Colombia Part 2 2018

Date: 24/08/2018

Position: Santa Marta, Colombia

Buenas Dias Chicos!!

Deputy Captain Alex here with part 2 of our Colombia story.

In the middle of July we set off on a 3 week tour of Colombia – inland, with Ari B safely tied up in Santa Marta and Captain Bonzo in charge.

Medellin

After taking the bus to the airport (40 minutes, 60cents per person) we boarded a flight to Medellin, ($33 each including luggage), our designated first stop and the second biggest city in Colombia. We are not normally ones for big cities, but it’s a good starting point for our tour and also centrally located to a couple of locations we wanted to visit. After arrival, we checked into our apartment - a room rented in someone’s apartment, with full use of the facilities, booked through Airbnb at about US$ 20 per night. We were lucky, the apartment was stunning and the owner lovely. The town itself, well nothing too special if you compare it to Cartagena, but the transformation it has undergone is spectacular. Medellin (and the infamous Commune 13) was ranked as the most dangerous town in Colombia and maybe the world at the height of the drug wars, only 20 years ago. Thousands of people had fled the mountain regions to get away from the control and danger of the drug lords and came to Medellin. The town was quickly overwhelmed by the numbers and the people were told to leave. They had nowhere to go, so they built shelters in the hills surrounding the town, which were then torn down by the police. Having no other options, the people stayed, rebuilt their shelters and stood their ground and after a few cycles of destroying and rebuilding, the town said that their homes were illegal, so if they stayed, they would receive no support from the town. That means: no electricity, no water, no sanitation/ toilets, no hospitals and most importantly, no police protection. Within 25 years the population was over a million with most unemployed. As you can imagine, it didn’t take long for the armed factions to take control of the slums, offering “protection” and Medellin became the cocaine trade’s world capital. The rise of crack cocaine supplied by Pablo Escobar’s Medellin Cartel brought in  money but also extreme violence and gang warfare. Anyone standing in Pablo Escobar’s way were offered plata o plomo (silver or lead) and his enforcers (sicarios) roamed the street on motorbikes shooting down anyone Escobar wanted dead. Since the poor people in the slums had nothing from the government and lots of “help” from Escobar, it was in Commune 13 where he managed to hide for years, protected by the people he looked after financially until he was finally located and killed in 1993. We talked to the mother of our apartment host, who gave us the first hand accounts of what it was like – armed motorbikers on the lookout for a kill, no law and order, dangerous to leave the house, hardly any food to buy etc etc.

It was with this background that battles between gangs themselves and battles with the government took place that sometimes lasted days – that’s an armed conflict with automatic weapons and helicopters taking place in a residential area – as recent as 2002!

Even more amazing is how they turned everything around! We did a walking tour with one of the guides who lives in Commune 13 right into the heart of the barrios. Amazing graffiti is everywhere depicting not only the sad history of Medellin but also the positive future. Some of the young people started learning English from travellers and it was suggested that as a way to practise their English, they give some free tours of the area. The tours are so popular that they now have several each morning and afternoon everyday of the week. There is no charge, they just ask for tips and a large portion of the money made is invested back into the community. As a result the whole community is behind this initiative and traffic just stops to allow groups to cross the roads. Cafes, homemade ice-cream shops and art shops have sprung up and some of the local lads have formed a break dancing troupe to entertain the tourists.

Medellin today is as safe (or unsafe) as any other large town following a major regeneration project to integrate the outlying slums by providing a unique transport infrastructure. A new metro system connects the districts and 3 cable cars (just like the ones we have in Europe to go skiing – 6 people per car) go up into the hills to connect the barrios into the network. In Commune 13, a series of outside escalators enables people from even the most remote areas to be in town for work in record time and as a result, the previously remote areas are now fully employed. Of course, there are still gangs and crime and you wouldn’t wander into Commune 13 or any of the other barrios at night, but it’s a far cry from the previous conditions. A success story for sure!!

Day trip to Guatape

About 90 minutes by bus from Medellin lies a large artificial lake, created by a dam about 20 years ago, with the most beautiful villages around it and a smaller version of the famous Uluru (Australia, also known as Ayer’s rock). Piedra del Penol has stairs built on the outside of it (621 of them) and you are encouraged to climb to the top to see the AMAZING view. Check out the pics. The village of Guatape itself is lovely, with colourful buildings that each have decorative panels called zocalos built into the walls. The zocalos often describe the purpose of the building – a butcher might have pictures of cows and pigs, the bookshop books and the bakery – I’m sure you’ve got the picture by now.....

We enjoyed some lovely fresh trout and ribs for lunch and bumped into a young couple we met on the Lost City walk – Alec and Nicki from Australia, who we ended up spending quite a bit of time with in the coming days.

Jardin

After Medellin, we took a bus to Jardin, a beautiful village about 3 hours south. Jardin doesn’t appear in any of the foreign guidebooks at the moment so whilst it is popular with Colombians at the weekends there are very few backpackers. Tourists are welcomed here but it is not the be all and end all for the residents. We felt like we had just stepped back 100 years. It has the prettiest and most colourful village square which is characterised by hundreds of tables and chairs from the various bars – all painted in different bright colours that sparkle in the sunlight – and is surrounded by spectacular hills. A great sight and the prefect place to celebrate Carla’s birthday which we celebrated with our friends Alec and Nicki. I am now married to a pensioner.....

After dinner, we went to the square for a few drinks and watched the local cowboys ride their Paso Fino horses into town – not for tourists (there aren’t many) but for their own pleasure – a local equivalent of boy racer cars doing doughnuts I guess.

Absolutely spectacular, I have not seen horses being ridden like that, outside dressage competitions. It’s hard to describe, and the video is poor quality due to the light, but it was unbelievable. They do some fancy footwork then jump off the horse and down a couple of aguardientes with their mates before jumping back on to show off a bit more. We talked to a young guy we met the next day, who was training his horse just outside town and he showed us how he controlled his horse just by hand signals – tiny signals at that – and no leg movements at all. I think he was psychic and talked to the horse, otherwise this kind of control surely couldn’t be possible!!  

One of the great passions in Colombia is billiards. Not so much pool, but the 3 ball, no pocket version of carom billiards which I have played for years during my school days. There was a club just a couple of minutes away (pretty much whenever I didn’t like the lessons on offer we went to play - I played a lot). So we introduced Alec and Nicki to this version of the game and enjoyed a number of nights in bars, playing billiards (chatting to locals who love to help with shots, explain better options etc) and drinking cheap beer and rum. They do take it serious in Colombia and the quality of the tables and equipment is first class, best I have seem in many years – and an hour on the table is about 2 US.....

One of the days we went for a horse riding in the surrounding hills, stopped at the top of the cable car (square, open 2 by 2 meter wooden box, suspended on a couple of wires up from the village). It’s a cable car, but Colombian style – charming, and since it was only a few meters above ground you might even have survived the (inevitable) failure.

The trip took us to a tunnel, leading to a secret waterfall. The tunnel started as a door in the side of the mountain and had been dug by two guys in their spare evening hours – it took them 3 years to complete the 100 meters or so. When I asked the guide why they dug the tunnel she explained it was for tourism – and that it was crazy... I tend to agree especially if you consider she charged 70 cents per person for the tour...return on investment might take a while J She also explained and showed us the 4 types of bats that lived in the tunnel – in their hundreds, including the Dracula type that feasts on life stock – they only attack humans if they can’t find any pigs or cows – very reassuring!

The next day we set out to hike the 5 hours to the Cuvee d’Esplendour – a waterfall within a cave. Unfortunately since we do all hiking (if possible) without a guide, it took us 2.5 hours to find the track, and by then it was too late (and we were pretty knackered having hiked halfway up the wrong mountain!). to accomplish the hike before dark, so we cut it short and went to a mountain bar overlooking the village to spend a few peaceful hours sipping drinks and listening to music – bliss. There was even a picture of a mule on the wall with a disturbing likeness to myself!

When we returned to the town square it was now weekend, national day and the village was hosting a film festival, so every bed in town was taken and the population must have doubled for that Saturday night. Our peaceful village was transformed and was swarming with Colombian tourists – no room for horses now. We were very lucky to have enjoyed this peaceful amazingly beautiful village during the week. We absolutely loved it and hope it doesn’t change too quickly.

Next time we travel on a chicken bus, admire alpine palms, freeze our backsides off and jump off a mountain.

Hasta Luego

Ari B out

Commune 13, Medellin

Medellin