Hannah and I are currently sitting in business class on a flight to Bogotá Colombia via Dallas having quit our well paid jobs in a top pharmaceutical in order to travel across South America and Asia...we didn’t sleep well the night before fretting over our life choices and whether we have really made the right decision or whether we are two spoilt 30 something millennials having gone nuts...so how did we get to this point?

Hannah and I met in the audit department of our previous employer. I’d been in the department for 18 months before Hannah transferred over from another part of the company. Once introduced by a colleague I then proceeded to make various efforts to chat to her and grab her attention over the proceeding months until we finally started our ‘secret office relationship’. From memory my efforts were what you could now call tragic and probably not aiding the stereotype that accountants are poor at chatting up the opposite sex. One particularly excruciating memory comes to mind of Hannah finishing work one day and heading off home as I chased and managed to catch her just as she was leaving to ‘apologise for taking her seat earlier in the day’ to which a very confused Hannah explained she had been sitting in a completely different seat. Some people meet the love of their lives in classic meet cute situations, I on the other hand literally chased mine out the office.

Who would have thought after my various failed attempts that Hannah would eventually begin to see my ‘cute’ side as I held a cup of tea and made an office announcement about an upcoming social event I was organising, apparently the tea in hand method to calm the awkwardness of public speaking has it’s appeals.

Fast forward about 11 months and here we are having booked an economy flight for the first part of our travels and been upgraded first to premium economy, then owing to a faulty seat on the plane getting further upgraded to business class, god bless Hannah’s seat destroying booty, I do hope this is a good omen for the rest of our travels.

Over the course of the next seven months in this diary I’ll try to not dwell on the monotonous and stick to the essentials...over and out for now.

We arrived in Bogotá late at night and made our way to the hostel via official taxi, as like everyone who visits Colombia we had certain preconceptions about the security of the country. The city seemed pretty empty apart from the odd vagabond wandering the streets in a zombie like fashion. The hostel was located right in the city centre and had two sets of security doors, clearly safety has to be taken seriously in Bogotá.

As we were up early and the weather was dismal (pretty standard for the city) we decided to first go to the Botero museum. He’s the most famous artist in Colombia and well known for his style of painting fat people and other fat things, fat Mona List was a personal favourite Hannahs and she spent the whole time giggling away at the various paints. They also held some Picassos which looked like they’d been painted by a toddler, but were worth millions. I’ll pop some photos of the paintings we saw here so you can choose your own favourite.

Afterwards we took a walking tour the next morning and were guided around the city by a Colombian guy called Jeff (his real name believe it or not). I enjoyed his depiction of the city and the history of Colombia which basically was a spoiler alert for the whole series of Narcos (we’ve only seen the first two episodes so now have no need to see the rest of the series :o)). We also got to try traditional Colombian drinks along the way such as Chicha (alcohol made from corn) and Aqua de Canela, a hot cinnamon drink. Something which Jeff mentioned was that Colombians are haunted by the negative stigma that drugs have on their country and are desperate to not be associated with the topic, however I’m not sure if they’ll ever be able to do this.

At lunch we went to a touristy restaurant and ate Ajiaco, which was an incredibly hearty chicken soup with everything you can think of included, you even get a bowl of rice, an avocado, cream and capers on the side to add to this mass of food.

That evening jetlag, the awful weather and a general feeling of clostrophobia from our hostel room took its toll on us and we went to bed early.

I’m now writing this from a small Indiana jones plane flight on it’s way to La Macarena, in the Colombian jungle so more updates later on. \240

[Hannah] La Macarena, no, not the 90s hit song by Los del Rio but instead a small town in the Meta region hosting the grand tourist site Cano Cristales.

Mark and I took a small tiny plane from Bogotá and arrived into La Macarena airport, one that looks like someone’s backyard. I have never been so happy to touchdown on ground in my life. Let’s say my seatbelt was never off.

As usual, the gringos were targeted. Our arrival entry was recorded into the airport’s old school handwritten book system followed by a hefty 40,000COP pp airport tax fee to match our profile. I really hope they’re using that money for the airport. We were tagged with bright neon yellow wrist bands. I felt like I was heading to a festival; Mark on the otherhand felt chained (men!)

An adorable teenager, Santiago, from the hotel picked us up and rushed us off to the local tourism office to watch a video on basic rules of Cano Cristales. It told us what we knew, no sun screen and no insect repellent. We knew we would suffer, but how much?

Santiago’s family owns the hotel we were staying at. We walked to the hotel after collecting our baggage and realised just how small this town is. The hotel was only 5 blocks away! The town reminded me of home in Vietnam. Muddy roads, lots of motorbikes and hot tropical heat.

Our main tour was booked for Saturday 11th, so with a whole afternoon free, we dropped our things, had a shower and headed out for lunch (standard meat, rice, plantain and Botero sized avocado). We decided to walk around and explore the town, but soon realised it was even smaller than we thought, covering it in just 10-15 minutes. We debated between passing the time by playing pool (there were a lot of pool clubs here!) or go back to the hotel and chill. We opted for the latter when Mark saw the erotic pictures of women hung up on the walls of said establishments. Bless!

Laying on our hotel beds and feeling pretty restless, we were asked by Adrianna, the hotel operations manager, if we wanted to join another tourist group for a ride around town on a makeshift mototaxi, see some streams and go for a swim. At 20000COP pp we went for it.

The ride was uber bumpy. With heavy rains the night before, there were muddy puddles everywhere. The mototaxi got stuck a number of times, such that Mark and the other gentleman had to jump out and push. In these situations, it pays to be a petite Asian lady.

The driver took us to Cano Piedra, a small baby version of Cano Cristales. We saw the pretty red/purple aquatic plants, walked across the streams, had a dip in the natural pool and saw the sun set over the hills.

We were later informed this tour if done officially would have costed 200,000COP. Whaaaaaat?! We were chuffed for landing such a bargain. Mark couldn’t stop talking about it. What an accountant.

Back on the mototaxi, we rode home, if finding out we got a similar tour for a fraction of the price wasn’t good enough. We were then told we only need to pay 18000COP pp, an extra 4000COP saving! Mark was feeling estatic now.

We had another quick shower and headed out for dinner where there was live music and dancing. The live music was more constant talking down a mic and the dancing was more men stomping really hard on the wooden floors and spinning their female dance partner round and round like a record. Still fun though.

We seemed to get better treatment by the waiters because we arrived as independent travellers rather than part of a huge tour group. That or they really like the look of Mark. Dinner was the usual spread, meat, fries and salad. We treated ourselves to beer, the local brew, Poker.

After enjoying (or enduring?) the entertainment and meal, we called it a night. Great timing since they were starting to usher the customers to dance on stage. I mean, we all know how Mark dances... I don’t think La Macarena is ready for his moves just yet.

With stars in the sky, we strolled home. With happy tummies we got ready for bed, tucked ourselves in and were excited for the next day and the big tour ahead.

Hannah on instagram:

Caño Cristales, La Macarena.Coined as one of the most beautiful rivers in the world. The aquatics were pretty. The hike was tiring in the swealtering heat. But met some cool travellers and shared some beers. Mark got to use his muscles pushing the mototaxi in muddy puddles and I was gifted with 10+ mozzie bites plus Macarena song on loop in my head. Next stop: Caribbean coast, Cartagena!

Continued:

What Hannah didn’t mention above was that as we were not allowed to use sun cream or insect repellent as it could damage the fragile ecosystem, I got burnt to a crisp on my neck and ears and Hannah got even more mozzie bites. It was a tough long and hot day, but in the end very enjoyable.