Nilesh's Posterous

Food of Colombia

Colombia had a wide array of food. A lot of the food is fried though and they use lots of butter and cheese. While it might sound bad for health, it's all very delicious though. They also eat a lot of plantains and fish. I particularly loved their soups - all their soups are very thick and starchy made with different kinds of potatoes and meat. The most famous soup in Bogota was Ajiaco soup pictured in the first picture.

I am posting a sample of the food I had in Colombia.

Filed under // colombia colombian food fish food soup south america backpacking travel travelogue

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Scuba Diving in Taganga

When I got to Taganga, I saw that there was like a dive school at every other block and they had very competitve prices for just fun dives (around 140,000 COP = usd $70) or for the padi open water certification for about 540,000 COP (usd $280).

That got me thinking about trying it out. I've always wanted to try it, but in the US, the PADI course costs a lot and they do most of it in the swimming pool.

It was just a thought and I had many questions about whether it was worth it (safety wise, fun wise). I was sitting by the swimming pool/bar at my hostel and I met Athanasia. She was working at the hostel bar that night and she had actually learnt diving in Taganga itself and was now an advanced diver. She answered all my questions and encouraged me to do the PADI course. She even came to hostel in the morning and went with me to the diving school she recommended, as she also had a dive that same day. Thanks a lot Athanasia !! I think if I had not met you that night, I'd probably not have gone to do the scuba diving class !

So, went with her to the diving school and signed up for the class.They were pretty cool about it. They said I can try it out the first day. If I did not like it, I did not have to pay for the entire class, but just for the price of a fun dive. Instructor was Fabio - really cool guy and teacher. That school's philosophy was to go out to sea directly rather than doing the preliminary exercises in a swimming pool, as many times student get too confident in a swimming pool and when they get to sea, the environment is different and they don't know how to react. So we went out to sea with scuba tanks and all on the first exercise itself.

We did a total of 6 open water dives. In the first 3 dives, we did half time, exercises under water and half time just general fun diving. The last 3 dives were just fun dives. After the 6 dives, I had to study the 300 page padi open water certification manual (not fun at all) and take the test on the last day to get my PADI certification.

Filed under // colombia diving scuba diving south america backpacking taganga travel travelogue

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Taganga Sunset

Sunsets in Taganga are simply gorgeous and the natural colors of the sunset reflection on water are so beautiful !

Filed under // colombia south america backpacking sunset taganga travel travelogue

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Taganga, a small fishing village in the North of Colombia

Taganga is a small fishing village about 4 hours by bus from Cartagena. It has become a major backpacking and diving destination. Taganga being very small, there is not much to do - there are a couple of clubs/bar, a few restaurants, a few dive schools and the beach. So whether you want it or not, you're forced to chill and relax it out :)

There are many hostels, backpackers and a dive school/shop basically at every other block, but it's still a fishing village and fishing is the sustainance means of many local people who live in Taganga.

Being a fishing village, seafood was excellent and always fresh. There are many restaurants by the beach, where they showcase you the numerous fish caught on that day, you pick your fish and they cook it the way you want it and the prices start from 8000 COP (US $4)to 16000 COP (US $8) for an entire fresh fish, fried plantains, rice and salad. Had some good fish everyday while in Taganga.

When I got to Taganga, I wanted to stay the Casa de Felipe, a french run hostel, but I went there and it was all full. So I instead went to Bayview hostel which was not too bad and had air conditioned dorm rooms, a swimming pool, a bar and good facilities.

Filed under // colombia fish fishing south america backpacking taganga travel travelogue

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Volcan de Totumo, Colombia

North of Cartagena de Indias, there is a 15m high Clay Volcano - The Volcan de Totumo - Yes, the volcano spits out mud/clay from within rather than lava.

We can climb to the top of the volcano and then immerse in the crater in the warm clay. It's supposed to be good for skin :)

We got to the volcano and changed into our swimming trunks and climbed up the little baby volcano and one by one, all of the persons in our tour bus got in the volcano and they have the volcano staff who rub the mud on you and give you a massage and then let you float off. It was such a weird feeling to be floating on 15m metres of mud and yet no sinking. The mud is very buoyant and keeps our body up. So the staff were just making us float or stand up whichever was our turn in the process. They also had staff which we gave our camera to, and they took pictures of us while we were immersed in the mud.

After the mud immersion, we got off and walked to a nearby lake, where they had the local village women help bath off the mud off our body by pouring water on us from the lake.

Very unique experience indeed to get in that mud. I did feel very fresh afterwards :)

For each of the services, cameramen, massagemen, bathwomen, we had to tip them 3000 COP (USD 1.5) and the fee to enter the volcano was 2000 COP (USD 1).

After the volcano, we went to a beach where we enjoyed the caribbean sea and had a good lunch of freshly caught fish !

Filed under // colombia fun muddy south america backpacking travel travelogue volcano

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Cartagena de Indias, Colombia

After spending one week in Bogota, I flew to Cartagena de Indias in the North of Bogota, which faces the Caribbean sea.

Cartagena is one the most visited cities in Colombia, due to it's preserved colonial architecture and fortresses dating from the old days. A major part of the city, "the ciudad amurallada" is in fact walled by huge fortresses made of solid coralstone. The fortress, complete with watch towers, cannons, observation points to the ocean encloses the city and was used in the spanish colonial times to protect the city. It has been deemed a protected site by the UNESCO. I loved the colonial architecture of the city and all the history behind the city.

While it's a very beautiful city, it's also a very very HOT city. The city is like a sauna - the temperature is usually very high and there's not much wind/breeze. Because of this, at nights till late, most people stay outside of their houses, on the street, just chilling out with their families, talking, dancing, doing homework etc.. the usual things we usually do indoors, but outdoors.

I did no spend much time in Cartagena - only a couple of days. Spent one day roaming around the city taking pictures and then spent another day in a tour to go to a Volcano - Volcan de Totumo which is north of Cartagena.

Filed under // architecture beautiful cartagena colombia colonial south america backpacking travel travelogue

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Cathedral del Sal, Zipaquira, Colombia

About 1 hour away from Bogota is the small town of Zipaquira. I took a day trip there using public transportation to come see the famous Cathedral Del Sal. They have many mines in Zipaquira, where they mine the underground salt formed ages ago when the ocean got sunked into the earth by the movement of the earth plates. Prehistoric salt !

I think the church bought one of these mines and built a church within the mine and carved sculptures and statues on the salt blocks. It was an impressive sigh to see these huge salt carvings. The church is a fully functional church and they have mass there every Sunday.

Apart from visiting the church, I also took a mine tour, where they explain how mining works and they brought us in the mines and showed us how the salt mining is actually done. They explained how plates moves and the earth movement and all, and in 300 years, that entire mine/church will be gone, as the walls of the mine keep on decreasing in size.

Also, in the mine, they have the world's largest salt mirror. It's a salt lake which is so dense with salt, that it's exactly like a mirror. It was an amazing view !

Filed under // church colombia salt south america backpacking travel travelogue

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Bogota, Colombia

Bogota is the first stop in my South America trip. Flew from Miami via Costa Rica to Bogota. Unlike all my other trips, while I was excited as well, I was somewhat nervous about traveling to South America, mainly because I do not speak any Spanish and feared communications difficulty and indeed it was the case - I've been lost in translation most of the time and apart from other tourists and hotel staff, do not find lots of people who speak English, but slowly I am learning more and more Spanish sentences and vocabulary and able to communicate a little bit more everyday. That was one reason for me being a bit scared, but second reason was I heard a lot of stories from many people about how dangerous Colombia was etc.. (even though they had not personally visited the country).

I Reached Bogota El Dorado airport in the afternoon, changed some money (exchange rate was 1 USD = 1984 Colombian pesos), got an official taxi (it costs a bit more, but I read on travel blogs etc.. that private taxis can kidnap tourists or bring you to other places and the places you want) to take me to the hostal I had booked the previous day. Most hostels and backpacker's hangouts are in the Candelaria neighborhood of Bogota. The hostel I chose was Hostal Sue (pronounece Su-Ey). Great choice. The hostal was very nice, great staff, great common areas, good kitchen and good crowd from all over the world, but only two bathrooms.. but that is ok if everything else is there :) I stayed there for 3 days and then switched to Cranky Croc Hostel which was even better. Cranky Croc is run by an australian who has himself been traveling and backpacking a lot. So he knows about what do travelers want and he catered for all the things - great nice big clean kitchen, great communal areas, a locker in each form bed with a power supply inside the locker (to be able to securely charge your stuff, while you're out), great fast wifi access and on site computers, bar, restaurant and everyday they have special communal dinners with an international theme. I could stay there for weeks !

Living in hostels, you meet a lot of people. Within the first few days, I met people from Spain, Israel, Pakistan, Holland, Malta, Australia and USA - some were at the beginning of their travels just like me and some had been traveling for a few weeks and one for over a year. It was great hearing the good travel stories and tips on things/places to visit. There was also some bad travel stories such as this one dude from Oregon whose Bus he was traveling in got hijacked. The hijackers took the bus together with them and middle of the way, they took out guns and stopped the bus and stole everybody's things - both tourists and Colombians. Others were not that extreme, but I talked to 3 other persons that lost their passports too. They all were from big countries which had consulates in Colombia. I was wondering if my passport is lost, I'd be screwed basically as there's no Mauritian consulate anywhere around in South America as far as I know. All these people's consulates got them temporary passports to use for 3 months, till they get their actual passports. I wonder if any other Mauritian have lost their passport in a country where Mauritius don't have a consulate and how did they manage or if the Mauritian government would be of any assistance?

While the backpacker's crowd is very fun and interesting and we get to share lots of travel stories, we mostly all speak only in English. So did not really get a chance to speak a lot of spanish as was hanging out mostly with the people I met in the hostel. Hopefully, going forward, I will try to do more hanging out and trying to know local people than only tourists.

Bogota got to be the city with the most cops and military with guns in the streets. They're everywhere. Sometimes, there seem like there are more cops and military than civilians. The Cops randomly stop people on the street, check their ID and check their bags. I made a copy of my passport and visa and always carry it with me rather than my passport just in case I get checked too, but so far I have not yet been stopped. I wonder on what criteria they stop people. Talking about cops, I visited the Police Museum that they have in Bogota and got to learn a lot about Pablo Escobar - once the most wanted man in the world and the history of drug and drug cartels in Colombia.

All in all, Bogota is a great city. I enjoyed staying there a lot. It's a huge metro city - 12 million inhabitants. As every big metro, it has anything one want to do - shopping, entertainment, fine dining, people watching etc.. people always busy and on the go. I stayed 7 days in Bogota. Did not do many touristic as such while I was there, but still loved it and would not mind going and staying more !