Reflections

Well I have now been back in Toronto for 5 days; it has been really nice to see my family, but the fucking snow and negative temperatures that have greeted me have NOT been welcome.  Everyone keeps saying spring is in the air.  They're crazy.  This place is cold and grey, the trees don't have leaves, the buildings are characterless, and the streets are not alive.  There's no spirit in Toronto...it's just a boring, dull, soulless city.  That's freezing.  I was walking yesterday in the street wearing a sweater, wool socks, boots, a winter coat, a scarf, gloves, and earmuffs, and a gust of wind came and cut through all of those layers making me feel like I was being sliced with ice.  I swear I'm going to get hypothermia here.

But enough about how shitty Toronto is...I have a job here for the summer, which should get me enough cash to escape this wretched place for another winter.  I'm already planning it; maybe teaching English in Mexico.  Anyways, with all the places I've been and all the experiences I've had, some have stood out more than others.  So here is a list of tops...cities, museums, etc. from my last 5 months in Latin America.

Top Cities Visited:
1. Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
2. Mexico (DF), Mexico
3. Buenos Aires, Argentina
4. Valparaiso, Chile
5. Oaxaca, Mexico

Worst Cities Visited:
1. Uyuni, Bolivia
2. Lima, Peru
3. Quito, Ecuador
4. La Serena, Chile
5. Cuzco, Peru

Top Museums Visited:
1. Museo Nacional de Antropología, DF, Mexico
2. Museo de Arte Indigena, Sucre, Bolivia
3. Museu de Arte Moderna, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
4. Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires, BA, Argentina
5. Centro Cultural Paço Imperial, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Most Idiotic Statements from Other Travelers:
1. (in response to me saying that I'm from Canada) "Really?  You don't look Canadian!"
2. (in response to me correcting someone that I'm not American) "Whatever, it's practically the same place."
3. (in response to me telling someone I want to work with indigenous populations in Canada) "There are indigenous people in Canada?!"
4. "Chinese medicine cures everything, even caner."
5. "I think I'll just drink the tap water once, get sick and then I'll be immune to it for the rest of my travels."

Most Common Countries I Meet Other Travelers from:
1. Australia
2. Germany
3. Israel
4. Netherlands
5. Britain

Top 5 things I wish I had brought with me:
1. iPad/Tablet/other "smart" device.  So many hostel computers are shit.  I could have used so many hours on bus rides more productively...the last thing I want to do when I get to a new city is to go sit in an internet cafe for an hour.
2. Coffee, filters, drip.  For the biggest producers of coffee in the world, it's really hard to get a cup of decent coffee in the land of Nescafe.
3. Mini speakers.  The number of times I blasted my iPod, and put the headphones into tupperware to amplify them...
4. Collapsible bowl for washing clothes.  Yea, I had to borrow pots from the kitchen a number of times for this purpose.
5. Sleeping bag liner.  I had one with me, and then with a fit of "I HAVE TOO MUCH SHIT" I mailed it home.  Biggest mistake.  Perfect for cold bus rides, gross rented sleeping bags, and freezing cold hostels at high elevations.

La Ciudad Perdida y Parque Nacional Tayrona (19-26 marzo)

Ciudad Perdida was sick!  Unfortunately I left my camera in Bogotá (I have it back now), so I had to buy a shitty film camera in Santa Marta the day before I left.  Other than a few shots Fabian sent me, I have to wait for the film to get developed to see any pictures.  It was supposed to be a 5 day trek through the Colombian jungle, but according to the schedule we were supposed to be finished hiking each day by noon or 2 pm at the latest, so after the first day we convinced our guide to let us do it in 4 instead.  It's all uphill to get there which was pretty tiring, but at least there were mules carrying our food, so we didn't have to have too much gear on our backs.  There were only 4 people in our group as well which was nice--a german couple, and Fabian from Switzerland.  We saw some amazing landscapes, and passed by a few indigenous villages.  Some of the kids have to walk over an hour each day to get to school; our guide grew up in one of these communities and used to have to do this!  In the afternoon of the second day, one of our river crossings reached up past my knees--apparently during rainy season, this river crossing can be as high as people's shoulders!!  On the third day, we woke at 5:30 in the morning to climb to the lost city.  It was only about a 40 minute hike to the base, but from there we had to climb 1250 steps to get to the city.

It was amazing once we got up to the top; our group only had 4 people, and the other group that arrived the same day as us had 15, so at the entire ruin site there were only 20 people, plus the other group left before us, so we had the place to ourselves.  There was though a military base, because apparently a few years ago the FARC was targeting the ruins here (I'm unconvinced...it's pretty fucking remote).  There are a total of 40 soldiers at the base and they are stationed there for 6 months.  Don't worry though, they have satellite TV, so they don't get too bored.  The city was huge!  At it's height, it had a population of 2000 people, and we saw the base of the homes of both the wealthy and poor, as well as the cultural centre.  Each family had 2 houses: one for each of the sexes.  And on certain religious or cultural celebrations, all the men would stay up all night in a special building built solely for this purpose.  It was amazing how untouched the ruins were; you can enjoy the beauty of a place so much more knowing you've worked to see it, rather than just sitting in some transportation for a few hours.  The fact that you have to hike at least 2 days in the jungle to get there makes it that much more special once you get there.

On our hike back to Mamey, we stopped at a number of waterfalls and rivers to go swimming.  It was a lot easier on the way back, as the majority of it was downhill haha.  We were really happy we were able to save a day on the hike, as it gave us an extra day for the National Park.  We finished the hike on Friday, and Saturday morning, Fabian and I had planned on going to Tayrona.  We ended up getting a really late start though, and after doing our various chores, we didn't even get to the entrance of the park til about 4:30.  And from there, it was an hour walk to Arecifes, the finca we wanted to stay at, so we arrived just before sunset.  We were a little concerned about everything being full due to Santa Semana, but luckily the finca had space.

Once we had set up all our stuff, we went for a walk to the beach; it was so beautiful!  We just watched the waves and felt the sand between our toes for awhile before heading back to the campsite.  The following morning we decided to hike up to what we thought was a mirador.  The map they gave us was really shitty though, and everyone was giving us different time estimates on how long it took to get there.  From Arecifes, we walked to La Piscina, and then Cabo San Juan, which was about 45 minutes on the beach, and from there the hike started.  It was supposedly an hour and a half, but we did it in an hour, and were kinda disappointed when we got up there.  It was just some dinky ruins (nothing in comparison to La Ciudad Perdida), and there was no mirador!  It was still a nice little hike, but it was too bad we didn't get a nice panoramic view of the beaches and ocean.  Once we climbed back down we went to the beach at Cabo San Juan which was nice, but pretty crowded due to Santa Semana.  The beaches though are so gorgeous--Lost was filmed at the beaches in this national park.  The water was bright turquoise, and the most exquisite rock formations were everywhere!  Our final day there, we walked first to Cabo San Juan, and then about an hour past there...the further you got from the fincas, the less people there were at the beaches.  At the very end of Playa Brava, there were very few people, so it was almost like getting the beach to ourselves.  But we couldn't stay for long, as we had to catch the bus back to Santa Marta that night.

Tuesday was my final day in Colombia.  Fabian took me to the airport, and it was really sad to say goodbye.  From there I flew to Cali, took an 11 hour bus overnight to Ipiales, crossed the border, and took a bus from Tulcan back to Quito.  I had 1 day to kill in Quito, before I finally had to head out to the airport on Thursday night to fly back to Canada.  I wish I could have stayed in Colombia...