Category: Colombia

This morning for breakfast, Freddie made some arepas, which are some sort of pancakes made solely of corn flour and water and are very traditional here. You can eat them pretty much like bread or pancakes: just spread some stuff over them (like marmalade or fresh cheese).

After breakfast, Christina showed us our task for today: build a better door for the third hen enclosure. The actual door is essentially a net hooked on a nail, and you have to unhook it every time you need to enter the enclosure. It’s not very practical nor hen-proof, as some hens regularly manage to escape the enclosure.

Our tools are quite old, and are mainly a metal saw and an electric screwdriver (with a short-circuit in the cord, so it doesn’t work in every position…). The building materials are some bamboos (which were lying around), a bit of rope and wire.

Our plan is simple: we attach two bamboos vertically to create a doorframe, then we build a frame out of bamboos and fill it with the chicken net to create a hen-proof door. The door will be attached to one of the vertical bamboos with wires, which should create some sort of hinges.

During the morning we only managed to cut and attach the bamboos for the doorframe. It has proven to be quite harder than we expected. The enclosure isn’t built in a very stable manner: nothing is really attached, and when it is, it’s by a bit of rope or wire. But that didn’t stop us and at noon, our doorframe was quite solidly (or as much as possible) attached to the construction.

This afternoon, we learned that it is quite hard to assemble a simple frame out of bamboos, especially when, like for us, the bamboos are small and not very regular. After a few tries, we did manage to attach them together by piercing a hole into their extremities and using some wire to link them together.

Work was delayed by the always curious tiny chicks that kept hanging around us with no regard for danger (our big hiking shoes can actually become a big danger to an animal as tiny as a chick if we step on them!). Even when we carried them to the other side of the farm, they managed to come back and annoy us very quickly (but they are so cute 😊).

Altogether, we’re quite proud of our door (and Christina and Daniel seem happy with our work). It works, it’s handy, it’s stable and it’s hen-proof (at least for now 😉).

Tonight, we went to a small feast in the village (well, it was supposed to be the birthday of a local girl, but most of the people from the neighboring farms were there). At first it was very chill, as most of the people just wanted a cool beer to relax after a day’s work in the sun. But after a while, more and more people went on the dancefloor (Saturday night fever!).

Here, dancing is a very important part of life. Everybody dances with everybody else, and even the smallest child knows how to dance. They sure got the rhythm (and the rhythms here are much complicated than our slow European rhythms!). At first, we were a bit too intimidated by their dancing level to participate, but after some encouragements (and a couple beers), we managed to dance too. We certainly didn’t impress them with our moves on the dancefloor, but we felt right at home in this small community.

That’s all for today, more news in the next article!

This morning, awakened by the song of the geese (not very elegant, although very efficient), we fell back asleep. Daniel and Christina had something to do in a nearby village and only left us the task of feeding the chickens at 7:30.

I see you laughing, but there are 3 different sorts and they tend to change enclosures, and we must prevent them. It’s funny. For more detail, they are hens for eggs with a total of 36 eggs every day, white hens for meat who live with a rooster that can absolutely not mount the egg-hens because fetuses are not cool in an omelet, and a few multicolor hens and chickens in a third enclosure. There are also 7 young chickens still yellow and 6 chicks that arrived today, 2 ducks and 2 geese in the courtyard, the formers for ducklings and the latter for company (and song).

We then went to feed the hens at 7:30 and met Freedie, a friend who helps at the farm when there is a lot of work. He told us that Daniel gave him a task for the morning with which we should help: picking up dejections! There are 4 horses (more will be said later) at the farm, and their poo is a wonderful fertilizer. There are large amounts of it here and there from the entrance of the farm to the sill of the house, in heaps in the grass. What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger! A shovel, another tool (I don’t know the name and don’t have internet access), wellies and empty big bags for 50kgs of rice: these were our tools in the horseshit-quest! Ben estimates that we picked up around 80kg in around 3 hours, that were matched by Freddie in the same time, on his own…

 

When Daniel got back (on horseback) we started cooking, and Christina joined us for a lovely meal and a long chat. In the middle of the afternoon arrived a new much nicer task: wash the horses. There is seldom enough time to brush and clean them around working time and they spend a lot of time outside on their own, so sometimes, they really do need a shower!

We started with the 6-months old baby girl, watched like a hawk by the mother. Followed a young mare who is still learning (we give her fallen-from-the-tree guavas when she recognizes her name, she loves it), then the baby’s mother (same age, still learning too, but can’t be mounted so long as she is milking). Finally, when Daniel got back with the last one, the last shower was for this lonely male, arrived at the farm 5 days ago from an almost-abandoned place, scorned by the mares and covered in ticks. It lasted until the night arrived and we were recompensed by a meal of gratin dauphinoise, rice and pork meat, and a desert of caramelized plantain!

The most amazing thing here is, we talk a lot with Daniel and Christina, we learn a lot about Spanish but also cooking, Colombian habits and traditions which we wouldn’t have learned in a hostel… It is also a relief to eat homemade food, even if meals are quite elaborate, they have this particular taste that restaurant-food doesn’t have. And besides, it is a drastic change in rhythm that we welcome, cooking with other people, looking at the countryside, reading in hammocks…

We still don’t exactly know how long we will stay in Tierra Dulce, but for now, we feel well here ! See you tomorrow, X

PS : there are also baby-pigs, scared of every sound, and very cute !

After breaking our fast in Guatapé (yes, I read a lot of Robin Hobb recently, hence the middle age vocabulary…), we took the bus to Alejandria. There are only 2 buses a day, so we didn’t want to miss this one ! We’re going to work (and rest) with Daniel and Christina at the Tierra Dulce farm near Alejandria.

We were told the bus journey should take about one and a half hour for under 30km, so we expected a chaotic road. So we weren’t surprised to discover a steep and muddy road full of holes slowly ascending the hills near the lake. The bus, even though it has very big wheels, still needed to slow down to a walking pace in some parts. It rocked a lot, but at least we’ll be ready when we’ll need to take a boat !

We arrived in Alejandria under a pouring rain that luckily didn’t last. After walking over 1 km we met Christina. She was heading into town to do some grocery shopping and meet us, but had been delayed because the road had collapsed (so she had to come on foot instead of taking the bus).

We went back to the town with her to help her shop. We also visited Alejandria a bit (which didn’t last long, it’s really small). It’s much less touristy than Guatapé (well, it’s also much harder to get to…), but there are still some tourists in the week-end who come to enjoy the countryside (we’re under 3 hours bus from Medellin, the second largest city in Colombia).

To get to the farm, we took the bus (the road had been repaired in between), which was a much better solution than walking the 5 km with 20kg of groceries (and our bags !). Daniel met us at the bus drop-off and we talked along the way to their farm (including 2 small metal bridges very slippery when wet !). They are very often toads on the way !

At their farm they cooked us a pretty neat almuerzo, with the best pork meat we’ve had since the beginning of the trip ! In the afternoon, we went to feed the hens and chickens, pet the horses and scare off the piglets. We also tried not to stomp on the chicks constantly walking beneath our feet !

We also played cards and discovered two new card games, one which requires memorization skills and the other quite like rami. The evening meal was patacones, a sort of pancakes made of fried platanos on which you can put tomatoes, onions and cheese. Like pancakes, it’s the lazy solution for when you don’t want to cook much, but it’s delicious ! We talked a lot with Daniel and Christina after dinner and hence improved our Spanish 😊

That’s all for the first day at Tierra Dulce. To be continued in the next post !

P.S : As expected, we don’t have any connection here, so all articles from our days at the farm will be posted as soon as we’re online again.

Turns out we didn’t go to a farm today.

In the end, it was more convenient for them if we arrived tomorrow in the middle of the day than tonight, so we had a nice break in this pretty town. We bought some items for when we are there, like a big water canteen and marmalade, because the closest town will be an hour walk from there, and they won’t provide us with everything. After all, this is not summer camp.

We took advantage of this to visit more Guatapé (understand : walk a bit between our hostel and the different places where we ate). This town is known for its colorfully painted house, and especially their cement bas-relief, also painted. More often than not, there is a theme in relation to the house : a worker with his tools on a workshop or music instruments on a house where piano lessons can be heard… Sometimes it is beautiful, sometimes corny, and some other times, disturbingly detailed…

We also used the time to get rid of a lot of stuff to do : housing tax, and above all accounting. We went back till august, cause it was a mess, and for the trip, we have this huge Excel file of the death to control our expenses by categories, date, country… It also allows us to check if we don’t just lose money, because colombian pesos are counted by the thousand (on the shops, the stores have a price in dollars, which are actually one thousand of pesos and don’t add up to a dollar at all). This means that lately, we are millionaires (but not at a given time, since ATM are limited to 600 000 pesos anyway) and so we can afford candlelit pizza night !

In the “funny things” category, we witness several nice examples of vehicles today : we already mentioned the mototaxis, sort of 3-wheeled tuk-tuk who have a roof and a bad time going uphill. During our dinner, we saw several of them with colored neon of blinking lights, and since they were delivering pizzas for their friends, we understood why Deliveroo was doomed to fail in rural Colombia. Finally, the local police was probably going to a party (we don’t have a picture, sorry), the two of them on a single scooter, leaning backwards, speeding downhill. With the kaki uniform and the neon green armbands, they were hardly plausible and looked more like a costume-party gone bad…

Tomorrow, we have a bus in the morning for Tierra Dulce, a small farm near Alejandria, where we will stay for a few days. We think we will have the internet there, but just in case, no one panics, we will spend half our time in coffee fields, and the other in hammocks ! XO

Howdy !

As you’ve no doubt guessed (if you read the headlines), we’re in Guatapé !

Today wasn’t as interesting as other days. We spent part of the morning in bed (to enjoy our great bed in Medellin until the end 😉 ). Then we went to grab a mini HDMI converter in an electronic shop (we often have a TV in our room, so now we can watch our shows on big screens !).

We left Medellin from the north terminal to go to Guatapé, about 2 hours to the south-west (now is when you notice the awesome map widget we have !). We thought it would be an easy ride (it’s often flat near lakes) but no, it was still quite windy near the end.

And we had to hurry out of the bus a bit before Guatapé, in front of a restaurant, because of stomach problems (we’ll keep our dignity and say no more…). So we ended up eating in said restaurant, which had a great view on a part of the lake and the Piedra, a big rock that you can climb to get a nice view on the surrounding area (we’ll keep the 740 stairs for when we feel more in shape !).

On the rock there’s a big G and half an U painted in white (Hollywood style). The two towns nearby, Guatapé and El Peñol, have always fought over which town should have the rock. One day a few guys from Guatapé thought painting “Guatapé” in huge white letters on the rock would make it theirs. But of course, as it’s not very discreet, so the guys from El Peñol stopped them at about the half of the U. We suppose nobody took the time to erase the first letter and a half since then.

After lunch we took a camioneta to Guatapé, were we chilled out a bit in our hostel. For now we’ve just seen the town quickly, but it seems nice and full of colors. It is very touristy on week-end, but very calm in the week (but that doesn’t stop the restaurants from actively seeking out clients !).

Speaking of restaurant, we ate at a very good vegetarian restaurant (to change a bit from the standard chicken and rice … although we still had rice), and the background music was french rap ! One of the guys from the restaurant is doing parkour, and listens to french rap to get in the mood (even though he probably doesn’t understands much of the lyrics).

That’s all for today. Tomorrow we’ll probably travel to a small farm near Alejandria to work there for a few days. We’re not sure we’ll get internet there (internet was already down this afternoon in quite a few towns, including Guatapé, because of yesterday’s storm). So the blog might not get updated for a few days (don’t worry, we’ll come back with a lot of new stories to tell you !).

Today was supposed to be quiet, but we ended up running anyway. It was fun.

Since most afternoon have bad weather, we reserved the whole morning for public transportation. Actually, Colombia is so mountainous that most big cities have cable car systems, and Medellin has three ! This way, when it’s sunny, tourists can have merry-go-rounds with panoramic views of the slopes, sometimes of forest (when it’s to steep), sometimes of new towers (when there’s some money), other times of half-slums (when there isn’t any).

After that, we went to the botanical gardens. We felt like going someplace nice, that would smell nice and wasn’t very touristic, it was free and shaded, there were 14 hectares, let us tell you, we didn’t see everything. The garden is beautiful, with real bits of jungle in it !

Finally, after some chicken (breaded and fried today, surprisingly good considering the campus-border-under-the-metro fast-food where we ate it), we saw the first drops of rain fall. We wanted to do some shopping close to the hostel, so we headed back (in metro). And then, the biggest thunderstorm breaks over the city center, with photoshoot lightning and really loud thunder. We were glad we were inside, but this time, the pouring lasted a while and we arrived at the hostel with soaked shoes. We waited a bit, went shopping (with our super sexy rain coats), boiled some pasta and are now wondering where we will go tomorrow !

Kisses everyone !

 

Today we finally got to see Medellin by day !

This morning, we went for a stroll in El Poblado, much calmer by day than by night ! The buildings here are not very memorable, by the neighborhood gives of a cool vibe, and it feels very European. Even by day, you can’t help but notice this is the place to be for parties, given the density of bars around here !

We also noticed a lot of greenery around El Poblado (but also in other parts of town). You can find a lot of old trees in most streets, which means they took care not to destroy them while building the city.

This afternoon, we took the subway (which is the only in Colombia, even though it’s aerial). It took us quickly and efficiently to the city center. The subway is large and very clean, which is a shocking change from the bumpy and filthy buses.

In the city center, aside from several statues of Botero in the main plaza, we didn’t see anything noteworthy. This part of the city doesn’t really feel like the real center, but rather a poor neighborhood (they are quite many prostitutes and hobos, even near the main square). The disparity between the filthy streets and the very clean subway overhead made us think of Gotham City (in Batman, for the ignorants !).

For lunch (ok, it was more like a very late lunch, but we had eaten a very big breakfast !), we ate half a fried chicken with potatoes. So we had the opportunity to eat it like the locals, meaning with your hand in plastic gloves given by the restaurant (convenient, but a bit weird and not zero waste friendly !).

Today we also changed hostels (because the dorms without windows felt a lot like a prison, and were also expensive). Now we are in the pretty chic residential neighborhood of Aguacatala. This part is clearly blossoming, with big glass buildings under construction and very high end hotels (our new hostel is also very neat !)

To unwind after this long day, we went to watch a movie (it had been a while since we last set foot in a theater !). The theater was in this huge, huge mall (bigger than anything we’ve seen in Europe). It’s quite classy, evidently it’s much richer than the city center.

P.S : As you’ve no doubt noticed, we’ve changed our banner picture (so that we know both appear in it !). The picture might have been photoshopped a bit … 🙂

As you should be aware by now, we have a routine for traveling days : leave the hotel, get some breakfast, hop in a bus, discover a new city in the afternoon !

After closed roads yesterday, we got construction today between Manizalès and Medellin, and we lost a lot of time. From 2 lanes they are making 4 in the next 5 years, winding on mountain slopes with sheer force of motivation and toggling traffic flow (every 30 minutes).

When we arrived at the South Terminal under pouring rain, we found a touristic information which was well beyond what we had had around here : a map with transportation and sights, a guide book, very useful advice in a very articulate Spanish… And the city has free WiFi almost everywhere. Tourism here is a serious thing. Same with accommodations : you can feel that a lot of young people travel here to party, the shared spaces are well cared for and decorated, the rooms are all reserved and the dorms are very small. Tough luck, tonight we sleep in bunk beds with a roommate, french like us, and tomorrow, we move !

That being said, this neighborhood is really nice : we are at El Poblado, part center, with streets lined of low houses with trees and street art, very different from the towers we saw on the way here. Bars and restaurants are everywhere, and we see a lot of foreigners. Since it mostly rained, we will tell you more tomorrow !

Night edition !

After writing the previous lines, we went out, first to eat, then to meet Lucas, a friend of a friend who lives here and offered to show us around. After a meal of ceviche and fancy rice, we had a beer at the park El Poblado and met a group of friends with whom we went to a bar for… dancing salsa !

Medellin, in some ways, is very much like a European city. Anyway this neighborhood for bars and parties could really be from a capital of the old continent, and we have, like at home, met new people, talked and drank… and danced salsa. OK, culturally, it doesn’t have the same presence here and there, so we weren’t as good as them, but our respective partners were really nice and it was a very pleasant evening.

Noting : here, too, are some sorts of fast-food restaurants, open late at night around bars for the party-goers. They seem pretty nice, especially for arepas, little rice and corn pancakes that you can eat anytime. They are fried and served with chocolate sometimes, or nature when served with chicken. Yummy !

PS : This article doesn’t have any pictures because of the bus, the rain and the night. Sorry guys, but that’s life !