I met up with David's colleague-friend, Ana Maria in Bogota and joined her on a road trip to Medellin. The 12+ hour journey was an eventful one as Ana Maria, a bubbly Bogota-transplant from Medellin, experienced one car-related hiccup after another.
First, there was the long-weekend, rush hour traffic to grapple with. It took her longer than usual to leave Bogota by 4 PM Friday. To control traffic congestion in the capital city, the government imposed a time ration of cars allowed to be driven on the road (each car has 2 "no-drive" days a week between 4-7 PM and 7-9 AM, and Ana Maria's curfew days were allotted Tuesdays and Fridays). She apparently drove "illegally" for 10 minutes that Friday before we crossed Bogota's border at 4:10 PM - a long 10 minutes for Ana Maria who had to dodge a few cops near the border.
Next stop was to fill up the tank and check the front passenger tire which was almost flat. Turned out, the tire had a few holes that needed to be patched up and this was done in a jiffy. With that out of the way, we set off and before long, day turned to night and the weather turned cold. Her windshield started to fog up and she had to use the wipers (with wiper fluid) many times to clear the glass. Eventually, she had to stop at a small town to get the glass cleaned with soap and water. A guard on duty at a local club house did the job for her. That was my first encounter with Colombian hospitality. Everywhere we went, local Colombians were there to assist - without expecting anything in return (although a small tip didn't hurt to brighten their day).
The road was a two-lane highway which meant plenty of passing of slower vehicles (in particular of large trucks). This was made doubly hard and dangerous on a windy and hilly el camino where landslides were also common - I witnessed my first ever landslide remnant on this journey. There were also road constructions and bridge improvements that added traffic hours to our viaje. After an exhausting first part of the journey, we rested the night at the small town of La Honda. Dinner was a simple fried chicken and rice (below).
The next day, we set off early at 6:30 AM for Medellin. It was another 6 hours before we arrived at Colombia's third biggest city. The day drive to Medellin was pleasant with sights of beautiful lush green hills and valleys. We passed several small towns where I saw many bananas and papayas (all locally grown) for sale. The weather was also nice and sunny with clear blue skies - couldn't have asked for anything better. It was hard to imagine that this stretch of the hilly forested road used to be dangerous with FARC rebels kidnapping locals and foreigners (as many as 10 a day) for ransom or political bargaining. However, since Alvaro Uribe took over as Colombia's President 6 years ago, an earnest effort to get tough with the FARC kidnappers had produced positive results, culminating in the release of Ingrid Betancourt in June this year. Today, the road is safe, thanks to the national guards who patrol the road on foot at various points of the highway. The guards were mostly young men, many of them did not look older than 20, who were serious about their duty and patriotic to serve their country and people; and the locals reciprocated with love and appreciation for their service and conviction.
Above left: Traditional Medellin breakfast - Arepa (buttered and salted) with queso (cheese) and eggs; Above right: Ana Maria drinking hot chocolate (for breakfast) from a big bowl
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