Leaving Manizales

I had half planned to visit the nearby coffee plantation early in the morning and then get back in time to check out and get to the airport, but by the time that I was properly up and awake I was too late for the three hour round trip and visit.

Instead I made got up, dressed and went down to the breakfast table where I made my first solo properly cooked breakfast, which was scrambled eggs and toast, although I put in too much milk and had to take a third egg instead of the two that we were allowed.

Over breakfast I marvelled at the genuis of having a large breakfast table in a hostel as it encouraged people to sit together and talk, and it was here than I got chatting to a very interesting girl from eastern europe whose parents moved to Germany when she was young and through travel and education could speak several languages.

She had been travelling and trying to do volunteer work, much as I had planned to do at the very start of my trip, and as soon as the rain and the flooding of the area had occured she had placed a call to the local red cross agent offering her help, to which the guy said that he would visit the hostel to talk to her around 9am. As I had also told myself that I would try to help when I could, I decided to wait around and see what jobs could be done either here or in Bogota as that was my next stop, however it would appear that the locals did not require any foreign help as the guy from the red cross again called the hostel around 10am to say that the situation was all now under control but if anything did crop up he would contat again in a day or two.

It was a little bit dissapointed not to be able to help, as not only would it be a great experience and something that I had said that I wanted to do before I started but had not yet had a chance to do. After this bit of news we sat around and chatted for a few hours ti lit was time for my flight, along with the hostel owner and by the time that I left I was passing my card out and hugs all round, so much more like saying farewell to friends than simply goodbye to a place where I was staying, and this I believe is the biggest bonus of staying in a hostel.

On the way to the airport I thought hard about possibly running a hostel as a buisness and where would the best place be, and yet when I got to the airport all I wanted to do was scream and find someone that spoke English.

Manizales airport was tiny ( being only suitable for national flights ), with only about 5 check in desks, one x-ray machine and one mixed arrival and departure gate. As it was only one gate it was easy to find but it didnt have any screen projects saying when things were arrving or departing and so I had to listen and then just walk over to the departure gate, only to find that my flight was delayed.

An hour later and the same thing happened, and eventualy my flight that should have left at 12:25 in the end left 2 hours late and I had gone from optomistic to frustrated to downright aggresive and if they had delayed my flight again I would have gone up and attempted to demand my money back, plus my luggage, and I have no idea how I would have managed that in the little Spanish that I know.

Arriving in Bogota was fine, except that it was a holiday Monday, and even though Bogota is the capital city, in South America on a holiday you will find only about 10% of the bars, restaurants, clubs, etc open, and thus my night was going to be long and fairly uneventful. The taxi rank at the airport had its own desk where you would get a fixed price in advance and a full direction to give the taxi driver, so there is no chance of being stiffed and little chance to get lost until you arrive at your destination.

Earlier in the week I had decided to change my lodgings to a hotel, as I wanted to be able to invite friends back after a day aorund the city, especially as it is raining a lot and cold at nights, and I had become increasingly frustrated by smal hostels refusing to allow friends of guests inside or into the rooms for security reasons.

I managed to check in, read through the whole sheet of warning and city dangers that did nothing to reassure me and as soon as I got to my room I checked to see if I could get a wifi signal in my room, and as I could not I quickly contacted the reception and asked to be moved to one that did, even though the final one was a fraction smaller and closer to the renovatoin works that were going on, as thus why the price was affordable.

A few hours later I met up with my friend N' and before she even came into my room she said that my hotel was in a very dangerous part of the city, being the central downtown which was an area full of drugs addicts, prostitutes and thieves. In fact, she told me, she had had her cellphone stolen there only last week and her mother had her purse pick pocketted the week before, all of which did nothing to put me at ease in a city that I had not been in for almost a year, and never to this part of.

After the hotel warnings, this further unsettled me, so together we went got a taxi and went to grab a bite to eat and see some of the city, although as I said, being a holiday Monday, all we could really do is see the outsides of places and not actually get in anywhere. Together we went around a shopping mall, saw the many Christmas decorations and took a few photos.

In an effort to find a more suitable hotel in a safer area we asked the taxi driver to take us to a cheap alternative nearby, but at over 600,000 pesos for one nights stay, I calculated that even if I was robbed of everything I would still lose less than the cost of staying in this hotel for 4 nights, and without even a tour I decided that I would prefer to take my chances where I was currently checked into, and just be extra cautious to not go out alone late at night with anything of value.

N' had to be up early the next day for her studies and work so I said goodbye and hoped that we could meet up again before I left at the end of the weekend.