Hannaldinha's South American Adventure!

It's been over two weeks since I landed in Heathrow and I felt it was time to write my last blog to sum up my trip. At my age I think I know myself pretty well, this wasn't intended to be a deep soul-searching experience and I didn't have any sort of epiphany while I was away. But it was a great time to reflect, push myself fully out of my comfort zone and go on the most incredible adventure. Travelling certainly does open your mind, it exposes you to other cultures that challenge your perceptions and softens the cynicism which can creep into our hearts from our everyday experiences at home. In a world where our news is dominated by negative stories and messages of fear it's really cool to be reminded that in every corner of the world there are people who will show you nothing but acts of kindness and hospitality for no other reason than to make you feel at home in their country.

Since being back people have asked me what was my favourite memory or the best bit of my travel and I can't single one out. For me going on an epic adventure on the other side of the world was, in its entirety, everything I dreamed it to be. Diversity and beauty were what I was searching for and I found them in abundance through the people, landscapes and situations I encountered. At the beginning of my trip I was nervous, not just because this was the first time I would be travelling alone, but I was also apprehensive about how I would deal with returning back to my routine - my everyday "normality" here in Manchester. Based on previous experiences of returning home after time abroad I knew there was a high possibility I would fall into post-travel depression, eating my body weight in chocolate and annoying all my friends with nostalgic tales and self-pity. Sometimes it really can take a while to get over that feeling of post-travel restlessness where you believe your world has been turned upside down and you question everything in your life. But even though I put myself through this emotional rollercoaster it is definitely worth it. Thankfully the adjustment this time has surprisingly not been too painful. I think it helps that I have returned to the UK in springtime when we are experiencing glorious sunshine, a mini heatwave and the celebrations of a Royal Wedding. It has been wonderful catching up with family and friends who I appreciate more than ever. I made some brilliant friends while I was away and I have an abundance of amazing people in my life back at home.

When I think about everything I did in just 3 months I feel a mixture of amazement, thankfulness and sorrow that it's all over. But the spreadsheet itinerary certainly came through! In my travels I spent over 200 hours on buses, trekked glaciers in Southern Patagonia, danced tango in Buenos Aires, saw Evita's grave, stood beneath the powerful rush of the Iguazu falls, climbed up to snow-capped mountains in El Chalten, experienced the adrenaline rush of white-water rafting down the Argentinean/Chile border, had three hilarious hitch-hiking experiences in Argentina, went on a road trip in the lake district of Bariloche, tasted wine in the vineyards of Mendoza, laughed to the point of crying with Lidwien, Sivan and Haggar over a bottle of Malbec, was highly amused at the amount of Argentinean el mullets on show, saw a mountain made up of seven colours, watched more than one spectacular sunset that brought me to tears, sandboarded down the dunes of the Chilean Atacama desert, got up at 4am to see geysers smoking at dawn, swam in hot springs, floated in a volcanic salt lake, ascended to the dizzy heights of over 6,000 meters in the Bolivian desert, chewed on coca leaves, slept in all my clothes in a hostel with no hot water, heating or electricity, walked on the largest salt flat in the world, mountain biked down the most dangerous road in the world, drank home-made caipirinhas and ate churrasco with my Brazilian friends in Sao Paulo, experienced Brazilian Carnaval in Rio, received freshly squeezed orange juice and ground Colombian coffee for breakfast from Juan and Carlos in Bogota, watched a fellow traveller in a hostel confuse an internal palm tree with the communal toilets, visited a coffee plantation in Salento, made friends with the Colombian military, stood in wonder looking at 60 feet wax palm trees in the Valle de Cocora, went to the place where Pablo Escobar was killed in Medellin, got giddy to the point of hysteria with Devi whenever reggaeton was playing, stayed in a hut on a remote island in the Caribbean, slept overnight in a hammock on the beach, immersed myself fully in a mud volcano, chilled out at Cafe del Mar in Cartagena's spectacular old town, walked with monkeys, boa snakes, ants and butterflies in the Tayrona National Park, invalidated my travel insurance by trekking to the Lost City, met an indigenous community and their beautiful children, received 37 mosquito bites from 5 days in the jungle, was given a personal dance lesson in Salsa and Vallenato, and made many friends from all over the world who I intend to keep in contact with for life.

I read a good blog entry recently which was written by a friend I met travelling in Colombia. He wrote about how it's the people who make a place and I completely agree. All my previous blogs mention examples of the incredible fun I had with local people and other travellers. And not once did I experience any problems or threat to my personal safety. But that's not to say that bad things don't happen and in any area of the world you can meet friendly people and dangerous people. Some travellers I met did have problems, several had been robbed and on more than one occasion this was at gunpoint. But for me the fact still remains that the only time I've ever had someone try to rob me has been in my own home city of Manchester.

So, after a long break from work where I've fully indulged in the beauty of South America have I got this travel bug out of my system? I certainly feel that I accomplished my dream to backpack across a continent I fell in love with two years ago and yes this satisfied my desire to experience travel in this way for the first time in my life. I also know that I squeezed the juice out of every place I visited so don't think I could have got much more out of the experience. But no, my hunger for travel is not satisfied. I know this sounds like i'm greedy but travel is my passion, a part of my life and I intend to continue doing it for as long as I can. I am going to say something very profound now so prepare yourselves: when I was in the Colombian jungle my body got covered in mosquito bites, despite a rigorous daily routine of covering myself in repellent. I didn't want to scratch my bites but I somehow couldn't stop myself and it felt sooooooo good to do it even though it made them all flare up and become more itchy. And then I realised that this is exactly what the travelling bug is like, once you are bitten the more you scratch, the more you itch!! You are thinking "3 months in South America and this is the most deep thing she could come up with?"!!! So now I will finish...

Taking a sabbatical from work to travel is a luxury of living in a developed society. And I can honestly say that every single day I was away I felt so grateful for the experience. I'm also proud of myself for taking some risks, personal and financial, to achieve my dream of backpacking across South America. 10 years ago I would never have had the confidence to do this, especially not on my own. Leaving it to when I had a mortgage and various other financial commitments posed challenges, but overcoming them made me even more determined. And it reinforces my view that when you are thinking of doing something that really scares you, as long as it's obviously not a stupid thing to pursue you should absolutely do it.

My dream to go on an adventure through South America, to seek out beauty in people, places and experiences has been completely fulfilled. Here are some of the highlights...

Iguazu Falls, Brazilian side


Bohemian neighbourhood La Boca Buenos Aires

Floralis Generica, Buenos Aires

Perito Moreno glacier, El Calafate Southern Argentina


Windy El Chalten

Patagonia...the land of blue and pink colours

Great girls I met in Argentina...Hagar and Sivan from Israel and Lidwien from Holland.

Trekking in El Chalten..climb every mountain

The Fitz Roy!

Whitewater rafting on the border of Argentina/Chile

Climbing another mountain in Bariloche, Argentina

Bariloche

Funny hitch hiking experience number 1...

Mendoza, Argentina

Wine tasting, Mendoza

Charlie's mullets...our take on Argentina's fashion faux pas


Dancing in Salta, Northern Argentina

Holy llama

The seven-coloured mountain, Purmamarca Northern Argentina

San Pedro de Atacama desert, Chile




Geysers, Chile


Salt plain, Chile



Lake containing so much salt you don't sink

Bolivia...cold, basic, diverse, beautiful


Laguna Verde


Our transport for the 4 day Salar de Uyuni tour

Geysers, Bolivia

Laguna Colorada at over 5,000 metres altitude...blew my mind




Hitting the Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia (largest salt flat in the world)


Rainy season turned the salt flat into a huge mirror






Train cemetary, Uyuni

Yes these are the "roads" in Bolivia

La Paz, Bolivia. 4,100 metres above sea level


Mountain biking Death Road, Bolivia

New Brazilian friends I made in Sao Paulo



Carnaval, Rio de Janeiro

Street bloco, Copacabana

We accidentally hit this girl over the head with our umbrella, after being covered in rain water her response to our apologies was to welcome us to Carnaval and have a photo

100 points to Amanda


Sambadrome, Rio

One of many amazing floats


Bogota, Colombia


Overlooking the huge capital

Coffee plantation tour near Salento..awesome!

The stunning Valle de Cocora, Colombia

Making friends with the military

Overlooking beautiful Medellin, Colombia

The infamous Pablo Escobar, really interesting tour

Eating out with Devi in Medellin

Hitting the Carribean coast

Playa Blanca

The beautiful old town of Cartagena, Colombia


Volcan de Lodo..mud volcano!

Park Tayrona, Northern Colombia

Getting used to sleeping overnight in hammocks

Getting used to 90% humidity in the jungle

Night at Cafe del Mar, Cartagena


The Lost City Trek...5 days hard trekking in the jungle...amazing!!!

An indigenous community in the jungle, my ovaries skipped a beat haha

We found the Lost City!!!

1,200 steps, smiling through the pain

My Birthday, final weekend in Colombia

Leaving Medellin and one final look at the city

So, continuing on from my last blog but without so much ranting about the inaccurate perceptions people hold about Colombia. If you don't believe me come and experience Colombia for yourself. You won't be sorry..

Santa Marta was the place where I realised I had fallen in love with Colombia. Like I said previously it took me a while to develop such a strong affection, this country for me had been a hard nut to crack. I'm always aware that when travelling any country my experiences are going to be limited to the places and communities I can access safely or easily. But wherever possible I wanted a taste of real Colombian life and culture. And if I'm honest, I wanted to be accepted by Colombians too; to know I was welcome and free to explore and delight in the country I was so intrigued by. Being a female traveller, sometimes travelling solo didn't cause any issues, the biggest barrier as I've said before was the language. But the north of Colombia was really very friendly and clearly more used to dealing with travellers and our gringo ways Cartagena was pretty but too touristy, Santa Marta was not that pretty but I loved it. Most travellers either base themselves here to visit the nearby National Park, Lost City and la Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, and a lot of people choose to stay in the more touristy town nearby called Taganga. Santa Marta was steaming hot, humid and loud. The streets were full of little market stalls, food stalls and crazy taxi drivers. The reggaeton or accordion sounds of the popular vallenato songs blared out of the shops, and often enticed me in even though I had no intention of buying anything! Even the beach wasn't that pretty but I felt a lot of warmth from the people in this city and somehow we managed to communicate pretty well. Best of all, the city had that wonderful relaxed Carribean feel and I started to really chill out. Even my spreadsheet itinerary took a back seat as I enjoyed spending time just walking around, taking everything in, sampling the street food and returning the smiles of passer-bys. The only annoyance I did experience was the mosquitoes, despite covering myself in repellent I was continuously attacked by them and man did the bites itch for DAYS after. Devi, who usually gets attacked too seemed to be perfectly fine if I was around.

(Continuing from previous blog) After getting back to mainland Cartagena from Playa Blanca Devi and I managed to get a late bus to Santa Marta. This was an amusing journey for me as I watched one of the bus drivers stare in awe at Devi for the whole journey, and when we were stopped by the Police for a standard roadside check she also managed to get the attention of a particularly attractive officer. Despite the usual arctic air conditioning on the bus we both fell asleep and were woken when we reached Santa Marta two hours late. Even though it was past midnight and the roads were deserted we got safely to our hostel in the centre. Our hostel was called La Brisa Loca and was modern and comfortable, established a few years ago by a couple of young Americans who saw a good business opportunity created by the growing tourism here. Nights were a little on the uncomfortable side since it was very hot and we only had a fan in our room. The next day we decided to take a local bus to the Tayrona National Park which is famous for its beautiful beaches. The bus journey was awesome, cramped and bumpy with the reggaeton blaring from the radio and a very cute old man sitting next to me who kept talking to me quickly in Spanish when it was obvious I had no idea what he was saying. When dropped off at the park entrance we decided we wanted to walk the long route into the park and onto the beach trails. While trying to establish how long this was actually going to take we met an American doctor called Carl who was happy to walk with us into the park. The walk was really nice, we had lots of interesting conversations with Carl, saw millions of ant trails and the beaches we reached were impressive. However the humidity was high and even though it wasn't that sunny it was very warm when walking. 4 hours later we arrived at a camping area. We ended up staying overnight in the park, paying a whopping 20,000 pesos to sleep in a hammock (compared to the 5,000 we had paid on playa blanca). The next day we walked back to the entrance and saw a lot of wildlife along the way include a boa snake (up a tree!), bats, a sloth, some beautiful butterflies and some very noisy monkeys. That evening we sampled nightlife in Taganga which was fun but I still preferred Santa Marta, probably because the ratio of travellers to locals was less! After this I had two days left with Devi before she went home, we ended up chilling out and laughing at all the stupid travel mistakes we had made together on this trip. The highlights being: Getting into a car with Colombians we'd just met on a night out in Medellin, travelling to a remote island in the Caribbean we knew nothing about, then arranging to stay in a hut on the island where the lack of security meant we had stayed awake most of the night praying we wouldn't be attacked, taking two speed boat rides driven by adrenaline junkies, accepting a cockroach infested dorm because we were too tired to inspect it properly and sunbathing all day on Mucura without adequate sun protection and then complaining we couldn't move.

When Devi left Colombia to go home on Saturday 2nd April I was gutted. I'd loved travelling with her and now nearing the end of my trip I was alone again and not sure what to do in my remaining time. I wanted to end my travels on a high but I wasn't sure how quite to accomplish this. This is what happens when you purposefully don't finish your travel spreadsheet itinerary! I ended up wandering the streets of Santa Marta contemplating whether I should do the 5 day Lost City Trek or just chill out on the beach, reading a book and getting tanned. The latter certainly seemed very appealing, particularly as a lot of people had told me the trek was quite hardcore in the humidity of the jungle. After eating a huge delicious mango off the street I felt quite energetic so decided to book myself onto the trek the next day. I also booked plane tickets to Bogota and Medellin for my final/Birthday weekend, I knew it would be tiring but it was my last weekend in South America and I wanted to go out with a bang!

The Lost City Trek was INCREDIBLE!! I've since read the travel advice given by the UK's foreign office on their website, it states "we advise against all but essential travel to the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, including the ‘Lost City’. Armed groups are still active in this area, there is extensive cultivation of illegal drugs and the risk of kidnap remains high. While tour organisers may assure you that the trek to the ‘Lost City’ is safe, we do not believe it to be so". I don't want to be flippant about what can and does happen to some travellers, and clearly our Government has access to a lot more information about the country than I do but from my experience, and after talking to a number of travellers I met in Colombia, many of these risks seem to be exaggerated and based on incidents that happened several years ago. The area is actively patrolled by the Colombian army (one of whom gave me his email address haha) and the tour groups involve the local indigenous communities so that they aren't exploited. Interestingly the people who did the trek with me also checked their Government's advice, Australia for example didn't advise against doing the trek. Anyway, my point is I'm glad I did this trek, I saw some of the most beautiful scenery in Colombia. It was also a demanding trek so completing it felt like a personal challenge. Basically it involved 3 solid days steep climbing up and around a mountain, through lakes, over rocks and up 1,200 steps until you reached the Lost City ("Teyuna" as the locals call it). The fourth day was especially hard as you combined all the walking in days 2 and 3, and while a lot was downhill the landscape and rocks meant it put a lot of pressure on your knees. Each day was spectacular, the abundance of plants and wildlife incredible, and just when you thought you couldn't sweat anymore we would get to a lake we could jump into. A further highlight was seeing an indigenous village and meeting some of the native Indian people, the children were just beautiful. Our tour guide and cooks were both Colombian, only spoke Spanish, although Omar would purposefully speak slowly and clearly so that he was easier to understand. We also had someone in our group who could speak Spanish well so helped to translate a lot about the history of the Lost City which was fascinating. I had a lot of fun with the other people in my group which was again Muy Internacional with two guys from Austria, one from Poland, one from the States and a couple from Australia. I was also really happy with the food we were given, our cook actually knew how to season food...it came in large quantities and was delicious. I was sad when the trek was over, but also exhausted. And with 37 mosquito bites, legs like a sumo wrestler and a rucksack full of clothes wet with sweat I was glad to leave the jungle. That night we all cleaned up and went out for good food and drinks in Taganga.

My final weekend in Colombia was brilliant. On returning from the trek last Friday 8th I met a lovely girl in my hostel, we ended up going dancing in a club called La Puerta in Santa Marta with another very funny guy from the UK. On the Saturday I took a flight to Medellin via Bogota, I was driven to the airport in Santa Marta by the most lovely taxi driver who wanted to practice his English as much as I wanted to practice my Spanish. When he found out I loved the reggaeton he got very excited and played me his personal CD of hits which was very funny. I was sad to leave Santa Marta and its people. When I got to the hostel in Medellin they had no spare beds in dorms left so for the first time in three months I had my own private room. This was great to chill out in and not be conscious over the security of my belongings but not brilliant for socialising so I ended up speaking to people in the internet area and at the bar! I spent the Saturday night with Colombians who wouldn't let me pay for anything, I tried to learn Salsa and reggaeton and saw in my Birthday, it was brilliant fun. On my last day in Medellin my Colombian friend Sebastian insisted on driving me to the airport, even though it was over an hour outside the city. We went via the mountains which provided a spectacular view over Medellin and then ate amazing cake in a pretty town nearby called San Antonio de Pereira. Once I arrived in Bogota I stayed again with my friends Juan and Carlos who took me out for a beautiful and expensive dinner and insisted on covering the whole bill. The weekend was a perfect example of the generous and hospitable nature of Colombians who want you to feel at home in their country.

Have also posted photos of my whole trip for those not on Facebook!