Hello!
I’ve been horrible at keeping up with this the past few weeks. I’ve only spent a bit of time on my computer, and it’s only been to get work done! If I don’t catch up before next week, I’ll write about everything when I get back to Salt Lake (I leave next Wednesday.. AHHH!))
-Nathan
Ok. I’ve been pretty bad about keeping up with this. Here is a recap of the past few weeks:
Ty arrived safe and sound on Christmas Day. We went caving, white water rafting, and then decided to do a last minute 6 day back packing trip in El Cocuy. 2 others from the hostel decided to join us.
20 hours of bus riding later, we ended up in El Cocuy. We rented gear, found a hostel, and made a plan for the next day. Long story short, we took a wrong turn on the first day, and wasted a day of hiking. Two of the people in our group decided to head back, and Ty and I decided to trek on. I was outvoted on bringing a tent, and it ended up being quite an experience.
For the first 3 days, Ty & I rocked it out. We had great weather, and made really good time. On day 4, we got a ton of rain. We ended up setting up a crappy tarp shelter, and huddled under it in a sleeping bag. The next day it started snowing, and a group of Colombian kids invited us in to crash in their tent. We hung out, made a ton of food, and got a 5:30 am start the next day. We hiked for 5 hrs and finally made it out.
It was a pretty interesting experience. It was both mentally and physically tough for both of us. Once we got out, we took hot showers, and hopped on a bus to Bogota.
We arrived at 4am, and the first two hostels we went to were full. Luckily, we found one that had room. We love it here. The hostel is really nice, and has an awesome social scene.
Today we are just relaxing and recovering from the backpacking trip. We are in Bogota until Tuesday, and then we fly out to Letecia (The Amazon Jungle). We are there for a week, and then we fly back to the coast to get Ty scubafied!
I’m not really for sure where I left off. This past weekend I finally made it to Bucaramanga to get my paraglider. It was 2.5 hrs there, and 2.5 hrs back. I stayed the night (saturday), flew saturday evening (1+ hrs), and came back on Sunday.
Monday:
Lately I’ve just been hanging out in San Gil. I’ve made a few friends (both travelers and locals). On Monday, a group of people from the hostel went to do tandem flights in the canyon, so I decided to go with them! I had a 1+ hr thermal flight. It was really nice. Everyone really enjoyed it.
Tuesday:
On Tuesday, I had 2 hours of spanish classes, and 1 hour of private salsa lessons with my friends’ mom. I asked my friend, Camila (who works at the hostel), is there was anyone around where I could learn salsa. She said she would teach me. I showed up at her house, and her mom offered to teach me, because she had to go to work. It was so much fun. Her mom doesn’t speak English as well.
She was very friendly, and welcomed me to her house anytime. People here are very friendly!
Wednesday:
I had another 2 hours of spanish (1 in the morning, 1 in the evening), and then ran around with some people from the hostel. At night, we decided to hike up to an overlook (about 2km away) over San Gil. It was really pretty. There is a statue of Mary up there, and it is all lit up.
While I was up there, I was taking some long exposure night shots of the city. I walked past a group of people my age, and I heard one of the girls say: “Que Bonito”. I smiled, and responded with: “Ahh.. Gracias!”. She didn’t expect me to understand her, and she got really embarrassed. I went over and ended up hanging out with them for 2.5 hrs+. I can understand a lot more spanish than I can speak, but they were very patient with me. It was so much fun!!
After we came back down, a few of us from the hostel ended up stumbling upon a birthday party. The locals invited us, and were very friendly. The guy who had the birthday owned a restaurant in town. I only stayed for about 20 min, and came back and hung out at the hostel.
Well, with a plan of leaving on Sunday, it’s Wednesday night and I’m still in San Gil. This place is so much fun.
Yesterday, on the way back from breakfast, Marie and I chose to checkout a new hostel, Sam’s VIP hostel. For the same price, it’s 100000x as nice, has a pool, 2 balconies, a big screen tv, faster wifi and HOT showers! Instead of heading out, we both decided to check in to here. Just our luck, it was the 1 year anniversary of the hostel, and the owner provided free food, live music and dessert. I hung out with everyone, had some traditional Colombian food, and went to bed semi-early.
Marie left for Bogota tonight! She’s off to visit her friends there, then back to Denmark! We became good friends, and it was really awesome getting to know/hang out with her.
Today, Thursday, I had my first spanish lesson. We went over basic pronunciation, inflections, and the alphabet. I really like the teacher, and am going to book more time with him.
He was also able to answer a bunch of my questions about living around San Gil. For a cheaper apartment, with all utilities, it runs about $200 US / month. For a nicer apartment in a nicer area of town, it’s about $250. (Or $300 for a 2-3 bedroom). My jaw dropped when I heard the prices! Groceries are about $25 US/week here too!! It’s so cheap, and so beautiful!!
I had two really cool experiences this evening. While I was out grabbing some food, I ran into my friend, Leila, that I met at the other hostel. We ended up hanging out for a bit, and it looks like we’re off to explore a waterfall tomorrow! .. Then, on my way home, I was stopped by a group of colombian girls/guys. I ended up talking to them for 30+ minutes in english/spanish. They spoke very little English, and I spoke very little Spanish. It was a cool experience!
I’m really enjoying all aspects of this. I could get use to it for a while!
Well. I think I’ve decided to stay in San Gil for a while. It’s such a friendly town, and I found a nice spanish school that does one on one lessons for $10 US/hr (I really want to learn more spanish. I feel so out of place here not knowing it). I tried to find a school in Buca, but I think I would enjoy myself here much more. I’ve mostly been travelling the whole time I’ve been here, and want to stay put for a bit until Tyler gets here (because then we’ll be traveling more).
There is an awesome paragliding spot (Chichamocha Canyon), which I should be able to fly daily. There is a tour group here that goes there a lot, and I think I can hop in with them for little to no costs.
Sunday:
Last night, Marie and I watched “The Social Network” (a movie about facebook). It was pretty interesting! This morning, we went out for breakfast, took a nap in the hammocks, then headed for “Polo Azulu”; a local swimming hole with waterfalls & bar. It was a $3,000 PESO taxi ride, or a 35 minute. We opted for the walk.
It was a nice hike, and such a nice area. We took a nap by the water, hung out for a bit and enjoyed the area. It reminded me a lot of Mill Creek in Moab. I tried a couple of new desserts, had some ice cream, then we made our way back to town.
The evening consisted of more hammock napping, pizza, then walking around town. I really like this area, and am excited to spend more time here once Tyler gets here.
Monday:
I was planning on heading back to Buca this morning, but, that didn’t happen. Marie signed up for a tandem paragliding flight at Chichamocha Canyon. I really wanted to go with them, but I left my paraglider in Buca (2 hrs away). The hostel owner called around and found a glider for me. I was packed, and ready to head back, but decided to go fly the Chciamocha Canyon with them at the last minute.
The drive was beautiful. Once we got there, a guy gave me a site orientation in spanish (and by drawing the canyon in the dirt and pointing of where not to go). I only understood about every 10 words, but I got the jist of it: “house thermals over there”, “rotor over there”, “land out over there” and “top land here”. A few moments later, a guy landed and just handed me his personal glider (dhv 2 freestyle glider).
We launched around 11. There were perfect clouds and perfect thermals. I was quickly able to thermal up above launch, and flew for about 45 minutes. I came in, top landed in the small LZ, and had a permagrin for the rest of the day.
We didn’t get back until after 2. I decided to grab some food, take a nap in the hammocks, and get some work done.
The evening was pretty relaxed. We walked around town, walked through a park that had a TON of christmas lights, ate (more) food, and played a game of Rummikub. Now it’s time for some sleep!
Well, being the sucker that I am (for cute girls), I decided to head for San Gil on Friday. My bus ride, which was supposed to be 2 hrs, ended up being nearly 5. Long story short, the bus driver drove right past San Gil, and I didn’t catch it until we stopped at the next town (apparently I was the only person getting off in San Gil). After he asked me 30 questions which I didn’t understand/couldn’t respond to, we flagged down another bus going back to San Gil, and I hopped on it (we were only 15 min past San Gil).
I met up with my friend I met in Buca, Marie, and we hung out for the night. We stayed up late, woke up early, and missed our chance to go rapelling from a 300′ waterfall. We decided to go check out a cave instead.
The cave was intense. The cost of the tour was $25,000 COP ($12 USD), and was about 1.5 hrs long. Right off the bat we were crawling on our hands and knees through 1′+ feet of water. After about 5 minutes of wading through up to waste deep water, we got to a section where our guide explained we would have to hold onto a rope, hold our breath, and hand over and to the next “air pocket” section. My first though was: “Ohhh… This definitely wouldn’t happen in the USA”. Well, we dove in head first, and made our way through to the next section. The rest of the cave was really cool. Lots of mud, lots of water, and really cool formations. Once we got to the end, our guide told us we had to make our way back the same way we came. The water was a bit cold, but it was definitely a full on adventure. When we came out, we were covered head to toe in mud. It was definitely a neat experience.
While in the small village where the cave was, we grabbed some food, and talked to some local children for a while. It was difficult for me to communicate with them, but Marie was able to carry on a pretty good conversation with them! After that, we made our way back to San Gil.
I’ve quickly fallin in love with San Gil. It reminds me a lot of Moab. There is paragliding, class 5 white water rafting, at least 10-15 swimming holes nearby, caving, rappelling, awesome scenery, etc. I really want to spend some time here once Ty gets here!
I’ve had a few people ask me if I can post photos. If you have facebook, add me!! If not, you can click here:
Well, so much for getting to bed early the other night. I ended up making a friend here at the hostel. We stayed up way too late hanging out!
When I went to go to bed, dan was sprawled out across the double bed, so I went and slept in hammock. It was my first full night ever sleeping in one. This one was pretty comfortable.
I was supposed to go to Chicha Mocha Canyon with Dan yesterday, but ended up having a conference call. He headed out early, and I stuck around and did some work.
I explored the city some more yesterday, did laundry for the first time, went paragliding, and went to bed early! I flew for well over an hour, reached cloud base, and landed way early because I was tired. People were still thermalling up 1000′ above launch 3 hrs after I landed!
Now I’m getting some work done and going to head out to San Gil later to meet up with a friend!!
Long story short, we explored Taganga (one of my favorite places I’ve ever been to), met quite a few English speaking travelers, and hung out with them for a day or two.
We found a dive shop yesterday to do 2 dives during the day, and then take us on a night dive. The 2 day dives were awesome. While we were waiting on our night dive, we at lunch with our new friends Julie & Hannah. At lunch, Dan and I were joking about going to Bucaramanga last night (night diving at 6:00, then catching a bus in Santa Marta). Well, Dan booked a ticket from Bucaramanga to Cartagena on Thursday, and so the decision was made.
I wasn’t quite ready to leave Taganga, but Dan really wanted to go to Bucaramanga. We went on our night dive (which was amazing). We were down, 45-50′, with no visibility except the little bit your flashlight offered. We even turned our lights off for a few minutes and stirred up the water to see the bioluminescent plankton. We swam with lights off following each other using the bioluminescent plankton. I saw a Jelly Fish, a blow fish, and quite a few eels. That was definitely an awesome experience.
Right after diving, we rushed back to the hostel, packed our stuff and took a cab to Santa Marta. We arrived 10 minutes before the bus was leaving to Bucaramanga. We left around 9, and didn’t get to Bucaramanga until 10am. It was a lloonngg bus ride!
We got here, got settled into the hostel that Richi (paragliding instructor owns), ate some lunch, and went paragliding. Dan flew a paraglider for the first time. I helped him launch, and he soared for 20 minutes, and made/landed in the landing area!! It’s a nice site!!
Now we’re both crashing. it’s 8pm and we’re exhausted. We’re off to explore chichamocha canyon tomorrow!!
