June 9 - June 13, 2008
It has been a great time in Merida. I spent three nights at couchsurfer Leri´s and her boyfriends place that was a pretty small place (June 9-11), but a good experience like always. I had my first Cachapa with them which is like a corn pancake wrapped with cheese (queso con mano) and steak and it was amazing. We had it at this little restaurant that made it right on the stove top for us. This little restaurant actually does really well, and the owner is there from 6 am to 11 pm making breakfast, lunch, and dinner. The night before we dined there he actually got held up by gun point at 11 pm when he was closing. The two people I was with both eat there all the time, so the owner told them that they found one of the two guys that took the money, and the cops brought the guy back to the restaurant so he could pound the crap out of him. I thought that was pretty sweet that at least if they took all of his money, he had the opportunity to pound the piss out of the guy!
After three nights with Leri and Manuel, I spent one night with couchsurfer David (June 12) because this girl Dani from couchsurfing talked me into going to the annual couchsurfing meeting up northeast about 8 hours to Choroni (a small little town inside of Maracay...just south of Caracas). There are many people attending and I guess we are all camping on the beach. I originally planned on leaving from here back to Colombia on Wednesday morning, but now decided to attend this event (leaving Friday evening June 13).
One of the days while in Merida I went on the Teleferico, and it was quite an experience. The cable car Merida is a system of four (4) Teleféricos series (different levels), which provides a displacement of 12.5 km to overcome the gap between the city of Merida (1640 m) and Pico Espejo (4765 m) and be regarded as the tourist cable car highest mountain and across the world. The view from the top of the mountains up at the highest peak was amazing. I was up there with sandles on and people thought I was crazy because they were so cold up there. It really was not cold at all. One girl even had a ski mask on because she was so cold. I thought it was pretty funny because people kept on asking me if I was cold.
A few of the days while I was in Merida I hung out with couchsurfer Dani and a few of her friends. They were all so nice, and made me feel at home. They drove me around the town and definitely made my time in Merida more enjoyable.
My bus leaves Merida tonight (FRI June 13) at 930 pm and then I will arrive the town early in the morning on Saturday. Then I will be heading back to Colombia either on Sunday or Monday.
