Heading north to the Caribbean

At Zipaquira, north of the capital Bogota, we visited a Cathedral built inside a disused part of a salt mine - quite a surreal place. The colours in the pics are more vivid than they actually are!

We are now heading north for the Caribbean coast via the colonial town of Villa de Leyva, where we saw the massive near complete fossil of a Kronosaurus and a funky clay house. Near San Gil we stayed in a geodesic dome tent and spent a day at Barichara - apparently the prettiest town in Colombia!

Colombian Dogs and Cats

We have met some lovely dogs and cats in Colombia - here are some of them...

This lovely gentle perro below was actually in Otavalo, northern Ecuador but we had to include him! We found him beside an ancient tree and think he waits there for tourists in case they have some food!

Coffee in Colombia

The coffee region is beautiful and we stayed for a few days at Salento, a lovely small town in the hills. We went on a coffee tour on the plantation where we stayed. Was very interesting even if Dee cannot stand the drink!

We hiked in the Cocora National Park, famous for its very tall Wax Palm trees (national symbol of Colombia) and more hummingbirds. Transport here is by Jeeps, called Willies! Standing on the back is normal.

On another long hike we started with a JR (Jack Russell) in tow and return with two more!

We camped for a couple of days a bit further north at another coffee plantation in the middle of nowhere along a dirt track.

There were oranges to pick in the garden to press for delicious juice!

Colombia

We crossed the border into Colombia to find no fuel because of a strike by lorry drivers - great! All the petrol stations were repainting their yellow and white lines with nothing else to do!

Luckily we had filled up in Ecuador (its only US$ 1.48 per gallon), however, we now had a problem as we didn't know if this was local or country wide. We stayed in the border town of Ipiales but would we have to return to Ecuador?

We rode to Las Lajas nearby, to see a cathedral built across a steep gorge.

We decided to ride a bit further north to Pasto and found a couple of petrol stations open with long queues. We were limited to about a gallon but were not sure if we had enough to make it to the next big town, where we hoped to buy more!

We decided to try, passed many armed military check points and overtook a 50 odd long lorry convoy with armed escorts. We had a hot ride (note Dee's new Honda tee shirt)! We even coasted down the hills to save fuel.

We luckily found a small petrol station open and made it to Popayan, a nice Colonial town, where there was plenty of fuel. It seems the petrol problem was localised but the dispute is country wide. This is why lorries are sent in convoys with armed guards to make sure they get through!

After a Salsa lesson at our hostel in Cali and a stop at Buga with its famous cathedral (and a tight squeeze into a hotel), we headed for the coffee region in the hills.