Hello Ecuador

Well here I am in beautiful Ecuador! I finished up in Colombia last week after couchsurfing with a local from Cali, Eliana.  It was a great experience. I met her at her workplace, a huge preschool where her colleagues were having a party for the schools anniversary.  There was a lot of karaoke and her 8 year old son Miguel did a pretty awesome Michael Jackson dance.  The next day she showed me around Cali and in the evening we sat up on San Antonio hill overlooking the city, watched some comedy in the open air amphitheatre (which I barely understood but it was amusing nonetheless) then had dinner with her friends.  The language barrier was challenging- I felt like an ignorant retard a lot of the time but then I figured I am relatively ignorant of the Spanish language so that's probably a good reality check for me - can't be awesome at everything can I :)  The Sunday evening we drove out to her grandmothers little country house up in the mountains, where her family were all gathering.  There was a soundsystem set up on the veranda and Eliana danced salsa with her grandmother which had everyone in stitches.  Then it was karaoke time - I did a woeful rendition of Yesterday and a slightly better version of La Isla Bonita.  Then an embarrassing uncle took hold of the karaoke and wouldn't let up with the ballads so Eliana and I sat on a log in the yard, looking out over the valley drinking beers an listening to music on her ipod.  I felt like we were teenagers at her parents party it was funny.

After a brief stop at Popayan the next night I crossed into Ecuador the next day, arriving to Quito that evening.  I was really happy to be there - the hostel had a gorgeous terrace overlooking the city with a fire going, it was great.  The next day I went out to the equator park, where you do all these experiments like watching the water going clockwise, anticlockwise and straight down all within a few meters of each other. I tried and failed to balance an egg on a nail, and also found it rather difficult to walk in a straight line right along the equator - something to do with the centrifugal force ( I wasn't drinking honest!) This science fan was pretty impressed with the whole thing.  Quito itself wasn't bad either, I enjoyed walking around the old town, hula hooping in the park and drinking and chatting with some lovely fellow travellers on the terrace.

I decided to tag along with a few said travellers, a cool couple from oz Kate and Luke and the cute Canadian brothers Brad and Jeremy, up to a hostel in the countryside near the Cotopaxi volcano.  The place was just amazing.  Stunning scenery, relaxed beautiful hostel with hammocks and fireplaces, amazing food and a spa bath! The first afternoon we walked up to a nearby waterfall and jumped into the pool below - not a huge drop but woah! Icy cold! Then we walked home down the river, skipping along the rocks feeling all adventurous.  The next day we walked to a place with these amazing caves, confronting claustrophobia and bats, but again, feeling pretty darn adventurous.  

On the last day I was even more adventurous still - climbing to the summit of the extinct Pasochoa volcano to an elevation of 4200m.  What a spectacular day that was! Walking alongside the old Inca terraces with their still functioning irrigation canals.  Across the ridge with the tall grasses gently flowing in the wind, then overlooking Quito and the surrounding farms at the top of the ridge.  And finally scaling the summit and looking down into the crator all lush with trees, around at the countryside, Cotopaxi and all the other mountains surrounding us...It was magic.  I could really get into climbing mountains I think it´s so satisfying, and I totally have a better understanding of the term 'feeling on top of the world'.  Mind you I'm still feeling pretty sore two days later - time for some hot springs at Banos methinks!

Hummingbirds and Gunpowder

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!

Travels through Colombia

I've been in Colombia for a couple weeks now and it's been pretty awesome.

After Taganga the three amigos made our way down to Cartagena, a lovely city on the coast surrounded by high city walls (to keep out the pirates).  We cruised around the bars drinking rum, saw this great band that Kate knew from her last trip to Cartagena, afro-caribbean beats with melodic latin lyrics plus a little bit ska with the trombone, the dancefloor packed and pumping.  It was really all about the party in Cartagena, we had several crazy nights.  In the day time there was a lot of lounging around the hostel which had a lovely courtyard and a pool.  On our last night together (Kate sailing to Panama, Dougie off to Buenos Aires, me staying in Colombia) we had a massive one on the rooftop of the hostel, watching the sunset, doing acrobatics and other nonsense and making our own fun during a blackout.

After a fair bit of indecision I decided to make my way to Medellin, a thirteen hour overnight bus ride away.  It wasn´t that bad actually, when I woke up in the morning we were winding around the high mountain roads, with the clouds hanging low and the sun attempting to break through, it was quite beautiful.  When I got to Medellin I took a few days of resting and recovering.  I gradually explored the city which is set in the valley between two mountain ranges, checked out the plaza of sculptures by the famous artist Botero, the Colombian art gallery nearby, and chilling in the botanic gardens.  One afternoon I caught the cable car up to Arvi Park, a nature reserve at the top of one of the mountains.  Cable car is a pretty cool way to travel, the first part was sweeping over the rooftops of the city checking out the various neighbourhoods, watching the kids playing soccer in the streets, then the second part was quietly gliding over the canopy of the forest.  At the top I went on a guided walk through the reserve with a lovely guide, Monica (who I got all to myself) who told me all about the trees and different types of forest.  She practiced her english and tried to teach me some spanish, we had a great old time.  There were two dogs accompanying us and she explained that one of them used to be really skinny, so the park staff named him Juan, after a really skinny co-worker of theirs.  This human Juan took a liking to the little dog and started feeding him and fattening him up, and so now he was quite healthy looking, frolicking in the forest with the other dog, living the good life.  Monica said the human Juan is still skinny though!

Since Medellin I've been in the beautiful Salento, high in the Zona Cafetera (coffee growing region).  Its just my kind of town - small and friendly, beautiful mountains all around and GOOD COFFEE!  The coffee has been pretty crap around most of south america, all the good stuff gets exported.  On my first day in Salento I went to the lookout at the top of town and was blown away by the beauty of the valley below.  A guy up there told me I could walk down to the river below so I did, then decided to keep on walking to Cocora, a little spot with lots of walking trails and such.  It took a couple hours to get there, but it was such a nice walk along the quiet country road through the valley.  When I got there I had lunch then went on a short horseride through the forest along the river, it was magic.  Afterwards I caught the jeep back to Salento and met some other tourists including an Australian Katie who was staying with friends at their bar the SpeakEasy, so I went there that night and had a burger and a few beers and made plans to go on another horseride the next day.  Another fantastic day! I had a fiesty horse called Violin who liked to be at the front of the pack and when he broke into a gallop was really bloody fast, almost scary, but in a fun rollercoaster kinda way:) We spent four hours riding though another gorgeous valley, to this little farm where this cute old grandpa showed us around his palm trees and coffee plants, smiling all the while, then a muddy precarious walk to a beautiful little waterfall.  We had tea on his balcony before going home again.

I was a bit sore after that ride! But I like it heaps here so I reckon I'm gonna hang around a while and take some spanish lessons:)