Cabo de la Vela truck ride - Colombia

7 am on Uribia’s dusty main street. I dodge mopeds and trucks loaded with twinkling salt crystals. A withered man riding a bicycle with a trailer stacked with yellow oil containers barrels past me.
The street heaves with people loading battered trucks with provisions. I approach the burly men standing on top of a truck
“How much to Cabo de la Vela?” I ask.
“20,000 pesos”.
I agree and ask what time we are leaving.
The driver shrugs: “When the truck is full”.
I nod, smiling at the laid back Colombian schedule, and go to a nearby stall for breakfast. The teenager tending it ladles milky guanabana juice from a clear plastic box and hands me a plastic cup and a steaming egg arepa. I bite into the arepa, its thick cornmeal crust sticks to my palate and the sizzling egg filling explodes in my mouth.Nearby, a group of Wayuu women dressed in long shapeless tunics sit deftly crocheting multi-coloured mochilas. Their work-worn hands move, creating geometric patterns in the fabric, while barefoot semi-naked children swirl around their skirts, giggling.
I sip the cool guanabana juice while people approach the truck, each carrying something to take to Cabo de la Vela. Polystyrene cool boxes, crates of fruit, boxes of Colombiana beer, a cage full of chickens and a live goat are loaded and strapped onto the roof with worn down ropes.The truck is ready. I lever myself up into the back, where nine other people already sit. Their cinnamon faces peer at me as I perch on a crate covered with a grubby cushion. My thighs squeeze up against an old Wayuu man’s sinewy legs. A gaunt pregnant woman sits next to him, clutching her small bump over her brown tunic. Opposite me a toothless old woman stares at her. As the engine starts, the truck trundles to life and the other passengers reach up and grab the metal bars of the roof. I do the same. As I feel the wooden slats vibrate against my back, I prove everyone wrong who told me an expensive bus tour was the only way to Cabo de la Vela.