A Place Both Wonderful and Strange – Tash & Ricki's Career Break Travels

While Colombia steadily made their way to the Copa America final, we were enjoying the various sights the country has to offer.

While we were still staying in Medellín, we signed up for a day trip to Guatapé. I had never heard of this town until this year, but since following Visit Colombia on Instagram, my feed had been inundated with posts about it.

The first stop was probably the most iconic of the day, with a huge rock, the imaginatively named El Peñón de Guatape (Guatape Mass of Rock), looming over us.

From our seats on the bus, it looked comparable to Machu Picchu’s Huayna Picchu, and so when asked to guess the typical time to the top, we ventured 45 minutes. We were surprised to learn many do it in 20 minutes or less, with our guide having managed it in 9 minutes on one occasion.

This gave us a target for the 740 steps. Only pausing for a couple of brief water stops, we powered on up and were pleased with an ascent of about 10 minutes. A walk in the park compared to HP, and thankfully no false finishes this time! From the top, we could relax and take in the views of the surrounding reservoir. It was so unusual to see the various punctuations of land that break it up.

One of the later stops that day would be Viejo Peñol, a replica of a town which had to be relocated due to construction of the reservoir.

Colombia loves a replica town!

Pics from a quick included boat tour on the reservoir. Clockwise from left: The burnt out remains of one of Pablo Escobar’s properties; a marker to the original town of El Peñol; the rock and some millionaire footballer properties.

After our descent from the rock, while we waited for the other groups to complete, the only thing to do was explore the tourist strip and strike some poses.

Photos from the base of El Peñón. The Virgin Mary is hidden on the rock face, while the man statued is the private landowner who realised he could make himself a few pesos if he built a staircase up the rock.

From here, we were off to Guatapé town itself, a beautiful, colourful community.

It was easy to spend an hour so wandering the picturesque streets.

The town is particularly famed for its zócalos, carved panels adorning the exterior of almost every building. These might represent the family living there, the business trading there, or simply tell a story.

All in all, it was a great way to spend what would be one of only two days outside of Medellín city.

Our month in the city of eternal spring (or what often felt like summer) absolutely flew by. Before long, it was time for a long weekend on the coast in Cartagena.

Despite the modern city photographed above, photos of the remaining colonial buildings and cobbled streets were what originally sold me on Colombia years ago. Hopefully it could live up to expectation.

It was certainly attractive, with the centro historico sitting proudly alongside the Caribbean sea.

It was also incredibly warm, with some of the highest temperatures we’ve seen this year. Although I’m usually loathe to visit anything naval related, we needed to escape the heat so off to the Museo Naval it was, as well as the modern art museum, Museum of Cartagena and the Museum of Gold.

Ahoy! At least we could play make-believe in the naval museum

I have to admit, perhaps meant we didn’t maximise the time in Cartagena as we should have. There were plenty of excursions we could have signed up to, many on the water or involving nature, but Ricki wanted to prioritise seeing the walled city (all photos above) and the colourful district of Getsamanai.

Getsamanai

If we hadn’t been so lethargic with our wandering, we probably could have crammed all that into a day/day and a half, leaving a day spare. It was a bit of a money saving exercise too though. In Cartagena, we really noticed a difference in prices, especially for tours. Together with the busier streets, vendors constantly hawking their wares/tours and more noticeable use of English, I think it was a good insight into what a Caribbean island holiday might be like.

After our weekend in Cartagena, it was another culture contrast as we moved on to Bogotá for a very brief two night stay. Once again at altitude, we went from t-shirts back to jackets and swapped ocean glimpses for a concrete jungle.

With only one full day here, this was spent in the central downtown area checking out a few museums / subliminally signalling to Ricki what I’d like for Christmas.

Museum of Gold

Museum of Emeralds – you aren’t allowed to take many photos there

It was really interesting to see the contrasting cities. Each one felt like an entirely different country, nevermind region.

It’s not all tower blocks in Bogotá

And I have to say, we were very glad we picked Medellín as the one to use as our main stay. It manages to blend attractive spaces with a cosmopolitan variety of things to do, as well as feeling very safe.

The contrasts outline just how interesting and evolving a country Colombia is. While I won’t pretend its troubles are completely behind it, it has plenty to offer visitors. As our tour guide for Guatapé put it, the biggest risk to visiting Colombia is you’ll want to stay!

Tash’s Treats

In Cartagena, once again I found myself cooling off with some unusual ice cream flavours. This time one scoop of tomate de arbol, and one of pineapple-basil. Who knew tomato ice cream could be so good?!

In Bogotá, a cafe stop with an unfamiliar menu led to me ordering peto completo. On paper, the list of ingredients (corn soup, cheese, bread roll, cane sugar) seemed unusual, but I was sure it must make sense on presentation. Not so.

Much more enjoyable was finally getting to try an oblea. Obleas are thin wafer shells which are used to sandwich ingredients of choice. We tried the classic Colombian mix of cheese, cream, blackberry jam and condensed milk. I guess it’s a bit like a street food cheesecake. Delicious, but quite impractical to eat!