I'm enjoying my last few days in Colombia, and I have to say I've had a great time here -despite getting sick. I ended up spending two and a half weeks in Salento partly because it was beautiful, and partly to recover from a hefty bout of bronchitis! It wasn't a bad place to fall ill though, the hostel owner was friends with a very good doctor who came to see me and sorted me with antibiotics. So for a few days I just lay about reading, enjoying having a dorm to myself for several days, drinking nice coffee and soaking up the chilled vibes of the place.
In the end I decided to take some Spanish lessons while I was there, so did a week's worth with a teacher Louisa. She was great and I learned a lot, even though she usually spent a good 10 minutes every lesson telling me about her love life! (If you want my opinion he sounds like a jerk, but maybe that was just my bad translation of the Spanish)
Once I was feeling better I got to enjoy the highlights of Salento once again. One being the Speakeasy, a bar run by a two brothers from Perth. They have a cool little set up and do good meals, a mean 'russian cocaine' shot (coffee limey goodness!) plus really know how to have fun. I played many a game of 4-2-1 down there, plus there was a cracking disco-funk party last Saturday night - I made some hula hoops and took them along and everyone had a go, it was loads of fun!
A major highlight of Salento is the Valle de Cocora, a picturesque valley with lots of the very tall national tree of Colombia (does Australia have a national tree?) the wax palm. These things are like 60m high and strange to see in the high rugged mountains- think beachfront meets cows and coffee plantations. Anyway there's a 5 hour hike you can do up and around the mountains which I did, god it was lovely. I was so excited to be healthy again I strode ahead of the others (who I had caught the jeep out there with), and so got to enjoy the scenery and the forest to myself. Theres something fantastic about hiking alone, I felt like I noticed and appreciated the forest more, had more awareness of my surroundings rather than being distracted by other people. Hmm, I wonder if I have some little inner hermit...(Ha! Me?)
Continuing up the mountainside you get to a little rest stop where I recharged with hot chocolate and watched the many different hummingbirds buzzing around. It was then a further kilometre uphill to the top of the mountain. My goodness that view was spectacular. The clouds would sweep in from the valley below, hit the highest mountain and woosh up higher into the air - this cloudspotter was enthralled! And it was an absolutely glorious day, too, so much sunshine!
What else was great about Salento? I can't seem to rave enough about the place. Louisa showed me the artisan village and I arranged a workshop to make jewellery with a the quirky lovely Diana. I couldn't make out what she was saying half the time but she punctuated her words with a slightly crazy giggle which was endearing. That was quite a girly day actually - the wonderful Ruby and I spent the morning traipsing around the countryside together, then made jewellery, then had pedicures and a d&m. (It was rather strange actually, sitting in this lady's loungeroom getting pedicures while her kids ran around and her brother studied, chatting away about boys and god knows what else, assuming that none of them spoke English!)
Oh and the other cool thing was tejo! Heard of it? Its like a cross between shotput and and archery, with gunpowder! You throw these metal discs at a clay target and on the clay sits a horseshoe, and little packs of gunpowder. They explode if the disc hits the horseshoe. Its not dangerous, its probably the equivalent of like 10 party poppers all at once. Loud and a flash of light, and oh so satisfying when you get that bang!
Anyhoo it was sad but I said goodbye to Salento and am now in Cali with my friendly host Eliana, who is doing a very good job of immersing me in Spanish. She is quite patient even though the most common thing I say to her is 'No entiendo'. But boy has my dictionary got a workout! Anyway we´re about to go out on the town so hasta luego!
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