Cute colonial streets of Cartagena.
There is a block dedicated to street art. There was some amazing work going on.
The "old town" is surrounded by a massive cannon festooned wall. Inside are passages and dungeons from the inquisition. For some reason Cartagena was a favourite for passing pirates, so its very well protected.
The old town is full of these weird iron sculptures. Dog pulling boy is a particularly odd one.
This is the fort which was used as a last line of defence for the royalty etc against pirates and invading forces. Its huge! This fort was never taken, even though it was attempted numerous times.
Here we are in Medellin, home of Pablo Escobar. The bird on the right was destroyed by a bomb set by a rival drug cartel. The sculpter built a new one and left the two as a statement about the pointlessness of violence.
For a dollar you can ride the sky rail and cable car anywhere around the city and back. We took the cable up the mountains near Santa Elena. The government built the system to allow the poorer people in the mountains access to the city for work etc. It's been really effective. Its cool to see a city that successfully eradicated their crime problem by giving better infrastructure, education and opportunities to its people.
This is where Escobar took his last stand, or was murdered by police, depending on whose story you believe. Many people see him as a kind of Robin Hood figure.
Dad taking his son somewhere on the bmx, in peak hour, holding onto a truck, at 60 kmh!
This is at the Hacienda Venecia boutique coffee plantation in Manizales in the coffee region. We were camping at the beautiful hacienda and took a tour showing how they make their incredible coffee. This is a box of coffee aromas for master roasters. Apparently there's about 700 distinct aromas these guys can detect!
Free espresso all day!
Mmmm... Roasting...
The finished product. We really came to appreciate why good coffee is expensive. There's so much labour, so many levels of selection and expertise involved.
The hacienda.
The view of the coffee plantation from our camp spot.
We had to come here to get our brakes fixed. Strange location for a brake shop (keep in mind its a one way street).
Salento, a beautiful little town in the mountains. We camped at a lodge called La Serrana. Had a lot of fun here with a bunch of like minded travellers, including a few Aussies. Every night there were fireflies everywhere, I'd never seen them before so it was really special.
Laura on a swing set on top of the world.
Nice door.
The Valle de Cocora had these incredible giant wax palms. I couldn't shake the feeling that I need a Sneed.
That's not the Lorax, that's Aaron.
Imposing statue in Popayan.
This was our last stop in Colombia. Popayan. It seemed to have more churches than people.
In the central district everything is whitewashed. Weird look.
Currently we're on our way down the coast of Ecuador after spending a while in the mountains and jungles.
