Where 23 - Cartagena, Colombia --OR-- How to Find the Lost City

HI there,

I´m sure that when I planned this 6-month trip i was supposed to have about 5 and a half months in Central America - now 2 and a half of the six have already gone and I am still in South America - so much for the maths. But at last, via a strange route, I have made it to the top of South America and the last port of call before heading across to Central America.

When I last wrote I had just arrived in Bogota where Sally came out to see me and we travelled together for 3 weeks through Colombia and Venezuela. We headed North East though a string of colonial towns where we spent Xmas and then into Venezuela to Merida, in the mountains for new year and then right across the country to the south east to see Angel Falls, then to Caracus (where Sally flew out) and along the coast, safely back into Colombia, to Santa Marta (to find the Lost City) and to Cartagena.

HIGH POINTS
- Bogota is full of interesting fruits, teas and powders. Some of them are very good if you have a cold, others make your nose run - and some of the tea was intesting too...
- Spent Xmas in a well preserved colononial village called Barichara in Colombia where on the wall of every single house was a crib - they do love their cribs - and every street was lined with lights, Xmas trees and (even though these people have never seen snow in their lives) snowmen - made of plastic cups! There were no other foreigners in the place, which was great, and entertainment was laid on for the locals who danced all night in the plaza, to salsa and the band who didn´t come on stage until 4am Xmas morning - and hardly anyone was drunk ! Not like England at all.
- In this village stayed in a nice small hotel but when I asked for the key to the room I was told - ´no key - its very tranquil here´... and this is Colombia. I have never been anywhere where I have had my own room but no key! Is this now the safest place on the planet? I was a bit dubious but she was right, and no, nothing was lost or disappeared.
- And the xmas beers were only 25 pence each. Not real English beer, fizzy stuff, but ice cold.
- Angel Falls (Venezuela) - The highest waterfall in the world, almost 1,000 metres of sheer drop awaits the water that comes off a flat topped mountain - only ´discovered´ in 1935 as it is so far away from ... anywhere. The water seems to turn to mist a third of the way down as it loses motivation to get to the bottom, and it almost stops. We managed to time it all the way down though and it takes about a minute (about 60kmh or 37mph) which isn´t bad going. It is huge but difficult to get into perspective when viewed from the bottom. Although it looks like hardly any water is falling, when it reconstitutes itself into a river at the bottom, it is a raging torrent!
- And now I´m on the north (Carribean) coast in the blazing heat (even though it is their winter). I´m trying to keep out of the sun as much as possible whilst all the locals are happy walking around in full length jeans - maybe they think it is cold!


The Treks
I´m not entirely sure why I/we decided to do these treks but I guess they seem like a good idea at the time.

Pico Humboldt
- In Merida we decided to do a 4 day trek/climb up the countrys 2nd highest peak, Pico Humboldt at almost 5,000m. The first day was a real slog uphill through a rainforest carrying over 20kg of equipment including crampons and ice axe. We passed a few day hikers in the rainforest - maybe we made them feel small with all the stuff we were carrying (as they jogged past us!) or maybe they just thought we were stupid, but then carrying an ice axe in a jungle is about equivalent of wearing scuba gear including tanks and fins/flippers whilst walking down Oxford Street doing xmas shopping.
- After starting at midday we only made it to the campsite, totally exhausted, 10 mins before it got dark. All of my muscles were screaming so loud that I couldn´t hear a thing.
- Overnight I left my waterbottle outside the tent and it froze (at about 3,000m).
- The 2nd day was over tricky rocks and took 8 hours, but them we had to get to bed early for day 3.
- New Years eve - Up at 3am and left at 4am trekking in the dark. By 9am we had reached the bottom of the 45 degree glacier that we had to climb - 5 mins later my calves were being pulled apart by the crampons - unfortunately there was an hour of ice climbing before a further half hour over rocks before we made it to the summit. And what a view. What an experience. There is no way I´m ever doing that again!
- I made it back to the tent totally exhausted and crawled into it at 4pm on New Years Eve and didnt come out again that night. Not much of a party then!
- Unfortunately we still had to come all the way down which took all of day 4. Sheer madness - those day trekkers were right!


Lost City (Cuidad Perdida), Colombia - Built during 700 - 1400AD by Tyrone indians as part of a trading network of towns over hundreds of kms - Population around 3,000. Discovered in 1975 by graverobbers (searching for the Indians gold).
- This trek has diminished in popularity since the kidnappings there last September (but they have all been released now so it must be OK!) - and less people doing it means it is even more worth doing. So ...
- Six days trekking through dense jungle to the middle of nowhere. Its hot, by god it is hot - and about 100% humidity - your clothes are saturated with sweat within half an hour of starting walking each day. Fortunately there is only an average of 4 hours trekking a day - in the afternoon you get to cool off in the freezing rivers and try and dry your clothes for the next day (tricky cos unless it is sunny in the afternoon, nothing dries).
- After 3 days of walking uphill and wading through rivers (fortunately only carrying about 12kg this time), a flight of narrow moss covered stone steps emerges through the vegetation by the riverbank in the middle of dense jungle. 1,200 steps (all slippery as they are covered in moss) leading up to the Lost City which is of course built on top of a mountain...
- Since there were no buildings ( they were all wooden and have decayed) I wasn´t expecting much, but it was more spectacular than I had expected - the numerous path and stairways that connect the 170 terraces (each housing between 1 and 5 houses) were amazingly intricate, almost delicate, and many of them disappeared into dense undergrowth, impossible to follow without a machette.
- And on the fourth day I had the whole place (almost) to myself - apart from my guide and a couple of local indians. Fantastic - well worth the walk. And I didn´t get kidnapped - again!


Low Points
- One night in the jungle at the Lost City I got over 100 mossie bites on one foot - and that is depite mossie net, repelent and wearing socks. The other foot only got about 70 bites.
- Xmas and new year are the time for fireworks here - so if you want to get a good nights sleep during the couple of weeks around then , forget it. Some one will be up at 4am just to set one off. And they aren´t even pretty, just VERY LOUD!
- It is a bit odd enjoying Xmas festivities surrrounded by fully armed military. OK so they still look young enough to be wondering what they will be getting for Xmas, but in a small 'peaceful' town they do look kindda out of place.
- Ciudad Bolivar in Venezuela - It ever you wanted to see an example of colonial decay then this is it. Build a string of huge colonial mansions, do no maintainance for 50 years, close most of it down, and let the rooms out to backpackers. It must have been a great place once - although not quite sure when that was...
- The Orrinocco (Flow) - So evocative of a magnificent river it makes you think of more than just the Womble and Enya. But naming such a dirty and disgusting river after a womble is just a sad joke! Oh and it flows through Ciudad Bolivar. And Enya can never have been to the Orrinocco, it just (sort of) rhymed with 'flow'
- Venezuela is a strange sort of country. Its main problem seems to be that it just doesn´t work very well - a good summary was provided by a bus I went on - the door latch had failed so the door wouldn´t stay shut, but instead of mending it they employed a third man (they are always 2 - one to drive and one to collect the fares) to close the door and tie it shut each time after someone got on or off.
- Lemon flavour crisps - yes really - And you just have to try them - once - sort of odd though. If you close your eyes and imagine that you are eating pastry and not potato, they sort of taste like Lemon Merangue Pie...


Oh and met a Brazilian who went into the Tesco Metro in Bristol, England, looking for the Underground - and she asked a few people before someone told her there wasn´t one - well you just gotta laugh!
(For non UK people Tesco Metro is the name of a supermarket and Bristol doesn´t have an underground.)

Now onto Panama - and its canal - I dont think it has a lot else...

I hope those of you in the Northern Hemisphere survive the cold spell - it should be over by ... May?

Best wishes

Pete