After leaving Villa de Leyva behind, the next stop on the list was San Gil, adventure sports capital of Colombia, and supposedly about a 4 hour bus ride after connecting in Tunja.
Now I know I´ve made my fair share of complaints/comments about some of the íncidents I´ve had when travelling in Colombia, but this one particular bus ride left them all FAR behind. I think we knew it was not going to be a pleasant, relaxing bus ride within 5 minutes of setting off when the bus driver decided that NOW was definitely the best and safest time to put on his tie (I assume his uniform). No need to pull over....no no I´ll go with the ´both hands on the tie, zero hands on the wheel´ tried and tested method of driving....and overtaking.
I lost count of how many trucks we overtook on blind corners, sometimes two at a time. Bear in mind this is through mountainous country, which always adds a little frisson of excitement to the potential death by fiery bus crash.
We seemed to stop an awful lot, picking up random people from the side of the road, including one guy who happened to be carrying a HANDSAW which he oh-so-casually stored in the compartment above his seat. On two occasions we just stopped in the middle of the road so that a car/motorbike travelling in the opposite direction could take a wrapped package from the driver in exchange for some money...hmmmmmm.
Even being stopped by the police and getting a ticking off for trying to overtake the 257th truck on a blind corner wasn´t enough to deter him into perhaps obeying a couple of road rules. It was a hairy 5 hours to say the least.
Thankfully we did indeed arrive at San Gil and booked in for white water rafting the following day - level 4 and 5 rapids are not to be taken lightly, and I was quietly confident that I would definitely be falling out of the raft on multiple occasions. However, somehow managed to stay in, despite not hearing the guide shout ´Inside´ at one point, and only clicking when I looked around and I was the only one still sitting on the edge. Idiot. Really good fun though, although being at the front you definitely become something of a human shield for the rest of the boat, I was drenched.
We got back around 4 and as the ´lunch provided´ was basically fruit and crisps, we went in search of something more substantial. Ran into a guy from the hostel who was carrying a takeaway carton filled with hog roast, crackling and some kind of risotto/herb stuffing which looked pretty amazing. He gave us a vague description of where the pig on the spit was located (´down there in the square´) and we set off to find it. Well despite canvassing pretty much every part of the square we couldn´t find it, however by this point NOTHING but hog roast would do. Freemo´s attempts to ask some elderly local women sitting in the square ´Donde esta el gran cerdo?´ (Where is the big pig),´do you know where I can find a big pig?´ etc were only met with bemusement. To be honest if a stranger with a wild beard approached me asking where he could find a big pig, I´d definitely do the London thing and completely ignore the clearly crazy fool.
The next day we took a day trip to Barichara - voted Colombia´s prettiest town, and another colonial gem. Very pretty and VERY quiet. At first we thought it was because we had arrived during siesta time (1pm) but no.....when we left at 4ish it was still just as sleepy. Had an amazing meal at a restaurant called Color de Hormigas which specialises in the local delicacy of fried ants, however when we were there they were waiting for a delivery so I couldn´t try them (which I was actually genuinely disappointed about, believe it or not). The fish was delicious though...if a little pedestrian compared to deep fried insect.
After returning to San Gil we checked out the Parque Gallinereal which are the botanic gardens in San Gil and worth a visit - lots of old mans beard (lord of the rings) trees, parrots, wildlife etc.
We went back to the main square, had a beer and on exiting the bar realised we were pretty much right next to ´the big pig´ we´d been searching for yesterday. Must have been the only metre of the square we didn´t walk past....but worth the wait.
