Burner Billy Adventures: Waking up to Colombia in your cup

Medellin, oh te amo. What a great city!! If people from 20 years heard me say that, they would look at me like I was a idiot. But, really the city is gorgeous. Laying between two mountain ranges, Medellin is vibrant, fun, and cultural diverse. People have been coming from all over the world to see this place and end up staying there longer than expected. Poblado is an area where most of the fun activities take place, but there other cool places like the botanical gardens, the Arvi park that you can literally take by tram from middle of the city, and Parque Barrio were you can see Botero sculptures around the area. The night life on a weekend in Medellin is incredible and thanks to my pal Alex, his brother Max showed me how it works. Being the entrepreneur mixed with his Midwest hospitality, Max was quite the person to know in Medellin if you wanna have a good time and because of it, I was able to stay up until 5am in the morning without thinking twice about it. But, sometimes the partying is too much and I decided to take a day/night trek to Guatape which is 2 hours outside of Medellin. This man-made lake supports 70% of the power supply in Colombia, but it's looks like a natural atop the Piedra del Penol. Staying at hostel El Encuentro, which is owned by a friend of a friend of friend from SF (typical, right?), it had the best view in Guatape. Like most places, it was a home converted into a hostel, but it was on the outskirts of the town that was extremely quiet and peaceful (this is not always the case. On weekends, it's getaway for lots of people). However, thanks to our hostel hostess from Cali, Colombia (Lina), we hit the town with two Swiss (Marco and Stephan), an Irish chica (Alannah) and this American (me..duh). We ate arepas, drank aquardiente (Colombia specialty, and is said to provide zero hungovers as the locals claim), and danced salsa with the help our local guide. It was really hard to leave the next day. The group made it really special. However, everything comes to an end and back in Medellin, I spent a lovely (that's for all the brits who read my blog) night celebrating a Max's birthday, and staying up in the wee hours exchanging stories with Colombian Amy. She was a kind listener. It was extremely had to get up the next day and I wanted to continue my lust of love for Medellin, but I had a date with Bobby and Jess in Cartagena before they flew back to the states.

Days turn to weeks and weeks turn to months, and seeing Bob and Jess again felt like years! It was good to be reunited with them, because we have so much in common, it's easy to get deep in conversation without even blinking an eye. Knowing they were heading out in a few days back for the states, we headed to the beautiful beach of Playa Blanca. Now, most people take a boat straight from Cartagena to Playa Blanca, which would obviously be the easiest, but we decided to do it the different way; a local bus, then literally a 5 min ride on a platoon boat, finally a motortaxi to our destination. Total cost 19,000 pesos (or $9.50). Tara and our new friend Desiree joined us for the venture. After the bad billpañol to negotiate our motortaxi ride (I thought he said "cinco pesos" but he told me after the ride "quince". Never let someone who can't understand spanish, let alone his native tongue, do the negotiations) and reeling through the numerous options of places to sleep especially with the over zealous Colombians eager for you to stay at their place because it's "barco" (lower) than the others, we settled on Hugo's place and I'm glad we did because it had "coktails" written on it's sign. Yes please! The weather was so hot that just sitting in the Caribbean Sea was enough to make a grown, hairy man like myself happy. It felt like being back in the beaches of Laniki in Hawaii. Pure satisfaction! And, thank god we landed at Hugo's place, because I never would have met Sebastian, our new friend who's from Argentina, speaks spanish AND english, and loves a big couple of mata in the morning like the rest of the Argentinians! Playa Blanco was a relaxing place and because of the group I was surrounded by, made it even more special. Two things I learned on Playa Blanco, Argentinians love to negotiate for a much lower price than offered (Sebastian got us all a lobster lunch for 7 USD!), and women in Latin America wear way more revealing bikini bottoms. I couldn't tell you which lesson was more impressive, but one thing for sure, staring out at the blue sea with nothing to worry about is utterly easy.

After a 1/3 the price boat ride back to Cartagena (yes, they charge you more to go to Playa Blanco, then to get back from there), I walked around the ambiguously large Castillo de San Felipe de Barajas with Sebastian, got a mud bath in some liquid volcano with a bunch of Americans from jeeersey, and took in some zamba and pizza in the Getsemani district, however the elephant in the room was around the corner, the time to say goodbye to Bob and Jess. Bob has been straight forward with me that he's not coming back to SF after this trip. I didn't believe him at first, but it seemed more inevitable the more we talked in Cartagena. Knowing that our wonderful friendship that started in SF will continue forever, it just won't be the same without him around the corner. So with simple hung after getting money out of the ATM, we said our goodbyes, knowing this might be the end of a great run (It was completely harmless with zero emotions, so not like me). Then, without hesitation, Bob turned to the local right next to us and said "donde es 'crepes and waffles'?" Yup, food always on Bob's mind.

Back on my own again, but this time with my new spanish speaking pal Sebastian and fellow backpacker Tara (an upgrade to Bob and Jess), we ventured our way to Santa Marta, where it would be a quick pit stop before we headed to Tayrona national park. A lot of people stay in Taganga outside of Santa Marta because it's a small and buried in the beautiful Sierra Mountains, but we heard it was a crappy town and really were more interested in Tayrona, so we took pictures from the bus passing through the town. Gorgeous view from the window seat! After adding Rihanna and Julia to our entourage, we were on our way to Tayrona. Hearing that the food was expensive, we made ham and cheese sandwiches with a whole bunch of cookies. Well, that lasted us maybe half a day after the long hike into Tayrona, but it didn't stop us from the fact that park was aaaaaaa-amazing. The place is filled with views and beaches for days, and you can only camp there (or try to tough it out in a hammock. Ask Sebastian about it from Playa Blanco). We literally spent 3 days and 2 nights just laying (or piling if you talk some of American friends) on the beach, swimming in the warm Caribbean, playing the card game poderia (it's sort of gambling game, but no money is involved. You win points if you don't bet which was what Tara did every time. I, on the other hand, always bet wrong), and drinking really expensive can beers. There was nothing to do, but watch the waves pass the day. I will say we all walked out of Tayrona, relaxed and happy, but all of us looked forward to a hot shower, good meal, and delicious caipirinhas (that was joke because Colombians don't know how to make them since it's a Brazilian drink).

After crawling my way out of Tayrona, I had one night in Palomino (the dreamer hostel is fantastic, and there is not much else to do but hangout out at this backpacker's luxury place. Here you REALLY can walk on the beach for days), another in Cartagena (Sebastian and I got pulled over by the cops walking back to our hostel late in the night, but not too late. They were more than likely trying to find something illegal on us so that we paid them off. Sebastian told the one cop feeling me up, "solo inglés, no habla español", but I was managing to entertain the guy with all my currency from different countries found in my wallet. No translation required with dinero. The next day I was able to hangout with Amber and her friends from Armenia. I had the best burrito of my trip with them), and then finally back to Medellin. Once I got back to Medellin, I was able to do few more things before exiting Colombia, like enjoy a Saturday night in Poblado and take the tram to Park Arvi which could easily be done from the city. Park arvi is incredible. It reminded me of walking around Muir Woods in Marin county. Peaceful with lots of trees and it's directly in Medellin's backyard. Before venturing onto the bus for Bogota then my flight to Brazil, I was able to spend my last day with the remarkable Amy. We had a couple of glasses of vino and for the first time in long time, a heathly plate of hummus (is this hummus?). She's a sweet girl who came with me all the way to the bus stop, just to see me off (muchas gracias para la pulsera, Amy), but this night belong to my thoughts that I seek to grasp answers for while riding on the bus, and with the solar eclipse happening above me while I thought, I knew this trip, just the eclipse, comes once in a lifetime.

El gato in Medellin

Palacio de la Cultura

Medellin at sunset

Bomb ass latte in Medellin. Yeah, I took a picture of it.

Riding my bike up the Piedra del Penol and...

...it's pretty close as the "Best View in the World". (View from top of the rock)

Although, I'll take this one. (View from El Encuentro)

Yup, second pic of food or beverage. More coming. (This is an Arepa)

Governor Max cleaning up the streets

Great sando spot in Medellin. The people here rock.

My take on art in Medellin

Cartagena at night

Motorbiking to Playa Blanco

Playa Blanco.....and babes

You had me at "coktails"

The crew in Playa Blanco

$7 USD meal. Beat that McDonalds!

A bird, a boat, and a sunset (Photo cred Jessica)

This is for Deanna. It was terrible b/c the guy who sold it to me said it was fresh. It was not. Luckily, I got a fresh Colombian one from my pal at the La Casa de Habano

Tourist Bill

Mud Bath

I wanted to show this pic, because this is how other people in countries depict us. Michael Jackson, Jordan, Bald Eagle, and MONEY! Where's the GG bridge?? (Dreamer Hostel in Santa Marta)