Well, amigos, let me apologize for the lack of correspondence these last 5 weeks. If you don’t hear from me, take solace in the fact that that means I am having a blast and have had trouble making the time to sit down and update this and reply to emails. Also, the wifi at the hostels has been a lot worse than I was hoping for. Although I’m winding down my time in Peru, this post is only on Colombia. Look for Peru’s recap in a couple days.

Let me back up to the beginning for a quick second…

I have developed a new travel rule for myself: No Swedish House Mafia concerts within 72 hours of departure for a foreign country, no matter how many members of the Mafia are present. Although my send off party was, indeed, amazing, that night coupled with my inability to sleep on airplanes definitely slowed me down a bit my first week as I was struggling to catch up on sleep and get healthy. In typical me fashion I saved too much to get done those last couple days before I left and was racing around up until the minute before I left for the airport. After not sleeping a peep on the redeye from LAX -> Boston and feeling the sickness creeping, I knew a couple hours of shuteye on the next two flights would be paramount. After the airport drug cocktail (Nyquil, airborne, advil pm, 17 sore throat drops) had failed, I walked back to the store and took a long look at my other options, namely those neck pillows. Now, I don’t know about you guys, but for some reason I have always held some deep contempt for the people that use those neck pillows. I don’t know what it is. Maybe I’m jealous they’re sleeping and I’m not; maybe I think they’re being soft; or maybe I just don’t like the way they look. It’s like the kids with the rolley-backpacks in middle school, you just didn’t like them, but you weren’t quite sure why. Anyways, I circled them distrustfully once more and finally took the plunge. End to a long a story: I will never travel again without one, that pillow has been attached to my backpack my entire trip, and I take back every ill-conceived notion I ever had toward you fellow neck-pillowers.

Now, onto Colombia…

What an incredibly beautiful country, both the landscapes and the people. Colombia was difficult to plan for because it has so much to offer, kind of like California. From the jungle to the beaches, big cities to small fishing villages, coffee farms to deserts, you could spend months in Colombia and still feel like you’re missing a lot. I only had three weeks and wanted to see as much as possible but still allow myself enough time in each spot to be able to soak in the culture. Talk to anyone that’s been there and they will all tell you the same thing: the people of Colombia are what make this country so special. For me, they are the friendliest people I have ever encountered. They are so prideful of their country and eager to share it with travelers. They seem so happy and grateful that you were able to look passed the stigma they have been fighting to overcome since the Pablo Escobar years and go out of their way to talk to you and help you in whatever way possible. My favorite memories of Colombia are undoubtedly the long conversations with my seatmates on buses and planes, and interactions with the waiters, taxi drivers and other locals. I’ll try and just stick to my favorite parts of my time from here on out.

As my plane got ready to land in Bogota, thunder and lightning began to surge, to which the guy behind me yelled out, ”welcome to Colombia!!!” Everyone laughed and I was fired up I had finally made it. I had no idea where I was going, it was late and raining and when we were in the neighborhood of my hostel my taxi driver kept yelling, ”peligroso! malo! peligroso!” which helped subdue any nerves I already had. It ended up being where most all of the hostels were in the neighborhood of La Calendaria and seemed safe enough as long as you weren’t wandering alone at night. I didn’t do a whole lot in Bogota except walk around and get a feel for the culture and how things worked. My last night, a Swiss guy staying at my hostel had a local friend, Julian, who took us out to a really fun bar and introduced me to the local cheap drink Aguardiente (tastes like sambuca) and accompanying cheer, ”arriba..abajo..al centro..pa dentro!” which we would end up rehearsing a dozen times.

The next morning I nearly missed my flight and groggily made my way to Medellin. (I’ve come to learn that in Latin America you need to double whatever time the locals tell you to be at the airport by) Medellin is actually pronounced ”Meh-de-jee-in” or ”Meh-de-jean.” Not sure how the Entourage guys overlooked that one. If you do any research on Medellin, you’ll find that what was once the murder capital of the world during the Escobar era, is now one of Latin America’s most promising and blooming cities. The turnaround it has made in such a short time is truly remarkable. That being said, there are still plenty of areas that are not safe and still a lot of evident poverty outside of the part of town most of the gringos stay, but, nevertheless, it is definitely on the upswing. A waiter told me that former president Uribe passed a law that requires all University students to serve on the police force for 1 year after graduation, and thus, there is an abundance of young men and women in uniform all around the cities. There are literally at least a couple officers on each and every block, many of which are holding machine guns, and who are a great resource if you get lost often like I do.

If you are a gringo looking to party then Medellin is definitely the place. The poblado district is completely safe and has a ton of good restaurants and bars all within walking distance of the hostels. The local women here are also some of the most beautiful I’ve ever seen. I, again, got lucky and got taken out by some Aussie friends I met at the hostel who had a local friend, Sebastian, who brought us out to some local spots just outside of the normal string of gringo bars for a fun night that ended in a Burker King barage. The next day I navigated my way through their public transportation and went paragliding, which was one of my favorite things I’ve done so far. From the time you show up at the office to the time you are in the air is honestly no more than 5-7 minutes. You sign some janky waiver and the next thing you know you’re strapped in, the flight instructor is yelling ”corre! corre!” and you’re up flying with the birds gazing out for days.

The next cool thing I did was take a 2 hour bus to a small lake town called Guatape, where I stayed for a couple nights. My intent was to relax there, but there was a local girl working and staying at the hostel who brought me and a few others out the first night and we joined in on some birthday party where everyone was wearing masks and dancing and it ended up being a blast. The next day I rented a mountain bike and took on the path to the main attraction of Guatape, ”El Peñon, or La Piedra,” which is a giant rock at the edge of the lake that, when climbed, gives you an amazing view of all the surrounding lakes. The bike ride was much tougher than I had anticipated, but my blublockers and the Black Keys new album coming out of my headphones made it a fun ride. Along the way I saw a sign that said ”Jugos Naturales” and a little tree house looking place next to it so I decided to go in. Probably Colombia’s best culinary gem is it’s fruits and juices. They have some of the most bizarre and delicious fruits I’ve ever had, and on this hot day, I was craving some jugo. Sadly, the jugo was by far the worst I have had thus far, but the conversation I had with the young girl who served it was one of my favorite moments of my trip. I sat down in her tree house, exhausted, and we ended up laughing and talking in spanish for over an hour about all sorts of stuff. She was two months pregnant and told me she really wanted a dog but didn’t want to be tied down in case she wanted to live elsewhere, something I could very well sympathize with. She gave me some tips of her favorite places near the Panama border to see that aren’t well discovered yet, which I plan to visit someday. Still thirsty, but feeling happy, I made my way to La Piedra and hiked up the stairs to what was truly the most beautiful view I had ever seen in my life. The pictures frustrate me because they don’t demonstrate even a fraction of how breathtaking it was up there. Everyone at the top was having there own little moment of zen gazing out over the splatter of water and trees that stretched as far as the eyes could see. Spoiler alert: this was as, if not more, stunning of a view as the first time you look down on Machu Picchu, for me at least.

After Guatape and one more night back in Medellin, I flew to the Carribean coast on Christmas Eve where I would spend my last week in Colombia. The next few days were my favorite string of days thus far, and it is definitely due to the people I met at my hostel. I got there around 9pm and by 10:30 I was on a Chivas bus with 40 people from the hostel and a slew of beverages. A Chivas bus is basically a party bus that is all open, kind of like a trolley car, with music and lights that drives you around to different spots and drops you off at a disco. Paul, you would love these. I’m starting to realize after talking to people from around the world, that Americans are the only ones who have party buses, and among my friends, use them regularly. So while most everyone timidly stepped onto the Chivas bus, unsure how to behave, I was already standing on the bench pumping my fists and got the whole party going after the first song. The next day we hopped into a van with our legend of a driver, Johnny, and spent Christmas on the beach drinking beers, eating fresh fish, and playing soccer with some little Colombian and Brazilian kids who were unbelievable with the ball. While I seriously missed all of my family and all the good food, my first Christmas away is one that I will never forget. (sorry for not skyping guys, the wifi at the hostel was down and their computers were rubbish! Love you all!)

After Christmas was Tayrona National Park, which is a two hour muddy hike through the jungle to some pristine beaches and relaxation. I met up with a couple Dutch girls from my hostel and I later found out it was one of their birthdays so we bought the last two bottles of red wine the campgrounds had to sell and did our best job celebrating. (Hi Teisje and Nikita if you’re reading this! Hope sailing to Panama was a blast!) After a surpsingly good snooze in the hammock, we made our way back to the hostel and went to Taganga for the night. Taganga is an awesome little fishing village 10 minutes from Santa Marta that has become a backpackers haven so it’s a great place to meet up with fellow travelers. The next morning I took a bus with another girl from my hostel to Cartagena, where it seemed everyone was heading for New Years Eve. Cartagena is a unique colonial city, and it’s awesome just walking through the streets checking out the vendors. It is extremely touristy, however, and the most expensive city in Colombia, but its architecture and colors enable it to maintain its charm nonetheless. The city was alive on New Years Eve, and walking around was great, but I actually had a lot more fun on the 30th at rocking discoteca, where I randomly happened to run into almost every gringo I had met the last 3 weeks and had an awesome time dancing the night away with a bunch of the people I had spent Christmas with. My flight to Peru was 16 hours on the 1st so I tried my best to get to bed early on NYE, but ended up getting convinced by a couple Brazilian girls to watch the first sunrise of 2012, for which I was thankful when it was all said and done.

If you’ve made it through that you must really love me or be very bored at work. After writing this right now, I will definitely try and break it up more as much as possible. Also, if you are genuinely interested in reading this blog, please click the follow button at the bottom of the screen and enter your email address and you will automatically be emailed whenever I update it. I’m going to stop posting the updates on facebook soon because as I become facebook friends with more people I meet along the way, it feels a bit awkward writing about them and the times we shared. Please, please email me directly at joey.garcia13@gmail.com if you want to hear some more detailed stories or just want to chat, it’s a lot easier for me to correspond that way and I love receving emails from you guys. Even if I don’t respond right away it really makes me happy to hear from you. Colombia is definitely on the up and coming and I strongly encourage anyone who has the opportunity to travel there to do so before some parts become too touristy. It’s pretty cheap, there is tons to do, and it’s relatively close to the U.S. It’s a great alternative to your typical quick trip to Europe and your money will go three times as far, so go! Here is the link for my Colombia pictures: https://plus.google.com/photos/105369803721680610594/albums/5697501579326557153?authkey=CMmm2ODB-NKDtwE

Peru’s update should be in just a couple days. Hope everyone had a great New Years!

-Joseph