A Couple of Nights in Armenia

Before arriving in Colombia, we thought the only Armenia that existed was the country that borders Turkey and competes in the Eurovision Song Contest, but, it turns out that it is also the name of a “medium-sized” city and the capital of the Quindio Department in the Andes Region. Armenia was a three-hour microbus journey from Cali and is one of the main coffee-growing regions in the country. Jason was in heaven to finally experience some “good” coffee.

When we arrived, we wandered around the city in search of food, fun and some coffee for Jason. We walked away with full bellies but unfortunately there wasn't a great deal of beauty or fun to be found in the city. Two out of three ain't bad. Unlike Cali, our personal security didn't feel threatened; well, relatively unthreatened. Though, the streets had its fair share of dodgy characters.

The next day, we went to the nearby theme park dedicated to coffee, Parque del Café. Well as they say, when in Rome. The theme park is about 12 kilometres from Armenia and occupies an area of 96 hectares that includes rides, shows, two telefericos, a train and a small coffee plantation. One of the aims of the theme park is to promote and to keep alive Colombian coffee culture. One of the attractions includes horse-riding and, like a child at a country fair, Jason mounted the horse and joined his new riding club. At first, Jason thought that he'd been given the grumpy, old horse with attitude, as it bucked a bit to begin with. But Ricky thought it was probably a match made in heaven. Jason survived the adventure and made it back before the torrential rain set in, bringing an end to our day and bringing an end to our stay in Armenia.

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