So yesterday was not the straightforward start to the trip that I´d hoped for.
After a lovely 4am wakeup call, I managed to get delayed at every single airport I had the misfortune to visit - starting with an hour on the tarmac at Heathrow swiftly followed by a 3 hour delay in Paris (for no apparent reason). Unfortunately that second delay was rather key, as it meant that I landed in Bogota just about in time to see my connecting flight departing......without me.
Feeling rather weary and grimy I approached the less than enthused Avianca ground staff and through a combination of miming and broken spanish managed to find out that I had been put on a flight departing just after 10pm - a paltry 4 hours from now. Fantastic.
Obviously those of you that know me are aware that waiting patiently is NOT my strong suit and Bogota domestic airport is hardly the stuff that travellers´ dreams are made of. I likened it to a cold, draughty, oversized tin shack. With a lot of donut eateries and not much else. I counted 3 different ones, out of about 6 ´restaurants´ in total, which seemed a particulary high ratio.
I eventually made it to Cartagena just after midnight - a good 5 hours after I´d planned, and 24 hours after leaving the comfort of my bed earlier that day. I also was not feeling overly confident at arriving in Colombia after midnight, with my senses not particularly alert.....in fact I was just praying that the hostel reception was indeed 24 hours as I was PRETTY sure I´d seen on the website......
Thankfully my Primark memory had in fact done me justice for once and the hostel was open when I got in. The taxi driver blatantly ripped me off (charging me double, I believe) but at this point I was just relieved to be within falling distance of a bed and too tired to care!
Anyway today started much better, waking to blue skies and a tropical 30 degrees.
The hostel is right in the heart of the old colonial town, which is a maze of cobbled streets full of colourful buildings, cafe´s and street vendors, all surrounded by 12km of fortified city walls.
You can´t really go more than a couple of blocks without seeing stalls selling fresh fruit, empanadas, or my personal favourite "arepas de queso". These basically seem to be some kind of really creamy mashed potato mixed with a LOT of cheese, shaped into a large pattie shape and then cooked (ok, fried) on either side so that the cheese goes all crispy. It´s one of the best (and cheapest, at 50p) things that I´ve had in my mouth.
On a slightly healthier note, the fruit vendors are also pretty special. They have a selection of mangos, pineapples, papayas, melons etc on display, you pick what you want and they´ll cut it up on the spot for you and about 15 seconds later you´ve got a huge tropical fruit salad - again for about 50p.
Definitely could get used to this....about the biggest decision I have to make today is whether to have cocktails on the hostel terrace, or go on something called a Chivas ´party bus´ - you get a tour of the town and free booze, doesn´t sound too bad...
