The Gym

We got up early and decided that we had enough time to hit the gym for a workout before our flight. We changed into our running gear and made our way to a gym that Luke had found. It was the same gym chain that he head used in Mexico. We jogged the three km to the gym and signed in. 

The gym was spectacular with all new gear and an awesome range of equipment. Christine and I worked our way through squats, bench press, bench rows and step back overhead tricep extensions. I finished up with some chin-ups. After our session we walked back to the accomodation, we picked up a couple of hot chocolates from a French bakery on the way back. 

Back at the accomodation we all pitched in to cook scrambled eggs with cereal and left overs from dinner last night. We ate breakfast, cleaned up, got organised and left just as the cleaners were coming in. 

The Delayed Flight

We drove down to Adobe to deliver the car and were waiting for our shuttle when we received a notificiton from Wingo to say that our flight had been delayed until around 6 pm. We had been scheduled to fly out at 2:30. Now had they notified us earlier we would have held on to the car and done some more exploring around San Jose, but now that all the paper work was completed and we were loading into the shuttle, we decided to continue to the airport. 

While we were at Adobe we were all disappointed to hear that Maduro had sworn himself in for another term even though he lost his rigged election. It was heartening to hear that the US had put up $25 Million US for his arrest.

Adobe shuttled us to the airport and we checked in. Two things to note if you use Wingo, one, the checkin app doesn’t work, and two, you cannot add checked baggage after you have purchased your ticket. 

The Airport wait

We wandered around the airport and organised some food. Luke found a restaurant where he was able to get a casada. Christine and I grazed on a pizza, smoothie and chicken wrap. We found some space to charge our phones and edit some video. 

After we had edited videos, done our Duolingo, written in our journals and Luke had sampled all of the chocolate and coffee that he could handle, we wandered down to the gate and picked out a comfortable patch of floor to have a siesta. No sooner had this occurred then the gate was changed on us. 

The flight eventually turned up and we were indeed on our way by 6. The flight was smooth and only took a couple of hours. 

The meeting

We unloaded at the other end, got through customs and met up with Diego and Juan just outside the doors.  Now this was actually a huge event. Diego was my first language exchange partner when I decided that it was time to start becoming conversational with my Spanish. We had been chatting on a fairly consistent basis for almost 10 years to the day. My kids had grown up chatting with Diego’s kids, and Diego’s son Juan had come to Australia and lived with us for around 6 months. Diego and his family have been a huge part our lives and so to finally meet in person, in Colombia and converse in Spanish was an epic moment for all of us. 

We gave each other a huge hug and chatted while we loaded the bags into the car. We drove over to Diego and Erica’s place where everyone Including Erica, Sarah, Charlie, Ida, Thomas and some of Diego’s other family members were waiting for us, it was great to finally see everyone face to face in the real world, we had met many of Diego’s family and friends in our Skype sessions over the years, but here we were in the physical world not just as an image on a computer screen. 

We unloaded our gear and then went in search of a discoteca. The one that these guys usually go to was closed so we went to one that was open across the road. We hit the dance floor, danced, chatted and partied until around 2 am. Diego organised beers and a spirit drink called Aguardiente, that has an aniseed flavour and is drunk in small sip glasses. He made sure that everyone had a small one to sip on a regular basis throughout the evening. Once we were all danced out, we headed back to Diego and Erica’s place to grab some sleep.

Colombia Day 19

Early Start

Diego knocked on the door at 6am. We got up hopped into the car and made our way down to Erica’s grandmother’s place Charlie, Ida and Thomas came with us in a separate car. It took around 2 hours to drive there through some spectacular countryside. We were met at the homestead by a huge group of Diego and Erica’s relatives. We all chatted together over breakfast that included arepas, soup and fried bananas. After breakfast we all went out onto the road and took a drone shot of the whole family with the homestead in the background. 

The Jeep ride

Diego and Charlie organised a jeep to take us into the local village. We piled into the jeep and traversed the mountainous roads into one of the local pueblos. From the pueblo we were able to walk down down to some rapids where people were cooling off in the chilly water. The track to the rapids crossed a couple of high railway bridges. If you wanted you could take a small electric vehicle that travelled along the tracks, other wise you could walk along a path that had been built between the tracks. Juan was saying that when he was younger the path wasn’t there and that you would have to step on the railway sleepers to make your way across the bridges. Erica’s mum who is in her 90’s took the train ride to the pools, but on the way back she opted to walk back with us, a truely amazing lady. The rapids were surrounded by bars and food places.

The Rapids

We made our way down to the waters edge and tried to fly the drone out over the water so that we could get a shot of everyone chilling in the bars over looking the creek. We quickly worked out the the drone had issues over the rapidly moving water, it started drifting with the direction of flow of the water and I had to keep moving it back up stream. The drone was also disturbing some of the dogs that were lounging in the rapids with their owners. In the end we decided that we weren’t confident enough that we wouldn’t end up loosing it down stream and decided to land it. 

The Dolce Capital

Once we had all cooled off in the pools formed by the rapids, we made our way back along the path and re – loaded into the Jeep. This time we went to a larger Pueblo called Villeta that you can just make out from the drone shot that we took from the homestead. In Villeta we were able to track down some Colombian pesos, only Christine’s card would work with the Bank of Colombia ATM’s. We also picked up a couple of fruit filled drinks, that would have been awesome had they not been crunchy from all of the sugar that had been put into them. Diego let us know that this was the sugar capital of Colombia, we had passed many sugar cane farms on our journey and much of the cane was brought to Villeta for processing, as such there was an abundance of sugar and loads of it went into everything. Luke grabbed himself a coffee and we all relaxed in one of the cafes that were dotted around the pueblo. 

Lunch at the Homestead

After Villeta we returned to the homestead for lunch, some of the family had stayed back at the homestead to prepare a spectacular feast. We ate meat with rice, potatoes and vegetables. The food was amazing especially after our adventures of the day. We were thoroughly tired by this point in the day especially considering we were only running on a couple of hours of sleep. We helped with the dishes, said our farewells and headed back to Diego and Erica’s place.

Evening Festivities

We ate a light dinner, gave Diego, Erica, Juan and Sarah some of the gifts that we had brought from Australia and picked up along the journey. Diego, Erica and Sarah also had the pleasant experience of tasting Vegemite for the first time. Juan had already tried some back in Australia, so he knew what to expect, we filmed the various responses and you can check them out in the associated video. I can assure you it was good fun.