Full of expectations, we crossed the Colobian border. In Europe, the country is mostly know for its drugcartels (Pablo Escobar), kidnappinngs, shootings/killings and the farc. But lately there has not been a lot of (bad) news about the country.

From other cyclists we had only heard good things about the country; that the people are very friendly, helpful and hospitable. So we looked forward to it!

The expectations all came true. It’s a beautiful country to cycle through; nature is beautiful and so green that it almost hurts your eyes. The people really are very friendly, helpful and hospitable. A large part of the country is at low altitude which makes it very tropical (hot). It looks tropical, temperatures are tropical hot and humid, it smells tropical and the sounds and animals are tropical. Here we felt like cycling through the jungle much more than in Ecuador. The higher parts are mountainous with beautiful views of the valleys.

We were in the country the whole month of October. In October it’s officially rainy season in Colombia. Fortunately we didn’t have a lot of rain. It was very hot and the first rain we had was when we were about halfway the country, and it rained all night and day. After that day, we just had a lot of rain during the nights and it would be dry again during the days. Only during our last 2 days of cycling to Cartagena and the days in the city we had a few bad, tropical rain/thunderstorms.

We were offered many things while cycling and almost everybody waved, honked and/or gave us the ‘thumbs up’ from the cars, motorcycles or just from the front porch. We were offered drinks, (energy) snacks, light for bike and food. Hospitality also was great. It was hard to find an affordable hotel in Cali, so we asked a lady on a bike if she knew one. We ended up staying in the house where she rents a room and she cooked for us. We could have stayed with people in Santa Barbara, but we had already checked in to a hotel. But we did get food from them. And of course Medellin, where we stayed with Dennis and his cycle friends.

Despite of the poorness, which is not as obvious as in Bolivia or Peru but  definitely there, the people always seem to be cheerful, happy and generous. There was music everywhere. It came from the houses where people take their speakers outside on the front porch to be able to listen to the music and have as many people as possible listen with them.  When the neighbors do the same, you’ll hear a mix of songs. Also on the busses the radio would be played loud and many people, including the busdriver would sing along.

But there also was a different side, mainly in the south. There were no prices on the merchandise in many small stores, so we never knew if we paid the right price. We often had the feeling that they made us pay a ‘tourist price’, but of course we couldn’t prove it. We did walk out of a place a few times when the price really was way too high. But there also were honest retailers; once we paid too much for a bottle of Coke without knowing and a while later the lady came back with the change.

There were many military and police checkpoints on the roads. Especially in the south, in the Cauca valley. Every bridge was guarded by soldiers and the police also had many checkpoints along the way. They carry many and very large guns and the army build complete bunkers and shelters made out of sandbags next to the bridges. We never felt scared or unsave because of this. They all were very friendly and waved or gave us ‘thumbs up’. Some came over for a chat and a picture. We never felt unsave, anywhere in the country. But especially in the Cauca valley (the area between Popayan and Cali) is known as guerilla country, which explains all the checkpoints. When we were in Medellin, we saw on the news that there was a roadblock in that area. Fortunately, we missed that.

On the roads, but especially in the towns and cities, the roads were infested with motorcycles again. We sometimes felt like cycling in an ants nest. In Ecuador there were more cars than motorcycles, but in Colombia it was the other way around again. The country is poorer than Ecuador, so the people don’t have money to buy a car and buy a motorcycle. Apart from that, a motorcycle is more convenient and cooler in a tropical climate.

Because Colombia is a poor country, we saw things on the road that probably even our grandparents haven’t witnessed. We saw old carts being pulled by a horse or donkey, donkeys and horses loaded with things like a bunch of wood, bags of potatoes or other things, old fashioned milk churns and people. Aslo very old busses that were used as trucks as well, garbage next to the road, milkmen with churns on carts and vegetable sellers with carts.

There were many hotels alongside the road, only not all of those hotels were meant for tired cyclists to get a good and long night of sleep. Many of these hotels had a big wall around it and sheltered parking spaces. The names and logo’s showed what they were there for; they called themselves ‘love hotels’. You don’t pay for a night or a day, but for 1,3,6 or 12 hours and you pay (a lot) extra for extra hours.

The food was a lot like all the countries before; a lot of chicken and rice/fries, also mainly in the south. The chifa restaurants we loved so much in Peru, were hard to find in Colombia and if we had found one, the food would be very expensive. So we had a lot of chicken and rice in the beginning. But in Medellin we got to know ‘bandeja’, a big plate full with all kinds of things; meat, rice, beans in sauce, fried banana, salad, eg. Big portions which at least filled us up. We didn’t eat a lot of chicken and rice after that.

We love the (deep)fried banana, lulo juice (lulo is a kind of fruit) and agua panela (sugarwater made with sugar from sugarcane which tastes like lemonade).