Our Pacific Coast Bubble

Why hello there! We're back! And we've had the most astounding adventure...


For a start, actually deciding to go to the Pacific coast in Colombia was us making a decision to walk firmly into situations of discovery that had not been advised or recounted by anyone we had met so far on our travels. The most recent writing we could find was in our Lonely Planet and the most recent personal experiences came from the owner of the hostel in Medellin, both of which were three years old. As you no doubt know, Colombia is a country that has changed immeasurably in the last few years. Three years ago there was still talk of guerillas and rebel fighters being a daily threat on the Pacific Coast, a region of Colombia called El Choco. The previous president of Colombia invested a lot in the army and succeeded in easing much of the problems (although by no means all!) that the people of Colombia faced due to the guerllias, and after La Violencia came to El Choco in the early 2000's a huge military base was built there. So we knew that whatever the current situation was, we would be safe. We also asked a few Colombians if it was safe to go there and they said it was. So our decision was made. We knew that the only way to get there was to fly over the thick jungle and mountainous region as there was no road at all. In fact the only road in the entire region was from Bahia Solano (where the plane landed) to El Valle (which was where we wanted to get to), a stretch of 14 kms. We had no idea how we could get to El Valle, what we would find when we did, how we could get by with our rudimentary Spanish, how we would see whales and turtles and even if we had enough money!

For about an hour when we got to the airport, and after dealing with a pen knife freak out at the tiny security machine (all in Spanish), we were the only non Colombian people there. Then we spotted a small group of gringo looking people all crowded round a computer, laughing and looking at amazing wildlife photos. It turned out that these were a bunch of journalists from Vienna and Germany with their Colombian guide and photographer. They had been sent out to explore the Pacific Coast and write about what there was to attract tourists to it. Our plane was delayed for about four hours due to it being broken (!) and that it was waiting on parts to fix it coming from Bogota! We also got chatting to another interesting chap whom we named 'The Count' on account of his bushy eyebrows and slow and deliberate speech. He was a Colombian gent that had lived in the US for many years and was now being employed by the Colombian Tourist Board to investigate and bolster eco tourism on the Pacific Coast as he had had huge success doing the same in Chile. The Count was a character, he had many stories to tell and information to give us. Ultimately he told us the entire social and political history of South America (in brief)! Four hours later we took off! As you can imagine going through cloud in a small aircraft was a bit juddery. I was OK and the amazing views of Medellin as we took off helped but during the short flight the plane did fall quite a bit and Samly's hand got squeezed almost to a pulp!

Our first glimpses of Bahia Solano were of the brocolli shaped immensity that swelled and dipped before breaking onto thin slips of beaches as the land met the sea. We flew out to sea and turned round as the plane lowered and eventually landed. Lots of military men met us with their machine guns and thanks to The Count, we were kept informed of what was happening. Turns out it was really easy to get transport straight to El Valle, with no need to stay in Bahio Solano, travelling by jungle bus! Off we trundelled down the bumpy mud and puddle filled road for about fifteen minutes until we hit the immaculately paved road (the only one in the entire region!) through the jungle into the pueblo of El Valle and which dead ended at the beach.

The pueblo of El Valle is mostly populated by the descendants of African slaves along with a small contingent of indigenous Indians. Due to the region being virtually cut off from the rest of Colombia a lot of their cultures have been preserved but the infrastucture is poor and poverty is widespread. We found El Valle to be a very friendly place. When someone passed you on the beach they would always stop and speak, and everyone smiled. Despite the small information we were given about the military outnumbering tourists three to one, the only military we saw were at the airport and as we passed the base on the road from Bahio Solano to El Valle. During our entire stay, we felt safe and relaxed.

We travelled along El Almejal beach until we got to Playa Allegre and El Almejal resorts which both stood on the beach. I managed to bargain and barter with two lovely gents in both places all in Spanish and although El Almejal was expensive we thought we had a good deal and were both blown away with how beautiful and well looked after the place was. We had also read how tasty the food was there. So El Almejal it was and we settled into our cabin, hanging up the mossie net over the bed and most importantly the hammock! Now for a venture around...

We walked out on to the beach and looked around us. It was hard to take in what we were seeing. In the fading light from the sun we could see dense and lucid jungle falling onto brown sand that was punctured by crab holes, driftwood and undulating volcanic rock tickled by pools of water, the surfaces of which were turned grey blue as they reflected the sky at sunset. The beach gave way to endless blue green sea and rolling waves that turned the colours of brown grey, blue green, grey blue and orange grey at various times throughout the days in which we stayed there. Many times we stared mesmerised out at the horizon, feeling as if time was at once stretched and infinite. Over the six days we stayed on El Almejal beach we did in fact loose our way with time. We lost track of what day it was and when sheepishly we had to retrace our steps to come to determine the day, we felt foolish, only to find that The Count had packed his bags, being similarly muddled, thinking it was a day later than it was! El Almejal is indeed a special place. It was difficult to reach but when we did and passed days as the only two or so on its vast stretch, watching the days begin and end, we found it even more difficult to leave.

We spent days ambling along the beach trying to take in the jungle as it spilled onto the sand and the sun as it reflected in the water and shone through the myriad different clouds and sky colours. Nature was everywhere, and we were deep in it. The ground and sky were both alive and moving, our eyes and ears were continuously drawn to flickers, warbles, pips and trills. The beach was littered with crab holes and little balls of crab poo (or the sand that the crabs had passed through their bodies). They were everywhere! I liked the hermit crabs the best. They seemed to sense our eyes on them and pop! they would spring into their shells which would then fall to the sand and lie there motionless until we had passed. Then they would burst into life again and trundle on their way. They came in all sorts of shapes and sizes. The smaller ones were the more braver of the hermits, they would keep walking longer, I liked them. The other crabs were the sideways sort. They ranged in colour from bright red to brown. They would teeter on the edge of their small but deep black holes as we approached and when they decided that we had come too close, they would nip as fast as lightning down the holes and vanish completely. Seeing great hordes of bright red crabs scuttling across the sand was a sight!

The crabs would scuttle in between the mass of driftwood on the beach. Large pieces of driftwood were scattered all along the stretch of the beach, left by the retreating sea, and they looked like the bleached and dried bones of colossal sea creatures. Both the beach and the sky were homes to the most extraordinary birds of shapes and sizes, and they were so exceptionally colourful. Their peeks and twardles filled the air from the sun's first peak over the horizon until it slipped beneath again and darkness fell. There were so many different tweeps and trills but my favourite was the bird that sounded like a human whistling four notes and whom always had a replying bird friend in the distance, the same four note whistle, relaying over and over, lulling me as I swung in the hammock. As we watched the birds dip and peak in the sky we also saw the most unbelievable and ever changing billows and wisps of clouds, types of which I have barely seen before. They lent character to the sky and often aided it to talk through the giant claps of belly rumbling thunder we heard everyday. They say that El Choco is one of the wettest places on earth. I would concur. We witnessed the most amazing storms there, thunder, lightning, sheet rain, the works! The drama of this place was probably the main thing that held our attention in the moment as each passed and made us forget our overall sense of time.

El Almejal was a lovely eco resort which looked after and conserved the turtles that would return to the same beach to nest and lay their eggs that they were born on almost twenty five years ago. They had a tortugario in which they buried the turtles eggs to protect them and ensure that they would hatch, and when they did they would place them onto the beach and watch as they waddled into the ocean as if they were born with the knowledge that that was what they needed to do. They looked after orchids, a stream that fed into the sea, which they harnessed into a natural swimming hole and as a result many dazzling butterflies and insects of all sizes came here and amazed us with their strangeness (and at the beginning completely freaked Samly out!).

A paragraph alone needs to be given over to the sheer taste sensation that we experienced at El Almejal. The cook there fed us like kings and every meal was an exciting event, anticipated from the moment we awoke. I ate vegetables in a way that I had never encountered before such as caramelised aubergine and the jugos (juices) were delectable! Made from a variety of local fruits and tasty beyond reason! Samly had many different types of fish, fried, steamed, made into soups and the plantain she cooked was unbelievable. I don't think I've eaten such tasty food for such a long time.


One of the main things we wanted to do on our adventure was to see whales. Cesar (the main guy) and the three biologisto/a s came with us on boat trips from the coast in search of the soplass (blow hole breaths) of whales. Three days it took us to find one in our boat as it was coming to the end of the season and the whales were migrating back to the Antarctic mostly with their calves and were timid if we even saw one. We were very third time lucky and we saw one early in the morning on our third attempt. This whale liked holding his breath so we followed him for about half an hour and saw him about four times. He was curious of us and came very close to our little speed boat, so curious that he actually performed a cola y selta (a tail jump) right next to us. We were stunned into a wordless stupor at the enormity of this creature and our proximity to him. Samly was Mister Whale Man as on our first day he spotted a few whales playing in the sea really near our beach. His canny and rushed purchase of binoculars just before we left Blighty was a gold rush! You could actually see them with your eyes also. We saw them jump completely out of the water and slap their flippers onto the top of the sea. One of the biologists also had a really powerful telescope so we got to see a lot.

During our unsuccessful whale missions we got to explore different areas along the coast. On our first day we walked barefooted through the jungle and up a lovely several level waterfall called Tio Tigre. High up we came to a large swimming hole and spent an hour exploring the little cavernous waterfalls and sliding down into the large pool to swim and laze around in the cool jungle.

The second day we visited Ensanda de Utria, a National Park in a bay in which the whales come to calve their young. Samly went snorkelling and saw bursts of colourful fish darting here and there.

On our way to the boat early on the third day we spotted a nesting turtle! We had gone walking in the night to try and find them lumbering up the beach to put down their eggs but had no success. This turtle was a large one, silver grey in colour and we had to kick our brains into realising that this was a real turtle and not an animatronic model! The biologists removed the eggs to re-nest them in the tortugario and we watched as she started to waddle and carve her way down the beach back into the sea, just as she had done about twenty five years ago as a little tortugarillio. The biologists explained (and from what we could understand in Spanish) was that there is something magnetic in their brains which makes them return to the same beach along with other studies into the moon's alignment and the season etc.

Swimming in the warm waters of the Pacific, alone together on an enormous stretch of beach with the jungle before us left our senses fizzing and our minds overwhelmed. Now we are back in the city, it almost feels like a dream that we were even there. But we know that we were, and just how lucky we were to be so.

So I come to the end of another entry and we have the taste of sea salt in our mouths so tomorrow we are taking the night bus to Cartagena on the caribbean coast and we will explore west and east from there. It's October now! We have been away for two weeks, I know I say this every time so far but two weeks?? It feels more like two months. I hope my words find you all well and happy and feeling a sunshiny autumnal breeze in the air. We're off to sticky days and cool Caribbean breezes in the evenings.

Sending you all my love as ever,

See you here again soon, it'd be lovely to read your comments and messages,

Clarence y Samly xxx

Lovely Salento and the beginnings of our journey to the Pacific Coast

We find ourselves back in another city called Medellin as I write, after a beautiful stay in Salento. The day after I last wrote we moved down onto the farm, La Finca Don Eduardo, to stay in the amazing high up bamboo hut called The Penthouse. Far from the velvety luxuriousness that the name 'penthouse' conjures, the actual hut and farm were very basic. What was penthousey about the place were the views! Right outside our open windows were the sweeping luscious slopes of the Valle de Cocora, the multitude of stars at night and the blue skies in the mornings. High up on the ridge line opposite the farm were the remnants of Pablo Escobar's estate, complete with the empty cages in which he used to keep white tigers and eagles, and his look out tower!

Our first sight of The Penthouse came when we took a coffee tour down to the farm with the owner Tim. He was a funny character full of stories, the kind of storyteller whom you could listen to for hours, and we did! I actually found that which we learned, about how they grew, picked, processed and roasted coffee, a lot more interesting than I thought I would. Other countries process the green beans differently but it turns out that the way they do it in Colombia is a bit of an art form and extremely labour intensive. Unfortunately for us though (yes even for a non coffee drinker like me) Colombia exports 90% of their good coffee but as it happens even the second rate stuff is actually really tasty. A LOT more tasty than nescafe et al. I found myself drinking a couple of cups a day from the freshly roasted and ground beans when we were staying on the farm, and not actually going too mental. There are two types of coffee beans Robusto and Arabica beans. These beans were Arabica and they have more taste and less caffeine, so I was only climbing the walls and humming to myself for the first couple of days! The farm workers showed up at about 7:30am every morning and set to work planting new coffee plants or machete-ing down weeds etc. (Everyone - even some people in cities, seem to carry machetes...) They were really friendly and constantly kept offering us fresh coffee. Talking to them also afforded us a chance to practice our Spanish, which at best is of pigeon in nature, still, we're trying! There wasn't enough coffee for us to buy some beans from the farm directly but we were told that a guy named Jesus up in town sells coffee that has some beans in from the farm. So were tottered up there and bought a bag. It smells amazing! Samly has the bag in his rucksack and so his clothes will smell wonderful for the rest of Colombia until we fly to Buenas Aires and the bag will vacuum pack itself. Nice!

Our first and second day in Salento were spent wandering the friendly little streets and sitting in the plaza watching the goings on. Men washing horses, women cooking up yucca bread outside on old oil drum BBQs, kids chasing each other (all the little girls had roller blades on strangely!) and of course the hundreds of different perros wandering around. The dogs we have encountered are so humanlike. They wander around, communicate with each other, join you as you walk for a bit and seem to understand you when you talk to them! I love them! We also made it up a LOT of steps to the top of the hill at the end of town. From there we could see all over Salento and then behind us stretched out the undulating high hills of the Valle de Cocora. There were a couple of sets of swings up there, the most beautifully located swings I have ever experienced! So we sat on them for quite some time. We found a really tasty place to eat called Esquinia Lucy in town. I imagine it was like eating Colombian home cooking. We had the corrientes, which is a set meal of a soup and then a plate full of tasty food including plantain, different types of beans, tasty scrambled egg, different types of breads, rice and lentils. Samly had the trout as well which a local dish and he really liked it. Eating at Lucy's was even cheaper than cooking for ourselves! Yumble.

On our third day in Salento and second day on the farm we went on a trek through the Valle de Cocora. The first half we trekked for four hours through lush green hills spotted with the tall, lonely wax palm soldiers and cloud forest until we made it up to a little nature reserve called Acaime and an old ladies house. She was a funny old lady, smoking cigarettes and loudly barking at you to ask what you wanted to drink. Samly had a coffee and I had a bowl of delicious hot chocolate with a lump of salty cheese in it. Disgusting as it sounds it was actually quite tasty. It was a variation on the traditional drink called aguapenela which is a hot drink made from sugar cane and water into which you place a similar lump of cheese and wait for it to melt before eating/drinking it. Samly was not into it but I thought it was quite interesting. I'd definitely try it again. There were also lots of little humming birds zooming everywhere in flashes of bright colours and trying to take photos of these little guys was almost impossible! After this rest we climbed a lot higher up the path called La Montana and when we reached the top there was an old man standing there waiting for us to sign his book. He had a little house there, made of colourfully painted wood which had fantastic music blaring from it on what sounded like an old gramophone. All the music we're hearing in Colombia so far, from out of people's houses and on buses is really good. For two hours on the way down the valley we saw fantastic views, beautiful to our eyes but the low flying cloud made taking good photos quite difficult. But then I suppose it's almost impossible to capture even half of the beauty of a buena vista in a camera anyways. When we had made it down to the bottom of the valley we had to wait about an hour until there were enough people to fill a jeep. Then I stood up on the little platform at the back and clung to the bar for a slow motion rollercoaster ride all the way back to Salento. The views were amazing!

That evening when we returned to the farm we found that we had a neighbour. He was a British chap who suggested that we should go into town and play the traditional game called Tejo. Now I had read about this game and it sound right up my street. You stand at the end of an alley holding a large metal puck like object. Then you aim to throw the metal puck at an small area of clay in the ground in which a small metal ring was embedded. On top of this metal ring are placed four small parcels of gun powder. Your aim should be to hit the parcels of gun powder and make them explode! Fantastic hey? YES! When the guy was explaining how to play it he exploded a gun powder parcel right by our feet and all four of us nearly wet ourselves it was that loud! We played this game for about an hour, steadily getting more accurate despite drinking more beer. I managed to explode three parcels, and as I thought I would, I ended up thinking that this was definitely my sort of game. Very satisfying to hit a target and for said target to EXPLODE! Brilliant.

We left the beautiful farm and the town of Salento the next morning to head to the city of Medellin. We came here via Armenia making sure that we had seen all three of the towns (although they were quite large towns) in the 'coffee triangle', Manizales, Periera and Armenia. From what we've seen of Medellin so far it's quite a lovely city, although I am hankering after getting back to the countryside. We spent yesterday organising our flight and trip to the Pacific coast. We will be taking a light aircraft (VERY excited about this as neither of us have been on one before) over the jungle into El Choco and landing in Bahia Solano. Then we will be trying to get a lift to El Valle to stay on the beach. There is only one road in El Choco (the entire region) so this is going to be quite an experience. Apparently only twenty people travel there and back a day (the only safe way to get to Bahia Solano from Medellin or vice versa is by plane) and there are hardly any tourists there. In fact we haven't met anyone who has been so far, I expect because of the expense and the fact that most people we have met are travelling by themselves and quite fast through the country. We will be quite safe as there is a huge military base and soldiers and police everywhere apparently. This will be a definite test of our Spanish and our hand signals!

We have been in Colombia for a little over a week now and the haze of confusion that has been following us around due to money calculations, language comprehension and the processes of things, is starting to lift. We are beginning to reflect on our experiences in the country. So far Colombia is a lot more developed and Americanised that I expected. Granted we have mostly seen large cities, but the roads are really good even high up in the Andes, the bus company workers all have uniforms (something I didn't experience in Peru and Ecuador) and the buses themselves are REALLY comfy. They play films and music which makes me think of old couples dancing in their living rooms to their gramophones. It's not as cheap as we though it would be and we will be eating in quite a lot especially after our little expense to the Pacific Coast, but Samly is such an amazing cook - it's like travelling with a Michellen starred chef! Plus the fruit and veg all taste amazing here. We have been trying lots of odd looking fruit and cooking with really fresh veg. Pineapples are so tasty sometimes I don't think my mouth can take it! We have only had a few clear nights in the last week but because Salento is in the country we could see so many stars! I haven't been able to find the Southern Cross yet but I will hopefully one day soon. We went to sleep looking at the stars out of our open windows on the farm. It also rains each day. It only rains for a short time but it absolutely pours. Here in Medellin that is good because it's quite hot here so the rain freshens everywhere up quite a bit. There are condors everywhere, swooping and looping and whirling around. Samly got quite obsessed with them, trying to take literally hundreds of photos in which they all ended up looking like dots! They are quite mesmerising to watch though, especially over the Valle de Cocora. We have met a lot of lovely people, nearly all of them are travelling by themselves. We've been hearing stories about the places we will be going and getting tips on everything. It's nearly been ten years since I was last in Peru and Ecuador and hearing about how those places have changed is a bit strange as they've been cemented in my memory for so long. Faye, Jude and Phil, you will not be happy to hear that Cusco has been so gringofied that there is even a MacDonalds there now! Yuck. Also apparently Quito is a really unsafe city now, but from what I can remember I felt really safe there... Oh the ebbs and flows.


Right I better hop off now as I have prattled on for a LONG time. Today we are going to go and ride the metro cable (a metro car that turns into a cable car) which makes its way down through the mountains that flank the city and on which the favelas are built up each side. We also might visit some botanical gardens. Then we will have to start packing for our Pacific Coast trip! Next time we speak I will hopefully be able to tell you about all the whales and turtles we have seen and how flipping mental flying in a tiny plane was!

Love to you all as ever and keep well,
See you here next week!
clara y samuel xxx


PS) a few peeps have said that they are finding commenting on the blog a bit difficult. If you go to the bottom of this post and click on comments that will take you to a dialogue box in which you can write a comment, which we would LOVE you to do! Hope to hear from you soon xxx

Bogota arrival and a venture west

I'm writing to you from high on top of a valley in the Andean mountains, a place called Salento. It is so beautiful here! Salento is about 10 hours south west of Bogota in the Zona Cafera (coffee zone). We arrived a few hours ago and have done our first scout around and we are loving what we see! I'm thinking we will stay here for quite a while. There are mountain peaks cuddled by clouds and tropical flowers and plants everywhere, including banana plants and Colombia's national plant the wax palm (which can grow up to 60 metres tall and for 120 years!). The window of our little cabin overlooks the valley (valle de Cocora) and we will go trekking and horse riding in the next few days. We hear horses and dogs constantly trotting past and the cheeps of the birds and the hums of the crickets, just paradise. It's not too hot though, about 24 degrees and the air is fine and fresh filling our lungs. We are staying in the oldest lodgings in the town and they are beautiful. This place is called Plantation House and they also have a farm nearby. It is a working coffee farm and we can stay on it too. They have basic lodges and an open air traditional Colombian oven over there. The traditional Colombian ovens are built of brick, a fire is lit on the top and metal slates placed over it. This oven can be used in many different ways we are told; as a BBQ (without the metal slates), as a hob (cooking directly on the metal slates), as a heating system for your house and in some other ways we are yet to learn. There is a wooden lodge called 'The Penthouse' at the farm and the double doors of it open onto the valley, gasp! A lady has been there for a week and a half and we are now next in line so fingers crossed we'll get our time, and for £10 a night for both of us it'll be a time of paradise!

I'm glad we've made it here. Bogota we found large, colourful, cold and hectic. We then travelled to a large town called Manizales, nine hours west of Bogota and which is on the edge of a national park of volcanoes called Los Nevados. We found both places quite a lot more expensive than we were expecting but here in Salento we have found beauty tranquilo and the prices we were expecting. So we are starting to relax and breathe more easily. We are also finding our feet with the language and the money rates, which whenever you arrive in a country always hurts your head! Plus I have suffered a little from altitude sickness, dehydration and the malaria tablets are giving me indigestion but I'm starting to sort all that out. The jetlag however is giving us some amusing experiences, of which we are still encountering. Once it gets to 7pm here (1am your time) we start feeling quite floaty and these feelings add greatly to the dreamlike state we are finding ourselves in everyday so far, and it's only day three! Already we feel like we've been away for a lifetime! I can't imagine how we will feel after seven months!

We have found all the people we have met really friendly and helpful. We've seen some amazing smiles! There are the usual hoards of beautiful dogs (from what I remember in Peru and Ecuador) and I am getting seriously dog broody (if that is an actual state). I've got to be careful not to try and stash a few in my bag as I leave! It also seems pretty straight forward to get involved with things wherever I can. In Bogota the place we stayed in were moving boxes containing a library, toys, computers and tables and chairs out to ship them to a school on the Pacific Coast. Here at Plantation House there are opportunities to help in the local schools and work on the coffee farm everyday so they are possible opportunities.


We are so near the equator here that the sun rises at 6am and sets at 6pm so we have half an hour of daylight time left as I'm writing. So we better go and find a place to eat our dinner and try and stay awake longer than 9pm (3am your time). I think it maybe time for some cervesas to see us through!

I'll post some photos on here later and we'll also have time to put the ones we've taken already on our flickr account and of which I'll send the link to you all when it's done.

Sending you all our love as ever,

Until next time hasta leugo! xxx