Bogota or bust...

Hola!

Well Melissa how would you say Bogota was?
Dog ridden?
That about sums it up for me too. Oh an there were homeless men with open festering wounds as well.
For my sake and yours you should stop bringing that up...
Ok, well I guess there was more to it than that. There was the Museo de Oro (Gold Museum) which was pretty cool. It gave us some incites in the development of gold smithing in Colombia, and the importance of gold to the pre-colonial people in their traditions and trade.
There was my favourite exhibit by a local artist whose work included a room with a tv playing a dvd of a chicken and a series of portraits of a naked one legged man.
Oh yeah you mean the installation art at the National Art Gallery. I liked the carpet that was made of Hojas de Cocha. (cocaine leaves) What about that nice cop who gave us the tour of the Police Museum?
The runaway who was caught by the police and forced into service? The one who after 5 months in the jungle was shot by guerrillas and got to spend the remainder of his year long service as a tour guide? He was cool.
His English wasn't bad either. I guess my favorite part of Bogota was the scenery and the cheap beer. For 1300 pesos or about 60 cents you can enjoy some of the finest Colombian cerveza. The city is about twice the size of Toronto, and the architecture is fairly modern in the downtown core. It only takes about 5 minutes of walking away from the city center to find the homiest slums this side of the equator.
I think a highlight for me was seeing a man pour a bag of urine out of his car door. We may or may not have been in the best neighbourhood at that point.
Its true there are rough spots that you have to be careful of, but there are also a lot of nice ones. One in particular was Montserrat. It is only reachable by cable car, funicular (hill trolley) or incredibly long/steep walk. We chose hill trolley.
It was a pretty cool ride with a great view but I was distracted by a sketchy looking guy behind Chris who I was sure was going to pickpocket him. And the thought that if this cable snaps we're really in for a ride.
You didnt tell me about the pick pocket! The ride was a little unnerving I guess... for some of us. By the time we reached the top we were at an altitude of something over 10,000 feet and we found the air a little thin. (I thought I was just out of shape) At the top there was the oldest house in Bogota, a church, a restaurant, and about 50 "stuff" vendors.
The view was well worth the trek and cost though, we got some amazing pictures and enjoyed some delicious mayonnaise flavoured chips. Yum!
Our hostel was great. We were steps away from the financial district, and governmental area. These of course were not marked by signs but the number of police and soldiers that were on every corner. By the time you get to the road outside the presidential home you have to submit to mandatory bag searches. A guy with a automatic rifle told us to get of the side walk and walk in the street. He said it in Spanish though.
This is after Christopher had his face pressed up against the fence and was taking a picture of buddy´s house.
Yeah... My bad. Lets just say Bogota is a little different than Ottawa as far as national capitals go. We would have been a little lost when we arrived if it hadn´t been for our friends John, and Shar who met us at the airport. Shar had been in Central America since mid November, and John joined her just before Christmas so their expertise (Spanish speaking) was key to getting to bed the first night.
Unfortunately we only had one night with them before they left for Ecuador to meet up with another friend Chrissy. We hope we'll be able to all meet up again.
Well that about wraps up Bogota. We´re on The carribbean coast right now. Check in next week some time for all the news on Santa Marta and Cartagena.
Hasta Luego!

PICTURES OF BOGOTA