Summer break 2015 – my plan had been to go on a surf trip with my best friend at the time. Three weeks to drive from one spot to the next, enjoy the sunshine and life was what I wanted for this, my last break from school. When she cancelled last minute, I was not just upset about the miscommunication but also had no plans all summer and all my friends where already booked and booted for their trips, none of which I was gonna be joining.
When I was on a Skype talking to my sister, who was spending a gap year in Ecuador doing some volunteer work. In a couple of weeks, she would go to Columbia to travel with some friends, and we started talking about me maybe going over to join her. – Columbia would be lush and I ain’t got nothing to do anyways- and about two weeks after I was on the plain to Venezuela changing there to Columbia. I arrived on the 9th of July and had to find my way from Bogota Airport to the Tatacoa dessert without any knowledge of the language and culture. My sister had written down what I would have to tell the bus and taxi drivers and I was just going to wing it and trust the process, after 21 hours of plane travel I tackled the 300 km with busses and “Carros” (basic collective taxis) right away and made it to a little hostel within the stunning landscape. Since my sister had been there for two days already, we only got in a quick hike and some chill hammock time before we headed back to Bogota caching a plane to Cartagena on the next day.
There we started a week around the Caribbean coast, my highlights were firstly “Isla Baru”, a peninsular only reachable by Mototaxi swiftly going through a national park. We stayed tree days in a tiny beach front hostel where the garden was the ocean itself and wildlife swamped into the open bottom level of the little wooden house which was the campsite. Second highlight was a dive in Tayrona National Park. Where I got to experience my first dive and we saw many colourful fish and an unique underwater world.
On the 18th of Juli my sister and I embarked on the bus trip to Cali, arriving there on the evening the next day. We struggled a bit to find a place to stay since most hostels were booked out but after talking to some friendly people wo got directed to a small family run hostel which we loved so much that we ended up staying 5 nights. In the capital of Salsa Latina, we had no chance but to engage and, surprisingly I loved it, even having no experience it was great fun. We enjoyed our days in the city drinking loads of cerveca and catching up with some friends from Germany.
The third highlight for me was the drive to the small jungle town Sansibriano. The residents came up with a construction to use the cargo railway for their transportation to the closest town. A motorbike is equipped with a wooden platform to seat up to 6 people and without a single bother they ride the wobbly, squeaky vehicle. When the horn of the cargo train, which frequents quite often sounds in the distance, everyone has to get off, pick the bike and platform from off the rails and make way for it to pass.
For German standards this was a very poor town and we set up camp in the unfinished building they were trying to call a hostel for a few Euros. One local took us on a hike through the jungle to a waterfall with stunning Nature and almost unbearable heat and humidity.
In contrast to Sansibriano our next stop was the touristic hub in Salento. Here are many artisan jewellery makers and backpackers, it is full of hostels, cafes and activities. We got to know amazing people from all over the world and learned the traditional columbine game, everyone plays in the evening like bowling in our culture.
