You´ve all heard about the road to perdition, well this is not about that. This is about the road to Bogota. The road to perdition is nothing new, I´ve been on it for years:) It is almost 1000 kilometers to Bogota. The people I talked to said that the only safe places to camp in Colombia were campgrounds. I looked at the maps I have and 1) I didn´t see any campgrounds between Santa Marta and Bogota and 2) The number of towns between Santa Marta and Bogota seemed pretty thin. It did not look good for finding a town within my daily cycling distance and even if I found one there would be no guarantee that there would be a motel there. And 3) I´ve gotten out of shape and lazy. So for these reasons I decided to take a bus. The bus was scheduled to leave at 2:00 so to be sure I got there about one an a half hours early. I got my ticket and was shown where to wait. It wasn´t so bad there was a little store in the terminal that sold beer so I amused myself with a number of beers while I was waiting. Central and South America have a more relaxed attitude toward beer than the puritan U.S. It is amazing that almost anywhere you can buy and drink beer down here, including in the bus terminal. No you don´t have to hide it in a brown paper bag either. AT ANY RATE I got on the bus and settled in for the 16 hour bus ride. I had a book, sandwiches, snacks, and a bottle of rum, what more could anyone ask for? For the first few hours I alternated between reading my book and looking out the window. Also once in a while I would try to strike up a conversation with the young cute large breasted woman sitting next to me but that wasn´t working out so well. So the sun went down and the scenery disappeared the light for my seat wasn´t sufficient for reading and miss big boobs wasn´t talking. What to do, what to do? The answer was obvious, start drinking, which I did. For the 16 hour trip the bus company supplied a snack, about a one and a half ounce bag of peanuts and about a 4 ounce bottle of orange drink. So I drank a little out of the fake orange juice and filled it back up with rum. And every time I got enough room to add more rum I did. Obviously after a while I just ended up drinking it straight, which wasn´t so bad, it is pretty good rum. I got about half way through the bottle this way and decided maybe it would be a good idea to get some sleep. I have never been one of those people who could sleep on a plane or a bus but with about half a liter of rum in my belly I thought I would give it a try. I was starting to relax when it started. I don´t what caused it but all of a sudden there was a huge jolt to the bus that made it feel like it swayed to the side. Then there was another jolt that made it bounce. Know that this is not one of those recycled school busses that are so common down here. No, this is a fairly new Mercedes, you know the kind with the airplane style seats the whole bit. Now you are probably thinking ok but that was it right? NO it wasn´t it. It was only the beginning of it. Some times were worse than others but it never ended, and people were sleeping through this. Of course to top it off the little kid on the other side of the aisle(maybe 18 months old) let out the most god awful, stinkiest fart that has ever been smelled on god´s green earth. Fortunately the assistant driver also smelled it and went and got a can of Glade air freshener (I guess they keep it on the bus for just such occurrences) and sprayed it into the ventilation system. Catastrophe solved. Of course this did nothing to straighten out the road. So you have probably figured out by now that this is a long way of explaining that I didn´t get any sleep that night. The bus arrived in Bogota at 6 am.
Bogota
I got a taxi into town. It was about a half hour trip. After all I understand that there are about 6000000 people in Bogota. I made a reservation at a hostel named Anandamayi. The reviews I read said that if you want a relaxed peaceful place to stay in Bogota this is the place. Boy were they right. This place has more of an atmosphere of a buddhist meditation retreat than a hostel. But that´s ok I was ready for a little kicking back and relaxing. Besides it is close to all the tourist stuff. This place is staffed by angels, seriously. On my first night here my socks smelled so bad that I put them outside so as not to offend the other people in the room. The next day I forgot about them and put on a different pair. When I came back later on that afternoon the socks had been washed, dried, folded and put on my bed. Wow had I known that I would have put all my laundry outside:)
Impressions of Bogota
This city is fabulous. I am staying in the centro historico, funny it seems I usually end up in the historic center of the city. The first thing you need to know about Bogota is that it is very hilly. And steep. They have planned it well, at least this part of town. A large section of the town has been converted into pedestrian walkways, no cars. I love it. They have a couple of different bus systems here. One is the local which run all over the different parts of the city and surrounding area. The other is the Tecmilenio. From what I understand the rush hour traffic runs north-south. This is the direction that the tecmilenio goes. Well it may very well go other ways too but I am not knowledgeable about that yet. These are the caterpillar busses that you may have seen in some cities in the U.S. and cities outside of it. They are the length of 2 busses and have a flexible portion between the 2 halves. They have their own dedicated lane so they are moving while people in cars and other busses are stuck in traffic. I hear everyone thinking "Ok great Charlie, but what have you seen so far?" I am wirting this on the evening of my third day here. A few hours ago I just got back from the Salt Cathedral. This place is incredible. It is underground and it is carved ENTIRELY OUT OF ROCK SALT! On the way in are 14 stations of the cross, each individually carved by a different Colombian sculptor. There are naves off to the side, the main sanctuary can hold 8,400 people, as I said this place is huge. I can´t do it justice describing it if you want to know more about it just google Salt Cathedral Colombia and I´m sure you´ll get a lot of hits. But yes that is what it took to get me back in a Catholic church. The first day I got here I obviously had a lot of time on my hands as I checked in at about 7 am. The first thing I did was take a nap. But obviously when I got up a couple of hours later I still had a lot of time on my hands. There is a church on top of a mountain here in town it´s name is Monserrate. Yeah just like Montserrat in France. The church is nice but nothing spectacular but what is spectacular is the view from the top. You take a train car up a very long steep hill to get there and a cable car to get down. No I don´t know why, it´s just a catholic thing I guess. (I can hear some of you thinking "God Charlie, 2 catholic churches in less than a week what has got into you?) Well to those of you thinking that relax, after today I intend to go back to ignoring them the same way I have for years. I was done at Monserrate at about noon so I went back down and that I would check out the Gold Museum. It is a museum dedicated to pre colombian gold. Sounded interesting so I got a cab and went. I get there and find out it is closed for the months of sept. and oct. However there is a place across the street that is bunch of small stalls inside a building that sell art and handicrafts. I went and checked it out and I bought a beautiful painting. It is about3 ft. long and 18 inches high. The material it is painted on is a combination of palm and yucca fibers or something like that. It is not framed. I figured I could just roll it up in a tube and I could squeeze it in one of my panniers. WRONG! It rolls up but not small enough to fit in a tube that will fit in my panniers. So then I have a brilliant idea, I think to myself "Self why don´t you just send it back to Mazatlan?" So I go to DHL and ask how much it would cost to send. I am informed that in order to do that, since it is a painting, I have to get a permit from the ministry of culture. WELL AIN´T THAT JUST SPECIAL!? So I get there and am given the information I need and the forms and am told to come back on friday between 8:30 and 12:30. Now keep in mind that if I had been bringing this back on a plane I wouldn´t have had to do any of this. So friday comes and I go jump through all the hoops and they say no problems your permit will be ready in 8DAYS. And that brings me to today which I´ve already told you about. So that´s all for now.
The road goes on forever and the party never ends.
hasta la vista baby
Charlie
Saturday, September 27, 2008
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Part 2 the return from Ciudad Perdida
Sept.17 2008
We get up and have breakfast and take the tour of Ciudad Pedida. The sun is out and it is a beautiful day. We tour the entire area. Much of it is the same as the main area jsut spread out. After the tour we pack our stuff and leave. Paddy Francisco and I start out first knowing the rest will catch up. As we are going down the first set of steps, the wide ones, an indigenous guy comes from behind us and says "Con permiso" ( excuse me) and passes us. While we are gingerly, carefully, going down one step at a time in our hiking boots and shoes he is running down the steps in his bar feet. Yeah that makes us feel real good, you betcha. In counterpoint, Francisco fell on the steps 3 times. Later on in the day yours truly slipped and fell on the muddy trail 3 times. Did I mention that it started to rain about 1 hour after we left? Well it did. Fairly hard too. When we got to our destination for the day I was very happy to take a shower and get all the mud off.
A word about the indigenos, they are generally speaking, short of stature, with broad shoulders and dark skin. These are the people described the conquistadores, the ones who carry heavy loads all day and all they eat are coca leaves. And yes that is what they eat too, coca leaves. While the people in our party were struggling with backpacks these guys have these huge packs that are fashioned out of 100lb. coffee sacks and such. They are bulging whenever you see them. For footwear there are 3 options for the indigenos: Most common are your average every day flip flops. Next are rubber boots with stiff soles that give good traction. The third option is nothing at all-bare feet. I don´t know why bu you almost never see them smile. They all dress the same a white cottom tunic and white cottom pants. They all look like Juan Valdez. Just joking; but not much. The men all have long hair and none of them have beards.
Sept. 18 2008
Thank god I got to sleep on a mattress last night. I think I passed out immediately. I was so sore that I couldn´t believe it. So although I slept well when I woke up this morning my entire body was as stiff as a board. Large quiantities of Traumeel and Ben Gay were required to move. It was a laid back kind of morning for us as we had a three and a half-four hour hike to our next destination and once we got there the day was ours. To refresh your memory this is the place with the toucan and the guy who claps his hand for service. Before we left our guide pointed the tree that is used to make a date rape drug. I guess it is the flower which is used. The flower itself is beautiful, it is about 8 inches long and hangs down from a branch. We had a long climb out. On the way in it was nice because after an initial day of climbing we spent a large part of the day going down to the seconc one. However as today we were leavind the second one and going back to the first one we were going in reverse which means up. I had heard that the first and fifth day were the worst. So during breakfast I used the rest of my cocaine and put it in my coffee. You know some people use artificial sweetener....well this was more helpful. This is paste not powder, you can´t snort it. Ingesting it gives you an entirely different experience. You still get a head buzz but it is a whole different kind. You also get a body rush. It also gives you energy. There are 2 therapeutic uses of cocaine-energy and pain relief. I needed them both. For those of you who criticize my drug use during this trek all I have to say is: You´re right. There are a myriad of reasons why it is a bad idea. Legally, ethically, morally, and health wise. So why did I do it? Well a number of reasons. First of all I have used drugs in the past. Coke was a very once in a while thing for me. Cocaine is a drug that the further removed from it´s source the more diluted it becomes. The chance to try it pure and unadulterated straight from the factory so to speak was too good to pass up. I mean imagine if you had only drunk watered down whiskey all your life and now you get a chance to get a sample at the distillery. I know it´s an imperfect analogy but you get the idea. The second reason as I already mentioned is therapeutic. At 56 it is no easy task keeping up with a group of 20 somethings. The energy was very helpful. Necessary might be a more accurate word. And after a day of work followed by sore muscles the coke when rolled up in a joint (yup smoked weed too) was very therapeutic in alleviating the soreness. So those are my reasons, I make no apologies. However I will say that what happened in the mountains stays in the mountains and I am not about to start looking for any drug of any sort now that I am out of the mountains.
So, moving right along as I seldom do (D.Damron) we left camp and started the long climb out. Yes the coke helped a lot. We made it to our next stop at about 11:30 am. From that point on the day was ours to do whatever we wanted. There is a natural pool there with a waterfall at one end. After we were done swimming we spent the rest of the day smoking a bunch of weed that I had bought and playing cards. It was about one fourth of an ounce for 5000 pesos or about $3.00. Russ taught us a game called president ( also shithead or asshole). That was pretty much how we spent the entire day. When I went to bed I was sore. In fact every muscle felt sore. I couldn´t quite place it until I went to bed that night but even my toes were sore. Leading a fairly athletic life I´ve had my share of sore muscles but never have I ever had sore toes.
Sept. 19, 2008
This morning is pretty casual we have about a half hour climb out of the camp and then it is all down hill. It was sort of a bitch as I´d used the last of my coke yesterday morning. I struggled some but then YES! All the way down hill from here. We made it back to the town at about 11 am and had lunch, drank beer and played cards until 1:30 when they came to pick us up.
We get up and have breakfast and take the tour of Ciudad Pedida. The sun is out and it is a beautiful day. We tour the entire area. Much of it is the same as the main area jsut spread out. After the tour we pack our stuff and leave. Paddy Francisco and I start out first knowing the rest will catch up. As we are going down the first set of steps, the wide ones, an indigenous guy comes from behind us and says "Con permiso" ( excuse me) and passes us. While we are gingerly, carefully, going down one step at a time in our hiking boots and shoes he is running down the steps in his bar feet. Yeah that makes us feel real good, you betcha. In counterpoint, Francisco fell on the steps 3 times. Later on in the day yours truly slipped and fell on the muddy trail 3 times. Did I mention that it started to rain about 1 hour after we left? Well it did. Fairly hard too. When we got to our destination for the day I was very happy to take a shower and get all the mud off.
A word about the indigenos, they are generally speaking, short of stature, with broad shoulders and dark skin. These are the people described the conquistadores, the ones who carry heavy loads all day and all they eat are coca leaves. And yes that is what they eat too, coca leaves. While the people in our party were struggling with backpacks these guys have these huge packs that are fashioned out of 100lb. coffee sacks and such. They are bulging whenever you see them. For footwear there are 3 options for the indigenos: Most common are your average every day flip flops. Next are rubber boots with stiff soles that give good traction. The third option is nothing at all-bare feet. I don´t know why bu you almost never see them smile. They all dress the same a white cottom tunic and white cottom pants. They all look like Juan Valdez. Just joking; but not much. The men all have long hair and none of them have beards.
Sept. 18 2008
Thank god I got to sleep on a mattress last night. I think I passed out immediately. I was so sore that I couldn´t believe it. So although I slept well when I woke up this morning my entire body was as stiff as a board. Large quiantities of Traumeel and Ben Gay were required to move. It was a laid back kind of morning for us as we had a three and a half-four hour hike to our next destination and once we got there the day was ours. To refresh your memory this is the place with the toucan and the guy who claps his hand for service. Before we left our guide pointed the tree that is used to make a date rape drug. I guess it is the flower which is used. The flower itself is beautiful, it is about 8 inches long and hangs down from a branch. We had a long climb out. On the way in it was nice because after an initial day of climbing we spent a large part of the day going down to the seconc one. However as today we were leavind the second one and going back to the first one we were going in reverse which means up. I had heard that the first and fifth day were the worst. So during breakfast I used the rest of my cocaine and put it in my coffee. You know some people use artificial sweetener....well this was more helpful. This is paste not powder, you can´t snort it. Ingesting it gives you an entirely different experience. You still get a head buzz but it is a whole different kind. You also get a body rush. It also gives you energy. There are 2 therapeutic uses of cocaine-energy and pain relief. I needed them both. For those of you who criticize my drug use during this trek all I have to say is: You´re right. There are a myriad of reasons why it is a bad idea. Legally, ethically, morally, and health wise. So why did I do it? Well a number of reasons. First of all I have used drugs in the past. Coke was a very once in a while thing for me. Cocaine is a drug that the further removed from it´s source the more diluted it becomes. The chance to try it pure and unadulterated straight from the factory so to speak was too good to pass up. I mean imagine if you had only drunk watered down whiskey all your life and now you get a chance to get a sample at the distillery. I know it´s an imperfect analogy but you get the idea. The second reason as I already mentioned is therapeutic. At 56 it is no easy task keeping up with a group of 20 somethings. The energy was very helpful. Necessary might be a more accurate word. And after a day of work followed by sore muscles the coke when rolled up in a joint (yup smoked weed too) was very therapeutic in alleviating the soreness. So those are my reasons, I make no apologies. However I will say that what happened in the mountains stays in the mountains and I am not about to start looking for any drug of any sort now that I am out of the mountains.
So, moving right along as I seldom do (D.Damron) we left camp and started the long climb out. Yes the coke helped a lot. We made it to our next stop at about 11:30 am. From that point on the day was ours to do whatever we wanted. There is a natural pool there with a waterfall at one end. After we were done swimming we spent the rest of the day smoking a bunch of weed that I had bought and playing cards. It was about one fourth of an ounce for 5000 pesos or about $3.00. Russ taught us a game called president ( also shithead or asshole). That was pretty much how we spent the entire day. When I went to bed I was sore. In fact every muscle felt sore. I couldn´t quite place it until I went to bed that night but even my toes were sore. Leading a fairly athletic life I´ve had my share of sore muscles but never have I ever had sore toes.
Sept. 19, 2008
This morning is pretty casual we have about a half hour climb out of the camp and then it is all down hill. It was sort of a bitch as I´d used the last of my coke yesterday morning. I struggled some but then YES! All the way down hill from here. We made it back to the town at about 11 am and had lunch, drank beer and played cards until 1:30 when they came to pick us up.
Saturday, September 20, 2008
The Trek to Ciudad Perdida
Ok this is going to be long. I don´t know if Ihave the time and patience to write the whole thing out tonight or not. However for those of you who have received the findmespots and have written Charlie where are you? Here is your answer.
It is Sunday september 14 and today is the first day of our trek to Ciudad Perdida. We all met at the office at 9 am. We are a group of 5 but rather diverse. Simone is 25 and from Switzerland and a real cutie. Paddy is 25 and from Cork Ireland, Francisco is 33 and from valencia Spain, and Russ is a scotsman who has never lived in Scotland but has grown up in the french part of Switzerland. And of course yours truly. From the office we were transported by converted Toyota Landcruiser toward our destination. The road was paved all the way to the turn off. Let me say that this is not something you could do on your own. First of all there is no marked turn off from the highway and as i will describe the road got more and more interesting as we went. As we continued the road became more and more narrow. The more narrow the road became the further it deteriorated. There were places where there was barely enough room for the landcruiser to get through. Of course this is where the road was severely rutted and tipped toward a several hundred foot drop. After about 45 minutes we arrived at a town. No I don´t know the name of it. It did require going through 2 or 3 rivers to get there though. I guess the most noteworthy thing about the town itself is that after all that time on that horrendous road, the town itself was paved. At any rate we had lunch there which consisted of make your own bologna sandwiches with all the fixins´ After lunch we headed out. It turned out that we have mules to carry all our stuff. THANK YOU gOD! As we started out it was up and down a little. Then the nightmare of every fat out of shape out old man occurred. It went up and up and up and up....well you get the idea. Every time I saw a turn up ahead I would think "This has to get to the top sometime" But no it just kept on going up. At one point the guide came up behind me with a couple of guys who are leading our mules and sitting on a couple of mules themselves. One asks me if I want to ride the mule to the top. I said SI! And thank god because it was another 20 minutes to the top on mule. It would have taken me forever to walk it. There ws some thunder and lightning during the afternoon but not much rain accompanied it. Just enough to make the trail which is all clay into slippery as hell mud. Twice goiing downhill I slid on my ass for about 10 feet. One time when I slid I only stopped when my left foot hit a root. I felt and heard something snap. As of right now it feels fine, we´ll see. We finally got to our first destination at about 4:30 today. Basically it is a house, across from it is a covered platform that has a pool table and a tv. Beleive it or not they sell cold beer here too. It costs 3000 pesos, about $1.80 that is about twice what it does in town. The buildings are next to a river. Across the river is another outbuilding which is essentially a roof with tables and benches underneath a cook area and a place for hammocks which is we will sleep tonight. The owner(s) of the place are an older man, I´m guessing mid 60s and a woman maybe in her 30s. Just guessing. I hope for sake that is her father or father in law and not her husband. When we got there he was really drunk. When I went to buy a beer instead of getting it himself a trip of about 10 ft., he clapped his hands until the woman came running to see what he wanted. All in all the countryside we saw coming in was beautiful and the place we are staying at is beautiful and idyllic.
September 15, Monday
I didn´t sleep worth shit last night. I couldn´t find my first aid kit which has all my pain stuff in it. First I couldn´t get my foot, the one I heard crack, in a comfortable position. Next my right shoulder was spasming all night. It seemed like every few minutes I would feel a sharp stabbing pain go through my shoulder.
Today started at about 6:30 am. We got up. Had some coffee and then one of the local guys took us to show us his cocaine factory. Seriously, no shit. It was about a 10 minute walk from where we stayed.Boy was it off the trail. Kinda necessary I guess. Now you may be thinking the same thing we were. There are going to be guards with submachine guns, people wearing masks and gloves packaging it, you know just like in the movies. Well maybe there are places and situations like that in Colombia but this isn´t one of them. This place was a cleared flat spot close to the river. It was covered by a 20x20 plastic tarp. So get the idea of a huge operation out of your head and think moonshiner. The whole operation looked rather crude. He said it was necessary so that if he saw the military coming he could set fire to the place and run. I never what a process it was to make and some of the nasty shit involved to process it. He explained the entire process to us and demonstrated each step. Some of the chemicals used are gasoline and sulfuric acid. And he even demonstrated the final stepthe making of cocaine paste. The paste is pure unadulterated cocaine. Yes we were allowed to sample it. Yes some of us bought some of the product. So with all of that we were back at the camp at 7:30. We left about 9 am to begin day 2 of the trek to Ciudad Perdida. Today is much the same as yesterday except there was less climbing. We reached our camping spot at about 1:30. Turns out there is another group there that is just returning from Ciudad Perdida. They were all very enthusiastic about it. This gives us all hope for tomorrow.
September 16 2008 tuesday.
Today started MUCH too early. They have people working at the camping area. They were up and about at 5:30 am. As I said much too early. I ignored them as long as I could but around 6:15 our guide woke me up. At least last night i got to sleep on a mattress instead of a hammock so that helped. Also I had my pain stuff so that helped even more. Russ who is our official roller didn´t have time to roll a spliff this morning so we had to go without. Bummer. People had told us that today was going to be easy but in the beginning it sure seemed like we did a lot of climbing. At one point when our whole group took a break I took some coke and put it on my tongue. This isn´t coke as you may know it it is rather a dried paste, it can´t be snorted. I told everyone "Hey the old man needs an energy boost." They all understood. This country is incredibly beautiful. It seems like almost every time you go around a turn in the forest there is another beautiful waterfall of a fabulous valley view or an awesome view of the river. It is truly a pity that access is limited by the presence of cocaine labs and narcotraficantes. While on the trail our guide pointed out a poisonous snake. He called it the serpiente de San Pedro or a yellow tail. It was small, maybe a foot long. After he pointed it out to us he killed it. Later on we also saw something rather unusual, crabs along the trail. Yeah real crabs they looked sort of like sand crabs. We were nowhere near the beach. This is the first time in my life I have seen crabs in a forest.
Today we became amphibious. We had to cross the same river 8 times. The name of the river is the Buritaca. The 8th crossing takes you to the steps that lead to ciudad Perdida. There are 1800 of them. The builders had an interesting sense of humor. You climb and climb and nobody counts. Then you finally see something that is obviously man made and you think "Yes I´ve made it!"You continue walking and then you see it about 200 more steps. and you´re thinking "Damn I thought I´d made it." These are broad wide steps where as the others were small and narrow. These obviously lead someplace important. So you climb those steps and see some more man made structures, you walk across those and see another man made structure with about 30 more steps, this happens about twice more and THEN YOU ARE AT THE TOP. For all the fucking work it was worth it. The view from the top is absolutely incredible. It started to rain as soon as I got here. I proudly brought up the rear. It was just a little at first but now it´s coming down hard enough to discourage exploration around the area. So the rain is not making me feel much like Gene Kelly, I sure as fuck don´t feel like singing in it. This place is 1200 meters above sea level, so all the rain is doing is to make things chilly. It is now about 3 o´clock and we have been here about 3 hours, we´ll see what later brings. It finally stopped raining about 4:30 and I got some walking around and exploring time. This place is fascinating. It is a terraced city. None of the houses survived because they were all made of bamboo and palm leaves. However the foundations were circular and had a stone foundation. They buried their dead beneath the house. That is they dug a whole in the floor and buried them with all their worldly possessions. The higher your social standing the higher up the hill you lived the more possessions you were buried with.
The city was discovered in 1973 by some guy out in the area looking for marijuana. He found Ciudad Perdida instead. Now let me review what it takes to get to this place. You travel 3 days 4-5 hours a day. After the second day the trail deteriorates to the point where mules can´t make it. You cross 3 sheer rock faces with barely sufficient footholds. I already mentioned the 9 river crossings, each crossing is to another part of the trail. How the fuck did this guy even think to look in this area? How the fuck did he decide to walk across three rock faces, how the hell did he know where to dig? etc. etc. That this place wasn´t discovered until 1973 is no surprise to me. Im amazed it was discovered at all. This place is also referred to as the green hell because when Frankie Ray discovered all the gold artifacts he started selling them in Santa Marta. Word got out and people started following him to the site and killing each other for the gold. The gov´t took it over in 1976.
Okay that is it for part 1. I have already been typing for 2 hours and that is enough for today. Look for part 2 the trek to Ciudad Perdida in the next few days.
hasta la vista baby
Charlie
The road goes on forever and the party never ends.
It is Sunday september 14 and today is the first day of our trek to Ciudad Perdida. We all met at the office at 9 am. We are a group of 5 but rather diverse. Simone is 25 and from Switzerland and a real cutie. Paddy is 25 and from Cork Ireland, Francisco is 33 and from valencia Spain, and Russ is a scotsman who has never lived in Scotland but has grown up in the french part of Switzerland. And of course yours truly. From the office we were transported by converted Toyota Landcruiser toward our destination. The road was paved all the way to the turn off. Let me say that this is not something you could do on your own. First of all there is no marked turn off from the highway and as i will describe the road got more and more interesting as we went. As we continued the road became more and more narrow. The more narrow the road became the further it deteriorated. There were places where there was barely enough room for the landcruiser to get through. Of course this is where the road was severely rutted and tipped toward a several hundred foot drop. After about 45 minutes we arrived at a town. No I don´t know the name of it. It did require going through 2 or 3 rivers to get there though. I guess the most noteworthy thing about the town itself is that after all that time on that horrendous road, the town itself was paved. At any rate we had lunch there which consisted of make your own bologna sandwiches with all the fixins´ After lunch we headed out. It turned out that we have mules to carry all our stuff. THANK YOU gOD! As we started out it was up and down a little. Then the nightmare of every fat out of shape out old man occurred. It went up and up and up and up....well you get the idea. Every time I saw a turn up ahead I would think "This has to get to the top sometime" But no it just kept on going up. At one point the guide came up behind me with a couple of guys who are leading our mules and sitting on a couple of mules themselves. One asks me if I want to ride the mule to the top. I said SI! And thank god because it was another 20 minutes to the top on mule. It would have taken me forever to walk it. There ws some thunder and lightning during the afternoon but not much rain accompanied it. Just enough to make the trail which is all clay into slippery as hell mud. Twice goiing downhill I slid on my ass for about 10 feet. One time when I slid I only stopped when my left foot hit a root. I felt and heard something snap. As of right now it feels fine, we´ll see. We finally got to our first destination at about 4:30 today. Basically it is a house, across from it is a covered platform that has a pool table and a tv. Beleive it or not they sell cold beer here too. It costs 3000 pesos, about $1.80 that is about twice what it does in town. The buildings are next to a river. Across the river is another outbuilding which is essentially a roof with tables and benches underneath a cook area and a place for hammocks which is we will sleep tonight. The owner(s) of the place are an older man, I´m guessing mid 60s and a woman maybe in her 30s. Just guessing. I hope for sake that is her father or father in law and not her husband. When we got there he was really drunk. When I went to buy a beer instead of getting it himself a trip of about 10 ft., he clapped his hands until the woman came running to see what he wanted. All in all the countryside we saw coming in was beautiful and the place we are staying at is beautiful and idyllic.
September 15, Monday
I didn´t sleep worth shit last night. I couldn´t find my first aid kit which has all my pain stuff in it. First I couldn´t get my foot, the one I heard crack, in a comfortable position. Next my right shoulder was spasming all night. It seemed like every few minutes I would feel a sharp stabbing pain go through my shoulder.
Today started at about 6:30 am. We got up. Had some coffee and then one of the local guys took us to show us his cocaine factory. Seriously, no shit. It was about a 10 minute walk from where we stayed.Boy was it off the trail. Kinda necessary I guess. Now you may be thinking the same thing we were. There are going to be guards with submachine guns, people wearing masks and gloves packaging it, you know just like in the movies. Well maybe there are places and situations like that in Colombia but this isn´t one of them. This place was a cleared flat spot close to the river. It was covered by a 20x20 plastic tarp. So get the idea of a huge operation out of your head and think moonshiner. The whole operation looked rather crude. He said it was necessary so that if he saw the military coming he could set fire to the place and run. I never what a process it was to make and some of the nasty shit involved to process it. He explained the entire process to us and demonstrated each step. Some of the chemicals used are gasoline and sulfuric acid. And he even demonstrated the final stepthe making of cocaine paste. The paste is pure unadulterated cocaine. Yes we were allowed to sample it. Yes some of us bought some of the product. So with all of that we were back at the camp at 7:30. We left about 9 am to begin day 2 of the trek to Ciudad Perdida. Today is much the same as yesterday except there was less climbing. We reached our camping spot at about 1:30. Turns out there is another group there that is just returning from Ciudad Perdida. They were all very enthusiastic about it. This gives us all hope for tomorrow.
September 16 2008 tuesday.
Today started MUCH too early. They have people working at the camping area. They were up and about at 5:30 am. As I said much too early. I ignored them as long as I could but around 6:15 our guide woke me up. At least last night i got to sleep on a mattress instead of a hammock so that helped. Also I had my pain stuff so that helped even more. Russ who is our official roller didn´t have time to roll a spliff this morning so we had to go without. Bummer. People had told us that today was going to be easy but in the beginning it sure seemed like we did a lot of climbing. At one point when our whole group took a break I took some coke and put it on my tongue. This isn´t coke as you may know it it is rather a dried paste, it can´t be snorted. I told everyone "Hey the old man needs an energy boost." They all understood. This country is incredibly beautiful. It seems like almost every time you go around a turn in the forest there is another beautiful waterfall of a fabulous valley view or an awesome view of the river. It is truly a pity that access is limited by the presence of cocaine labs and narcotraficantes. While on the trail our guide pointed out a poisonous snake. He called it the serpiente de San Pedro or a yellow tail. It was small, maybe a foot long. After he pointed it out to us he killed it. Later on we also saw something rather unusual, crabs along the trail. Yeah real crabs they looked sort of like sand crabs. We were nowhere near the beach. This is the first time in my life I have seen crabs in a forest.
Today we became amphibious. We had to cross the same river 8 times. The name of the river is the Buritaca. The 8th crossing takes you to the steps that lead to ciudad Perdida. There are 1800 of them. The builders had an interesting sense of humor. You climb and climb and nobody counts. Then you finally see something that is obviously man made and you think "Yes I´ve made it!"You continue walking and then you see it about 200 more steps. and you´re thinking "Damn I thought I´d made it." These are broad wide steps where as the others were small and narrow. These obviously lead someplace important. So you climb those steps and see some more man made structures, you walk across those and see another man made structure with about 30 more steps, this happens about twice more and THEN YOU ARE AT THE TOP. For all the fucking work it was worth it. The view from the top is absolutely incredible. It started to rain as soon as I got here. I proudly brought up the rear. It was just a little at first but now it´s coming down hard enough to discourage exploration around the area. So the rain is not making me feel much like Gene Kelly, I sure as fuck don´t feel like singing in it. This place is 1200 meters above sea level, so all the rain is doing is to make things chilly. It is now about 3 o´clock and we have been here about 3 hours, we´ll see what later brings. It finally stopped raining about 4:30 and I got some walking around and exploring time. This place is fascinating. It is a terraced city. None of the houses survived because they were all made of bamboo and palm leaves. However the foundations were circular and had a stone foundation. They buried their dead beneath the house. That is they dug a whole in the floor and buried them with all their worldly possessions. The higher your social standing the higher up the hill you lived the more possessions you were buried with.
The city was discovered in 1973 by some guy out in the area looking for marijuana. He found Ciudad Perdida instead. Now let me review what it takes to get to this place. You travel 3 days 4-5 hours a day. After the second day the trail deteriorates to the point where mules can´t make it. You cross 3 sheer rock faces with barely sufficient footholds. I already mentioned the 9 river crossings, each crossing is to another part of the trail. How the fuck did this guy even think to look in this area? How the fuck did he decide to walk across three rock faces, how the hell did he know where to dig? etc. etc. That this place wasn´t discovered until 1973 is no surprise to me. Im amazed it was discovered at all. This place is also referred to as the green hell because when Frankie Ray discovered all the gold artifacts he started selling them in Santa Marta. Word got out and people started following him to the site and killing each other for the gold. The gov´t took it over in 1976.
Okay that is it for part 1. I have already been typing for 2 hours and that is enough for today. Look for part 2 the trek to Ciudad Perdida in the next few days.
hasta la vista baby
Charlie
The road goes on forever and the party never ends.
Friday, September 12, 2008
Hola jolly fun seekers. It has been a while since I have been to a computer and much has happened. I left Cartagena on my bike and headed toward Santa marta. The first day I made it to the mud volcano and camped there for the night. Nobody lives at the volcano they all live in the town close by and commute each day. So I got there about3:30 and asked if it was alright to camp and they said sure. Then at 5:30 everyone left leaving me alone. Talk about peaceful and quiet, it was fabulous. I woke up the next day and made it to Barranquilla. Not much to say about barranquilla it´s a city bigger than Cartagena but there is really nothing there to recommend it. Whereas Cartagena is a tourist area Barranquilla is an industrial area. I had only planned on staying there a day or two but a part on my bike broke when I got there and it is only available from the person who built the bike. So I had to take a few days and figure out what to do. I thought of sending the bike back to Mexico and continuing the trip using busses or whatever but I culdn´t find a box. So I decided to go to Santa Marta on bus and just bring the bike with me. I got here and got to my hostel and was talking to the owner and told him what the problem was and he said maybe he could take a look at it. He did and said he know a machine shop in town that could make the part. So we went there and for less than it would have cost to ship the parts from the U.S. they made me the parts I needed and 2 spares so I am back on the road again. I like Santa Marta and will be here for a few more days. I am planning on doing a tour to ciudad perdida on snday or monday. It is a 6 day hike I hear it is very nice. When I retire from there it is on to Bogota and some crisp air. Bogota is about 8000+ feet above sea level. (2600 meters)It has low temperatures of about mid 40s to highs of mid 60s. Sounds like Gunnison this time of year. At any rate one of the great spectator sports in Santa Marta is watching the hookers stroll by at night on the malecon. I wnder how many of them are actually women. No I´m not interested in finding out. I have no use for AIDS in my life. Well my time is about to run out so I better go.
The road goes on forever and the party never ends
hasta la vista baby
Charlie
The road goes on forever and the party never ends
hasta la vista baby
Charlie
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
The road goes on forever and the party never ends
First of all let me thank all of you who responded to my pathetic appeal for email. Sometimes it gets lonely out here and it is weeks before I hear from anyone. I write these blogs and I sometimes wonder if anyone is reading them because people so infrequently respond to them. So once again, THANK YOU!
It is tuesday in Cartagena. Tomorrow I am taking off for Santa Marta. It is 203 kilometers (about125 miles) down the Caribbean coast. Outside of Santa Marta is Ciudad Perdida, the lost city. It is an archeological site that was discovered in 1975. It is a 3 day hike in one day and night at the site and 2 days hike back. I guess it is downhill on the way back. I have heard differing reports about the cost and whatnot. So I will have to look into it when I get there. From Santa Marta I head south to Bogota. It is 918 kilometers about 500 miles. I have 2 options. I can take a route that is fairly flat until about the last 144 kilometers about 80 miles, and then goes straight up and straight down etc. Or I can take a route that more or less gradually starts going up for the last 300 or so kilometers. Colombia is interesting in that in most countries the population centers are on the plains and relatively few people live in the mountains. In Colombia it is the opposite. The result being that if I go the flat route it will be rather distant between significant population areas. Hmmmmmmm decisions, decisions. Right now I am leaning toward the flat route and see how I feel when I get to the climb. I mean God invented busses for a reason right?
On Sunday I had an interesting time. I went to a mud volcano. It is a cone about 60-70 feet high and at the top is perhaps 15 feet across. It is filled with mud. you go about 4 feet down a ladder and just lie down and float in the mud. It is great. It is impossible to drown it is that buoyant. A couple of times I tried to push myself further down and I just bobbed right back up. It is very relaxing and messy. After you are done you go to a marshy part of the ocean where the water is muddy to the point where you cannot see and there are women there who wash you off. They also tell you to take off your shorts and they wash those off for you too. It was fun. Well this is all for now. It may be a while before I can get to another computer. Have a good one.
hasta la vista baby
Charlie
It is tuesday in Cartagena. Tomorrow I am taking off for Santa Marta. It is 203 kilometers (about125 miles) down the Caribbean coast. Outside of Santa Marta is Ciudad Perdida, the lost city. It is an archeological site that was discovered in 1975. It is a 3 day hike in one day and night at the site and 2 days hike back. I guess it is downhill on the way back. I have heard differing reports about the cost and whatnot. So I will have to look into it when I get there. From Santa Marta I head south to Bogota. It is 918 kilometers about 500 miles. I have 2 options. I can take a route that is fairly flat until about the last 144 kilometers about 80 miles, and then goes straight up and straight down etc. Or I can take a route that more or less gradually starts going up for the last 300 or so kilometers. Colombia is interesting in that in most countries the population centers are on the plains and relatively few people live in the mountains. In Colombia it is the opposite. The result being that if I go the flat route it will be rather distant between significant population areas. Hmmmmmmm decisions, decisions. Right now I am leaning toward the flat route and see how I feel when I get to the climb. I mean God invented busses for a reason right?
On Sunday I had an interesting time. I went to a mud volcano. It is a cone about 60-70 feet high and at the top is perhaps 15 feet across. It is filled with mud. you go about 4 feet down a ladder and just lie down and float in the mud. It is great. It is impossible to drown it is that buoyant. A couple of times I tried to push myself further down and I just bobbed right back up. It is very relaxing and messy. After you are done you go to a marshy part of the ocean where the water is muddy to the point where you cannot see and there are women there who wash you off. They also tell you to take off your shorts and they wash those off for you too. It was fun. Well this is all for now. It may be a while before I can get to another computer. Have a good one.
hasta la vista baby
Charlie
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