Travel report #10
Colombia - Bogota
Wednesday January 31, 2001
Arrived in Bogota in the afternoon. Nice and clean city. We got on a
local bus into the center. Two minutes after getting of the bus, we were
offered cocain...
We stayed the first night at a dirty, cheap hotel. The place we wanted
was full...
Had arepas for dinner, pizza but made with sweet corn/maiz bread.
Thursday February 1, 2001
Moved to Platypus, a really nice and safe hostal. Then we visited the
city mountain, Cerro de Monserrate.
Really nice view of the city! A nice sunny day, we had a nice time up there. Also bouth us lunch, a sweet corn colb from the BBQ and a fried banana split as a hot dog with ham and
cheese in it. Not that good...
Walked around the city, very nice and tidy. Very different from La Paz
and Lima. Visited a gallery showing paintings of Picasso and lots of
Botero stuff. Botero, one of the most famous Colombian artists, famous
for his "fat" people.
Friday February 2, 2001
Visited Museo del Oro, a very good museum. We learned a lot about the
indian tribes of Colombia.
In the evening we saw "Bringing out the dead" on a local cinema.
Staying at the hostel was nice, we made our own sandwiches and got to
know quite a few traveles that gave us useful information on Brazil.
Saturday February 3, 2001
Relaxing day, wrote post cards on a coffe house and walked around the
city.
In the evening it was party time, drinking beer at the hostal then to a
salsa bar in Zona Rosa. Zona Rosa is the party district of Bogota, a
really posh area.
Sunday February 4, 2001
We took a local bus to Zipaquira and visited the Cateral de Sal. A
facinating "building", a cathedral carved into a moutain very rich on
mineral. Many walls were white of salt. Very many rooms and enourmosly huge!
We were on a spanish guided tour for 45 minutes... It smelled like
boiled eggs in there.
Nice bus ride, we got to see a bit of contry side Colombia. All nice
and tidy compared to Peru...
Monday February 4, 2001
Another excursion, together with a group from the hostal. We took a
local bus towards Guatavita, got of before the town and walked 8 km to a
lake. Facinating lake. The indinan used this as a offering site and the
lake holds a good amount of gold, but it has never been recovered (they
have even drained the lake to try to find it...).
Tuesday February 5, 2001
Our last day in Colombia. Spent some hours on internet (writing this),
waling around the city wating for the flight to Rio, due 9 in the
evening.
Bogota is one of the pretties cities we have seen. It has a nice
climate, situated 2600 meters above sea level. It has a drug and crime
problem, but we took normal precautions and was not troubled.