We left our lovely Bogotá hosts at around 7:30 am for a quick ride to the bus terminal to meet Nati, Ben, and Nati's father. We quickly got our tickets and surprisingly were not charged for the bikes! As we boarded we discovered that the bus was full of young school children from Medellín who had traveled to Bogotá for a choir contest. They won, and so were cheerful and friendly, singing much of the way to Medellín.
The ride was absolutely gorgeous – crossing from the westernmost chain of the Andes over the cordillera central to the easternmost part of the chain, we had to go down and through the Rio Magdalena Valley and up again, crossing several climate zones on the way as in Bogotá it had been only around 15 degrees Celsius while down in the valley at our lunch stop we felt again the sticky moist heat we remember well from the coast. Have we mentioned yet that Colombia is spectacularly beautiful? Luckily it was a clear day and we had fantastic views of the countryside and also of the Nevado del Ruiz volcano far off in the distance: seeing it's snow-covered peak at a height of 5325 m (~16,000 ft) was the first time since we started our trip that we have seen snow! The road was very windy, sharp curves, steep ascents and descents, there was a lot of truck and car traffic and very little shoulder on the road, so we were glad to be in the bus and not on the bikes for this stretch of highway. However, as we have said and observed many times before, it seems that in order to be a bus driver in Latin America one must drive like a maniac, so the ride wasn't as relaxing as we had hoped. Even though the nearly 400km (~640 miles) journey took us about 10 hours, we would have taken probably twice as long had we driven ourselves. We arrived in the Medellín terminal around 7pm, Nati's brother came in his big van to pick us up, and we piled in all the bags and bikes to drive to our new home for the next few days.
Known as “the land of eternal springtime,” Medellín (alt.1480m/~4400ft) has a very temperate climate – much warmer than Bogotá but less hot than Cartagena – the perfect temperature, and even though there was plenty of rain it didn't stop Ben and Nati from showing us the city over the next few days. The first day we walked to the metro station a few blocks away and instead of taking the metro right away to the city center, we decided to take the cable car – part of the public metro system! – that leads up to the neighborhoods in the hills. It offered great city views to orient ourselves and at the top we got off and walked down to the next station, to head into the city. We visited a nice sculpture park, had a great vegetarian lunch at the Hare Krishna restaurant, and walked through an outdoor fruit market where Nati introduced us to some interesting unknown local fruits. At the “barefoot park” public guides instructed us on how to relax by soaking our feet in the pools, walking blindfolded through a maze and enjoying the bamboo garden. That night we met some friends from our Panama-Colombia boat journey at a local bar to watch the Colombia-Peru football match, which was quite exciting – at least the other spectators were very excited to see Colombia win while we were more busy drinking beer and catching up!
We spent the next morning in the beautiful Medellín Botanical Gardens, and then in the afternoon went across the street to the science “Interactive Museum” where we let our inner children loose (especially Swen) and played for hours with all the games and exhibits: from the outdoor playground with a giant centrifugal-force spinner thing to the physics floor with many displays and games having to do with motion, gravity, optics, and sound waves, to the digital technology floor with many interactive games and activities such as a thermal imaging room, robots and a real size model apartment where appliances and electronics were controlled from either a computer screen inside or the telephone booth outside. We spent so long inside, we were exhausted and starving when we left! Our third day we spent traveling by bus to the nearby mountain village of Santa Elena, about 1000m above the city with great views into the valley on the bus ride, for it's 10th annual Street Arts festival. A quaint little town, but the festival was more than disappointing – maybe the rain postponed the music and dances that had been posted. Nonetheless we enjoyed a nice lunch and great walk into the hills to see the views and beautiful houses, some of which had large flower gardens, the flowers of which were cut and taken in huge bunches to be sold in the flower market of downtown Medellín. We returned home and prepared a Thai curry dinner for our fabulous hosts to thank them for having us, showing us this great city and for including us in their lives for a few days, and with hopes that someday, somewhere we will see Ben and Nati again – Europe? Australia? Colombia? Time will tell...
The rain poured all night long and we prepared our bags in order to head off in the morning. It had been 10 long and exciting days discovering Bogotá and Medellín, connecting and re-connecting with old and new friends, and experiencing some of the most beautiful and interesting days we have had since our trip began. It is time to get back on the bikes; we ride south, in search of new wonders and discoveries of this country and its people.
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