A first day in Cartagena, Colombia

Santa Marta was a little dissapointment after all the good things that I had heard about it, but then as always I admit that without meeting up with anyone and ending up in a hotel that got bad reviews and is relatively expensive for what it is, was never going to put me in the best of moods for the place.

Once I woke up early enough to check my emails and still found that I was alone, I caught up with my mail and blog, sorted out my luggage and checked out in time to grab a 11am bus to Cartagena.

The weather was cloudy and grey, but the bus stop was surprisingly well equipped and modern compared to the rest of the city that I had seen, and I was beginning to think that maybe I had judged it too soon, but by now it was too late.

20 mil pesos for a 5 hour bus journey from here to Cartagena was on the agenda, and I ended up sitting behind a polish guy and across form a Israeli, who by the end of the journey we had all become kind of good chums, swapping a few jokes and bits of news.

The bus left half an hour late, but was modern and showed a couple of movies which was cool, except thy chose to show a couple of horror / thrillers which is pointless as without perfect sound and atmosphere you cant get into one of those movies, so it was just a lot of mixed up images. The also had a film called 80 minutes which was so transparent that even without the sound up loud enough to hear I could tell where it was going and guessed the twist in the tail ending and even the bad joke at the end long before I saw it.

Once we arrived at Cartagena I had a hard time finding the details of my hostel, so the Israeli kindly suggests that we can all share a taxi into the city and maybe try to check out this hotel that he saw in the lonely planet, which I agree to as a firm believer in the old saying "things can happen when you say yes".

The taxi ride was short but during the time we managed to find out a few things about each other and when we arrived at the hotel I was pleasantly surprised as it was comfortable, clean, tidy, had brand new televison sets still in the boxes just minutes away from being installed in all the rooms and both a fairly quiet aircon and fan, which was doubly cool, plus at a price less than the one I had just left in Santa Marta. Plus it was minutes away from the beach and all the happening places in renovated part of the old city.

After we dropped out bags off we went on a bit of a wander, and ended up following the old port defence wall for a bit, which was very cool and picturesqe, til we reached a mini restaurant with a great view overlooking the sea. The prices were very steep for what they were, almost as much as standard London prices, but then we figures that it was as much for the location and for the many slim waitresses on offer as it was for the drinks.

We then headed into the city centre and found a place that looked ok and had on offer a 18 mil pesos meal, that seemed very reasonable. The warning of if anything seems too good to be true then it probably is, came back to haunt us, as despite us asking for the special of the day, and did so many times, when the final bill came through it was almost double what we were expecting to pay.

We argued, we haggled, we negociated, we argued some more and then in the end I just reasoned up with the guys that we shoudl just pay what we consider a fair price to be and just leave, which eventually we did. It was a shame, as I did not want my first thoughts of Cartagena to be negative, considering how beautuful the buildings and the location was, but then I was reminded that this is very much a tourist place and not just for Europeans but for rich Colombians, and thus a bit of over charging was almost inevitable.

Finally the Israeli said that with the nighttimes pretty much dead during the early week, this being Sunday was the best and maybe the only chance for us as a group to go out and try to see some proper nightlife, however I guess that it was just not my night.

We grabbed a taxi and ended up paying a minimum 5 mil pesos fare for a 3 minute walk to the happening part of the old city, only to find it almost empty except a few sexy chicas with their older boyfriends and some local guys sitting on the bar. I ended up sitting along side the locals who in no time at all got up on the bar, started dancing and them drunkenly came on to me in Spanish, only for his equally gay and drunk friend to try and translate for me that I could have with or both of them if I wanted.

Because I did not want to ruin the night for my new friends I did my best to shrug this off, but by half midnight and with a promising early morning alarm call for a cruise tomorrow, I just did not feel like trying our luck somewhere else, so I bade them farewell in the taxi as i went off to bed while they started on to the taxi driver to go to some other place that was happening.

An hour of so later I heard them come back, and in the morning I got the news that the taxi driver took them first to a straight out whore house, which they left in about three minutes flat, before then going on to a better class place that still ended up being a place where all the local women were for sale, but this time they liked to play a little shy and a little coy, waiting for you to dance with them and pick them up rather than the straight out come on and what is your pleasure kind of attitudude. I was very glad that I stayed behind, although being with a few reliable buddies the experience could have almost been worth the inconvenience and loss of sleep.

Leaving Bogota and a Day in Santa Marta, Colombia

I didn't realise that Bogota had a main airport but had seperate terminals for domestic flights, and this was something that I wish I had known before I booked a flight leaving at 07:25 in the morning.

Waking up extra early to finish getting packed was something that I did not relish, and the fact that I had to check out and grab a taxi to the airport for 06:00 in order to catch a flight that I had booked while on the road so had no paperwork to back up meant that I was in no mans land when I arrived at the airport.

I was shocked when I checked out to see that I was charged 60,000 pesos for having my laundry done, which is around £15 and so is by far the most expensivest laundry cost I have ever experienced and had I known I would have preferred to do it myself by hand.

On the way to the airport I noticed that there were a number of large and newly build hotels towards the outskirts of the city, all expensive looking and I guess that the reason why they are so far away for the city centre is that there is no room in the centre to have such large buildings built, or else they would have to make a few roads into dead ends.

Looking up at the board showing leaving flights I was confused and dismayed to see that I could not spot any going to Santa Marta, so in the middle of the main terminal I had to get out my laptop and open up the email to get the directions and the take a photo with my camera to store it as proof of purchase.

Once I had this I went to the Avianca check in desk, only to be told that Avianca have another, smaller, terminal outside that was a ten minute walk or a taxi ride away.

I headed outside to grab a taxi but the first one I tried had no idea of another airport nearby and so I had to get out again and return to the check in desk to get them to write out the full details for me. This time they sent me around the corner where after a wait of half an hour I was able to check in but only enough to get a boarding ticket where she wrote the name of the other terminal across the top and then again suggested I take a taxi.

This time the taxi driver understood better my directions, and took me to the other terminal that was just up the road, but due to illogical roads and one ways I felt that I travelled half way back to Bogota before I reached a round about and managed to head back toward the airport but on a slightly different angle and took a siding just before the main entrance.

I feel a tiny bit angry that I told the first taxi driver that I was going to Santa Marta and he still took me to the main terminal, despite Avianca not flying to Santa Marta from that terminal, but then maybe I didn't tell him I was flying Aviance or maybe he didn't know that they didn't, but a 20 mil pesos ride followed by a 6 mil pesos ride all mounts up and I can see that too many innocent mistakes her ein Bogota could end up as expensive as anywhere else in the world.

Arriving at the other terminal I managed to check in my bag and as the time was ticking by I had no delay or time wasted in the departure lounge as my flight was boarding before I reached it, so I just had to clear security, and then get right on the plane.

For the second time this epic voyage I was asked to switch seats to one next to an emergency exit, so either it is random luck hitting me twice or the fact that maybe I have a trusting and safe face! The flight was almost over before it had begun as I was still tired from the early wake up and so I slept most of it and didnt even need to get out my ear plugs or face mask I was that close to sleep.

Arriving in Santa Marta I felt the heat and humidity the second the doors opened and I was already dripping before I got my bags. Looking our the window of the airport I could see the Caribbean ocean, and it looked clear, blue and peaceful.

Much like the outskirts of Bogota, the road from the airport to the city centre was littered with a sprinkling of very pricey hotels all on their own, and I was glad in a way that I was in the city centre as that way the prices should not be too much.

The taxi driver didn't know my hostel, but as its entrance was on a small backstreet I am not surprised, and the look of the hostel was the sterotypical image of a cheap south american hotel, with the flaking paint, the 50's wooden furniture, flies lazily buzzing around and fans the size of trash can lids everywhere trying to beat the breeze.

My room was up a circular creaking stairway, just past the ill lit kitchen, and although I was there slightly later than planned I still had to help the porter make my bed in order for me to crash.

Unpacking my laptop I contact my friend here, who was online yet for some reason despite it being a weekend and her having no work or children to look after she made her excused and apologised for not being able to meet me today, which was just not what I wanted to hear.

Logging off I decided to dose up on anti sun cream and then take a walk around the city centre, in the hope of finding a post office and be able to send home the much reduced, smaller and lighter package home, yet the hostel did not have a map ( other than showing me am old and heavily creased one that stuck to a wall with aging sellotape ) so the walk was largely fruitless. In random luck I went in the opposite direction from the beach, but I did get to walk past a few bars and the nearby Cathedral.

The heat was so hot that even with shorts and sandals I was roasted in no time at all, my suncream dripping off me in buckets and I could tell that I was getting a headache even before my eyes started stinging with the cream running into my eyes.

Unable to find anything to do and no escape from the heat, so I headed back to my hostel where I grabbed a bottle of local pop juice before retreating to my fan assisted bedroom and did my best to sleep and catch up on emails as well as book another hostel in Cartagena for tomorrow morning as already I could tell that this place was not for me.

After a sleep I found a restaruant that was nearby, where for 18 mil pesos I was given a couple more pretend bananas, a pepsi with ice and the largest plate of rice and chicken I have ever seen, it even made the one in Piura seem small by comparison, which is a scary thought in itself.

As it ws the only thing I had to eat all day I devoured a large chunk of it, but it was a little too salty and too had an aftertaste that meant I needed to drown every other mouthful with a glug of pepsi, and the plate was much larger than the glass so before too long I could not take another mouthful without washing away the taste of the last, so gave up and went back to my hotel.

I tried to watch a bit of television as by now the sun had gone down, the rain had started and this in turn increased to a tropcal storm where the thunder was so frequent that I could not tell when one ended and the other began and where so much lightening was flashing that I was lit up like a firework party. I watched a few things, but the reception got worse and soon each flash of lightening was knocking out the signal for a few seconds and before too long I was missing more than I was watching, so despite it being very early I grabbed my ear plugs, switched on the fan to blow the mosquitos away and dove under a thin sheet to try and get some sleep.

The last thing that I remember watching was a program about the American film instutitude saying that the top ten films were of each category and was shocked that although I think of myself as a bit of an amateur film buff I had not even seen half of the sci-fi films and when it came to comedies or epics I was down to 3 in 10.

TomorrowI will try to get up early, to get myself all up to date and then swing by the beack before I check out and head on off to the bus terminal and go to Cartagena.

Letter home

Hiya, how are you all?

I am fine here, there are a few decorations out wherever I go, but at 30 plus degrees and surrounded by palm trees and sand it is hard to image that Christmas is so close, it will not be the same this year, not unless I can find a traditional English Pub in Dominican Republic to spend it in.

I called my sister for her birthday, it was a nice surprise for her and I realised that I could have / should have called home on other birthday, but I just dont like the phone and also with the time difference it is very hard to arrange, not to mention the cost.

I am dreading what will have happened to my garden by the time that I return, and I feel in mixed sorts as a part of me loves to travel and meet new people, but I am really getting bored of bad hostels, restaurants serving things that I dont recognise or like and bedrooms that are either too hot or too cold and having to hide under thin sheets to hide from mosquito's or other flying insects.

In my house I have a quiet fan for the heat and a radiator plus blankets for the cold, but here it is almost always too hot and my bedroom fans here is so powerful that I think they stole if from a wind tunnel experiement and even with ear plugs I still have problems getting to sleep.

I won't be doing much Christmas shopping today, as the cost to send stuff back to the UK from here is astronomical, but I will be thinking of you all of course.

Please ensure that you get the most of carol singers, snow, christmas turkeys, crackers, chocolates and movies, I'd like to share them all with you so please keep me posted and send me photos as often as you can.
This trip has been one I will never forget and the people I am meeting are great and I have met a few that I would like to see more of, a lot more of, but equally I have arrived in some cities and been totally unimpressed from arrival to leaving, so its upps are even higher because of the downs.

Colombia does have a lot of history, but it does not seem to advertise its pre-columbian roots very much, so I will be looking forward to central America and Mexico, when I should be able to visit not only Chichen Itza but other stuff from the Aztecs, Mayans and Tultec cultures, which means lots more photos from me too.

I seemed to have travelled through the home sickness stage now, as I no longer suffer the nervousness, the emotional episodes or the mild panic attacks of being alone and equally now when I get lost through being all turned around or find myself in a place that I do not recognise I just see it as a waste of time and an inconvenience rather instead of a problem that needs to be overcome.

Likewise I think that I have got used to the food and the water, as I have not had a bad case of food poisoning or anything since leaving Cusco, although being fair I have lost a bit of weight since I first left the UK but this is through just not finding enough stuff to my palate, as even when I do eat I don't eat til I am full but just enough to starve off the feeling of hunger and then carry on with the day.

Without chocolate spread, strawberry jam, cornflakes or a proper fried breakfast in any of the places that I visit, I tend to find that I am skipping breakfasts more and more these days, but then I just dont like eating large rolls or giant mutated bananas first thing in the morning.

Staying in hostels means that often I am meant to be bringing my own food but as it is heavy to carry and cumbersome ( not to mention that your not allowed to fly with foods or drinks ) so this is another reason for this.

I still have not used most of the setting on my camera, although I have used it a few times as a digital camera but only really for wide panoramic shots when one photo just cannot capture it all no matter from what angle or viewpoint I chose.

I do seem to be spending a bit of time watching tv now, but part of that is to hear someone, anyone, speaking fluent english, and the rest is that I do not really know what to do with my time after 8pm when the rain starts to pour down and I am trying not to spend my money like it is water.

I guess that I could grab a taxi each night and ask me to visit either a billiard hall, a cinema, a bar or a night club but any of those would still involve spending money and I have tried many times to take photos at night and my camera is just not up to it, apart from it being more unsafe and much harder to navigate around a place, especially as I rarely have a decent map to guide me around.

Well I have to go now, I need to pack and try to find out how to get to Cartagena while the morning is still here that way I can reach my hostel while it is still light as the bus journey is meant to be abour six hours long and I still don't know where it leaves from or when just now.

Love and hugs