings.  they are a bit better today, and i’m going to go to the drugstore and see if they have anything that will help.

canceling the hike….i think it was a wise decision, but we’re really disappointed.  i talked about it for ages, purchased special gear, and not it’s not happening.  but it potentially could have been 4-5 days of being really uncomfortable. and although the Lost City would have been amazing, probably not worth my pain and misery. my misery which most definitely would have been shared with 10-12 other people. people that likely would have hated me by the end of the weekend.

so, what will we do for the next 4 days?  that remains to be seen.  for now, it’s hanging out in the hotel with a cool cloth on my legs.

a day long hike through Tayrona National Parque was adventure for today. hot and humid, 8 km, total (so said the guide) and beautiful beaches along the way.

the hike was relatively flat, and the terrain wasn’t difficult.  we walked along a dirt and sometimes a boardwalk path, through mud and sand, and made our up and down many stairs. one issue was that the shuttle picked us up at 6:50 AM, which was before breakfast. how are you expected to go on a hike without the most important meal of the day?

we did have an opportunity to eat at a restaurant when we got into the park, but we opted not to, and thought we’d wait for the restaurant by the beach.  in between the two, we stopped off at a bakery for a little warm bread with a cheese filling. that was really good.

we had lunch and a swim around 11:30 AM, and then made our way to the final beach of the hike, El Cabo. (pictured above) we rested there for an hour or so, and then made our way back to the entrance.

this was a good warm up to the Lost City hike. that will be longer and hotter. everyone says it is difficult, but so pretty. i’m not sure i will make it to the end, if today is any kind of indication.

although i’ve known it will be hot and humid, i somehow completely forgot about my propensity to heat rash. until today that is…..my legs are on fire.  i wore light weight zip-leg pants, but kept them zipped since we were in mosquito territory. mistake? hard to say. i would have gotten the rash even in shorts, i’m just that kind of person…..but maybe it wouldn’t have been so bad? i don’t know.  i took a Benadryl, hopefully that will help, and i’m anxiously awaiting a dip in the pool.

the next post will be next Monday when we get back from the Lost City.  until then, keep your fingers crossed my friends!!

today we enjoyed a private Santa Marta city tour where we took in the sites of downtown, the cathedral, and Quinta de San Pedro Alejandro.

did you know that Santa Marta is the oldest city in Colombia, founded in 1525, and the Santa Marta Cathedral was the first cathedral built in Colombia? now you do.

we could see that Santa Marta is going through a major revitalization, and asked our guide about all the work.  she said the government (now under new leadership) is finally putting money back into the city instead of their pockets, and has big plans. budget is going into public spaces, education and housing. by 2018, parts of the city will look different and be more tourist friendly.

we spent most of our tour time at Quinta de San Pedro Alejandro, which was founded in 1608, and was a working sugar cane plantation.  it was also the estate where Simon Bolivar spent his last days before dying of tuberculosis in 1830. he was only 47.

not knowing much about Simon Bolivar, it was interesting to hear all about his life (which was personally so sad, but politically successful) and the dreams he had for the future of Colombia.

not only did we see the place where he died, but the home (the Customs House) he was in before he went to the estate, and the cathedral where he was first buried.  he is now buried in Venezuela, his birth place.  except for the ashes of his heart which are in an urn hidden in the Santa Marta Cathedral somewhere.  “although he is buried in Venezuela, his heart remains in Santa Marta”.

ps. lunch at Lulo – delicious, dinner at El Bistro – good. but back to Ouzo tomorrow for our last dinner before the big Cuidad Perdida hike on Thursday.

woke up to a sunny sky, which quickly became cloudy, but thankfully not rainy. we enjoyed our last breakfast at the Hotel Monterrey and bid Cartagena a fond farewell.
our itinerary said we were going to be picked up at the hotel, and then have a shared transfer service to Santa Marta. we took that to mean we were going to be in a shared van or bus for the 4 hour ride. au contraire, mon frère, that would have been a delightful way to go.

we were picked up and made our to the main highway and headed toward Santa Marta. we thought, maybe there weren’t other passengers at that time and we had a private transfer.  wrong. two hours in we stopped off in Barriquilla and changed from our comfy car to a not so comfy van. ah, ok, so now comes the shared part of the trip. well we did share,  but not with other people…..we were in a courier van. we spent the next hour driving around Barriquilla picking up packages, including a sealed cooler from a hospital. we didn’t ask. we then stopped again, left the goods in the van, changed cars again and FINALLY headed out of town to Santa Marta.

the next 2 hours of the drive was along the coast, and parts of it were very pretty.  there were also a variety of terrains within 10 minutes of each other. one minute you were looking at lush tropical scenery and then next thing you realize, you’re in a dry rocky desert environment. it reminded me of driving to the top of Haleakalā on Maui.

in Santa Marta we are staying at La Casa del Farol, seemingly in the heart of town. it’s a super cute old mansion with 12 rooms and a rooftop pool. we are staying in the Paris Suite, and i’m ready to move in.  it’s spacious, has good water pressure and although on the street, isn’t very noisy.

after what seemed like a full day of travel (and yes i did send an email to the travel coordinator about the “transfer”), it was nice to land in such a great place. we dropped off laundry at wash & fold (it is really hot & humid), had lunch at Ouzo, and finished the afternoon with happy hour at the pool.

dinner was at a place recommended by Lonely Planet called Radio Burger.  it’s located at Carrera 1 #23-99, which was home to the first radio station in Santa Marta.  the decor features a lot of cool old radios and station gear, which is fun, but the burger wasn’t that great.  the potato wedges on the other hand, yum.

thunder, lightning and a lot of rain, that is how the day began. thankfully it stopped raining, just as we were getting ready to take a boat trip over to Majagua Island.

the island is only about 45 minutes away from Cartagena, and once there were a number of activities we could do. snorkel, paddle-board, kayak, take another boat trip to a different island to see the fish zoo, or you could simply relax on the beach.

we opted for snorkeling, which was a lot of fun. there were so many cool fish, my favorite was a small blue one with super florescent bright blue spots. of course i can’t remember the name now, but it only is that bright when it’s young, as they get older they lose their color. sad.

back at the hotel we enjoyed a cocktail at the bar, went for a swim and watched a Colombian pop-star get interviewed by a local celebrity. she also gave a live performance on the hotel rooftop. i wonder who she was??

now it’s time for Crepes and Waffles and a glass of cold white wine……yum.

we landed in Cartagena last night safe and sound, after almost missing the flight from Panama City. not my fault.

note – should you travel with someone that likes to wander and has no sense of time, set a meeting time in advance.  that way you’re not searching the airport for them while the final boarding call is being made for your flight. sigh.

we arrived fairly late, and thankfully we didn’t have to do anything today except for a city tour at 2 PM.  we slept in, had breakfast at the hotel (Hotel Monterrey), went to the market, took a nap, then went on the tour.

we went to the modern section of the city, the Castillo de San Felipe, the fortress that protected Cartagena from land attacks from the French and Spanish, the Zapatos Viejes (old shoes) monument, which pays tribute to the Cartagena’s poet Luis Carlos López and his poem “my old shoes” and the Cartagena Cathedral.

after the tour we went to Crepes and Waffles for a snack, and then made our way to El Santisimo for dinner.  Crepes and Waffles is already on the agenda for dinner tomorrow.