Bogotá

After getting up we stored our luggage and then made our way to hike up to Monserrat, a popular mountain overlooking the whole valley where Bogotá is nestled. There are several options to get to the top, one is of course walking the other two are taking the cable car or furnicular.

We decided to walk up because we had sufficient time and you enjoy the views more if you did something to earn them 😁 The walk from our hotel to the start of the trail already took more than 4km with some elevation. The trail was perfectly maintained and quite a lot of people already walked up at 9 in the morning. I had misread the first sign thinking it was 2000 metres ascend but I didn't really think about it... At the first sign I realized that the 2000m are distance and not ascend, which obviously makes sense but I was still relieved 😌 The walk up was not too tough and the view from the top was amazing despite the cloud cover (which is apparently normal for Bogotá). We took some pictures, looked at the church and walked through the stands on the top. But there wasn't much more to see and we weren't hungry so we went back down and into the old city, La Candelaria.

The little alleys are full with amazing graffiti artwork next to colonial style buildings. The whole area has a very hip charm and we enjoyed the whole vibe, it also seemed very calm for a Saturday afternoon. From there we continued on to the Botero art museum and it was soo much fun! His artwork is so unique and interesting, the scenes so normal yet so remarkable. I'm not very artsy but I loved it ☺️🤩 Afterwards we relaxed a bit in the patio of the museum and bought the tickets for the night bus to Medellín. Then we continued our exploration of the city to the Plaza Bolivar with the significant buildings surrounding it. We made a quick lunch stop at a typical Colombian restaurant and for dessert I tried a Oblea with cheese, cream, mora and some sweet creamy stuff 😁 It was really good und thanks to the cream with a fresh taste. Just as we started to eat the forecasted rain starting pouring down.

Luckily we were already in the entrance of our next stop for the day, the Museum of Gold 🪙 Unlike the one in Santa Marta this one did cost an entry fee but the dollar was easily worth it! We spent more than three hours with the interesting exhibitions about metals, their significance and how the different indigenous people had handled them. It had the perfect mix of showcasing artifacts and providing the information to them for us. Maybe I'll turn into a museum person after all 😅

We walked back to the hotel in the late afternoon to grab our luggage and continued on to the bus terminal. Our bus departed at 10 so we had almost 4 hours which we spent sorting some clothes (the warmer ones are necessary right now!☔) and having dinner. In the waiting area was a TV with news running and it showed just then that there was heavy rain in Medellín with floodings 🙈 After boarding the bus the driver walked through the whole bus and filmed us... When Julia asked what for he said that it's necessary to identify the victims in case the bus crashes 🤐🙈 With almost no delay we started our trip and we are supposed to arrive at 08:00 in the morning...Read more