The Northen Coast of Colombia

Yes our travels are nearly over only two days left so after leaving Tony we headed to the coast for some chill out time.  We took an overnight bus to Cartagena a very large town on the North coast. One side of it is all built up with high rise appartments and hotels for the tourists facing the beach and then there is the old city surrounded by old fourtress walls. These houses within the old town are beautiful with lots of climbing wall flowers hanging from balconies.

We moved onto Santa Marta which is further North on the coast and is a bit smaller than Cartagena but the beaches there are not so great. What did surprise us was how windy it was in the evening. It felt like a gale force storm in our hostel that night. The next day we moved onto Taganga which was just a 15min drive from Santa Marta and was once a small fishing village but has grown over the years to cater for the tourist. It was a great chill spot to base ourselves for the next few days and for me to get some proper swimming in.

We headed to a more secluded spot the first day where the local fishermen base themselves. At first we thought they have great life sitting around waiting all day and then haul it all in in the evening. However it was a different set up all together. What we couldn,t quite figure out was the guy in a wetsuit who stayed at the edge of the net with a snorkel watching down below. At first we thought maybe he was mending the net but when he stayed in the same spot all the time we thought he must be watching for fish. After three hours we got our answer. A roar went up from wetsuit man and the next thing there were 17 men hauling in the net and yes they had cought themselves a big one and a few tidlers. The big one was a salmon and would bring in the big bucks. As the afternoon progressed they had three more catches with less time between them but always the man in the water on lookout. Paul bought himself a catch of the day and we cooked it that evening in the hostal. His first time to fillet a fish and not a bad job with a seriously blunt knife.

The next day we stayed on Taganga beach itself as we had to leave that evening. It is always fun to people watch and the beach is a great place to do it especially if you are hiding behind sunglasses. Anyway this guy was very entertaning posing for his boy friend !!!!

Our next port of call was to head inland again to San Gil. A town well know for a bit of adventure. We were looking for more rafting and did the small rapids the first day and the wild rapids the next. We had another Irish chic with us on the second day and an English guy and Norwegian guy. We had a total blast and one hair raiser which did flip the raft over but that made it all the more fun. I don,t have those pics with me at the moment but will post them up soon.

So presently chilling in Ville de Leyva and gettin bikes tomorrow to go to Raquira which is well known for it,s terracotta pottery so looking forward to that.