Home Again, Home Again

We've been home for about a week and a half.  We have our son Ron, daughter-in-law Shelley and grandson Wes here.  We have wonderful snow for skiing and snowmobiling.  We have many friends whom we're glad to see.  In other words, it's great to be home for Christmas and New Year's.

Mike insisted I do an update on the blog because we were astonished to find that our friends and family who had been reading my blog were surprised to find us in such a good mood when we got here!

But, things happen!  The decision to return was very traumatic, but once it was made, we both were calm and accepting. The last straw was Mike's back going out. The adventure cost a lot with the shipping of the rig, but fortunately, we haven't made too many other mistakes in our lives.  We did what was best for us, by pulling the plug on the trip.  Remember, our motto is:  "What's a plan, if you can't change it!"

Our rig is currently on a ship at Veracruz, MX and the docking date has progressively changed from December 25 to the 30th now.  We were going to leave with the Tracker (small car) and the tow hitch on January 2.  We may need to delay a bit to give them time to get the rig through customs before we try to pick it up in Galveston, TX.

From there, the plan is to find a campground and wash all of the clothes, if they are as mil-dewed as I'm afraid they will be.  (I packed a few clothes from the camper in a suitcase in Cartagena, Colombia for the trip home.  When I opened the suitcase in the hotel, only a few hours later! --I discovered the clothing was absolutely DAMP!  Such is the humidity there.)

From our campground in Texas, we currently plan to head down in to Mexico.  We will go to see friends and our favorite campground in Cd. Valles, west of Tampico, then probably on to San Miguel de Allende, maybe even a side trip to Mexico City, since we will not have Mollie, our dog,  along.  She is still with my sister, Kathy.

All for now -- I'll be back.

Impressions of Colombia

People

We’ve found the very largest percentage of people to be very friendly:  The lady at the restaurant high up the mountain road where we went to get away from the valley heat and ended up spending the night.  The people in Medellin yelling with delight “Where are you from?” from their car while both of us were going down the freeway,  The men asking many questions at the semi-trailer parking lot where we spent several nights, Karolina and her father, and others.

Another time I was in line at a Super Wal-Mart type store in Medellin.  Bagging items was one of the most beautiful girls I’d seen (in a country of absolutely stunning dark-haired beauties).  I tried not to stare, and we actually caught each other’s eye two or three times.  As I drew nearer, she smiled and told me in Spanish that I had beautiful (blue) eyes.  And my thoughts were that she was beautiful!

While on the subject of women, many young women here are truly gorgeous. And most have fabulous figures, shown off, of course, by the tightest pants imaginable. (Common with all latinas.)  But no matter, ALL women wear very tight pants regardless of their figure.  I feel pretty darn frumpy here in my loose pants! 

A lovely girl and her sister or daughter.

Here is another encounter that shows extreme kindness.

Last week, we thought we were meeting with our shipping agent in Cartagena on Monday, and we had many miles to cover from Honda.  Then two things happened.  First, we learned it was Saturday, not Sunday, and second,  Monday was a holiday.  So suddenly, we had come up with two extra days.

With that extra time, the next event played out beautifully:  We were parked by the side of the road in a small town, having just finished our morning coffee.  We were just ready to turn the key in the pickup, and a neatly dressed man left his late model car on the opposite shoulder and walked across the road to us and introduced himself:  Omar.

Not unusually, he was interested in the camper, asking several questions.  Then he wanted to introduce us to his wife, Carmen.  We all laughed as he threw a couple of pebbles across the busy road to get his wife’s attention in his car.  We gave them both a tour of the camper, then he said that he would like to invite us to his home that day.  Given our extra time, we said yes to the surprise invitation.

We followed him several miles on the main highway, then 4-5 miles on a side road to a small town.  They had a small modest concrete home on a side street of town.  Two abuelas (grandmas) and their two preschool age sons lived there as well.  Visiting, were lovely twin girls, age 11.

Omar and the twins.

Mike and Carmen

Omar and Carmen's sons

They asked what we would like to drink.  Mike and I have become addicted to “limonada” which is a fabulous limeade.  So I asked for either water or limonada.  Carmen laughed, walked out the open back door, reached up and plucked several limes off the tree overhanging the doorway!

Omar is a heavy equipment operator at a coal mine about 20 miles away.  His boss is American and he is quite interested in knowing English words for everything. He was very entertaining and funny.  We engaged the 11-year old girls too, as they seem to enjoy listening.

Soon Carmen served us a wonderful chicken-cilantro soup, with a leg in the bowl, along with a separate plate of rice. Omar and Carmen had to return the girls to their parents and left with them.  We visited with one grandmother, but the sweet other lady was so soft-spoken we couldn’t make out a thing she said. 

Mike and I took a walk and when we returned I was so terribly hot that I jumped in our shower.  When I came out, Omar and Carmen were back, visiting with curious neighbors in the street behind our camper which itself was a curiosity.  More and more people arrived, laughing and chatting.  I gave numerous tours, and at one time counted 17 people standing around in the street talking. By this time, the little boys were calling me “abuela”.

We camped in front of their home for the night and left at seven the next morning.  A great experience, as is always the case with this type of exchange.

Other Foreign Travelers

We saw only one other RV while we were here, and that was the French couple in Cartagena who told us they were not allowed to stay overnight in the parking lot.

They came back for a few minutes and we learned a bit more.  Her husband lost his wallet or had it lifted right after we talked with them the first time.  They never found it.

Also, we learned they came from Panama in November when the ferry began running again.  Now they want to return to Panama, and the ferry again, is no longer running.  It lasted one month.  So they will have to ship in a container — they have a small Toyota pickup with pop-up camper, small enough to fit in a container.

Because of both their and our limited Spanish, we didn’t learn why  they are returning to Panama so quickly,  I did understand they had had some trouble with the police around Old Town Cartegana.  How much of the rest of the country they visited, I don’t know.  

Scenery

Much of the countryside is absolutely stunning.  We regret, of course, that we never made it to two areas we really wanted to visit, NW of Bogata around San Gil, and the coffee area south of Manizales.  But the country we did see, especially on the roads from the Magdelana Valley to Medellin, then south to Manizales and back across to Honda were fabulous.  Wonderful rugged country covered with lush tropical vegetation, so unknown in the bare rocks of our Rocky Mountains at home.

The Magdelana Valley, itself, extends FOREVER, and most is filled with cattle ranches and small, pretty normal, rural towns and some mid-sized cities. 

A vendor SITTING at a speed bump

I had an interesting encounter in one of these cities.  I was in the driver’s seat of the pickup waiting as Mike found a hardware store.  Two cops on a motorcycle came along, asking question and the head honcho then asked for “documentos”.  

He actually studied those things for literally a full five-ten minutes, standing in front of the pickup.  In the meantime, I was chatting with his partner.  FINALLY, he wandered back to my window and handed me my papers.  That was the only time I was a bit nervous.  Maybe if Mike had been around he might has hassled us because he kept asking about “su esposo?”.

An active mud volcan "Fortuna" we stopped at.

The "mud" people.  Tourists go down in the mud pit then wash off down at the lake.
The mud used to be to the top of the wood framework.  Now, because so many have dipped
in the mud and carried some out with each person, the level has fallen!

This cute girl's boyfriend said he had no desire to go in the mud.
He was watching from the top with an amused look on his face.

Food. 

Mostly not great.  I thought our best meal was the one at the tiny rural restaurant where we spent the night:  good beef soup, grilled thin sliced pork, yucca, red beans and rice and plantain.  We were served “platacones” a couple of other times, supposedly made from plantain which I love.  However, platacones are just plain flavorless. They appear to be breaded ground plantain. . .or something. 

Empanadas here are excellent — unless they are filled with potatoes (two starchy items put together. Not my cup of tea).  All the chicken, pork and beef ones are good though.

The meal Mike remembers most was the simple grilled chicken kabobs with a tiny bit of the most amazing slaw I’m ever tasted.  This was in Honda.

Language 

Throughout most of the parts of the country we were in for the last month, we found our Spanish to be adequate.  As always, we have difficult understanding, but it was not impossible. Here in Cartagena — impossible!

Dinner last night was most interesting and not because of the food which was very good, flavorful grilled beef and chicken. The story:  We walked in, checked the menu and decided to stay. 

 A waiter came up and I told him, “Dos para cena, por favor.” (two for dinner please)  He shook his head; didn’t understand me. I tried again, “Dos para come” (two for eat)  Still didn’t understand.  I tried a couple of other things getting more agitated at which point Mike grabbed my hand and pulled me to a table.

A few minutes later the same waiter came around and asked what we wanted.  I told him, “Un menu,”  He didn’t understand.  Now I was getting really annoyed and tried a couple of other things.  Nothing. Mike finally hit the right word:  “Carta” (menu). 

I know the word carta for menu but haven’t used it in years.  And even if I was using the wrong word, don’t you think he’d just bring us menus just because he’s a waiter and we were patrons?!?! (Update:  At home in Colorado, numerous people have told us they thought he was just being a jerk, and knew perfectly well what I was saying. I've come to agree.)

The truth is, our Spanish is almost useless here in Cartagena.  I can’t understand even a word here and there, and often they can’t understand a thing I say.  Very frustrating.  Thank goodness it wasn’t that way in the rest of the country! I admit, though, that I stopped talking no more than necessary after Omar told me that Mike speaks better Spanish than I do.  After all my study, I am really disillusioned.

Colorful, artistic sign at entrance to Barranquilla

Logistics of RV Traveling  
There is always a shakedown period at the beginning of every extended trip, when you figure out exact placement of items, you figure out the money, how to get water and propane, and places to park for the night.  This time that shakedown just never ended.  

Mike said it wonderfully when he said to me, “You know, we just weren’t cut out to be overlanders, we’re more “adventurous snowbirds”.  We found we aren’t good at “sussing out” places without good guide books.  We learned we really like having a tow car that we can unhook and locate grocery or hardware stores without having to drive down narrow, crowded city streets, or to check out country roads.  Also, we don’t want to keep moving day after day.  We want time to explore and savor areas we deem interesting. At times we enjoy staying a couple of weeks in a place.

All in all, the bottom line is:  this just didn’t work for us.  An expensive lesson, to be sure, but — but that’s life.  After a short break, we’re ready to pick up the camper in Galveston and head out somewhere again.

Drug Check at the Dock

Just a short postscript to the last blog.  The drug inspection went fine although it took all afternoon.  Mike left here at 1:30 and returned at 5:30.  It took Mike about 15 minutes to unload the camper (stuff from the cab we had to put back there)  Then the inspectors showed up and were reasonably thorough, but it took them less than an hour.

After that, all parties involved retreated to the shade after Mike treated them all to bottled water that was in our camper.  Mike said they just sat there and chatted until the required amount of time had passed -- another hour.

Then the guys did their paperwork, Mike put the stuff back, and they sealed all openings with a special sticker.  Done deal.

Paid for by us, about $100 and, I'm sure, by the DEA in their valiant and ongoing effort to eradicate incoming drugs from Colombia brought in -- by people like us, of course!  :-)

Last Few Days in Colombia -- Cartagena

Well, things have been nice and calm the last few days.  I told Mike with a laugh, “First, we can’t find ANY place to rest for a day or two.  Now, we have 5-6 days in a row of near-total rest!”  We’ve been reading books because it’s too darn hot to MOVE if you don’t have to.

Met with our shipping agent on Tuesday, learned we have to buy more life insurance to go into the dock area.  Spent $90 on that foolishness.  Got papers signed and motorized in about half an hour Wed. Then Thursday. we pulled out of our spot and went after water for the camper before returning.

Tomorrow morning (Friday), we must, once again, move everything from the pickup cab to the camper, then we will deliver the rig to the dock, finally catching a cab back to a hotel.  Hopefully, on Saturday, not Sunday, we must go out for a drug inspection.  This means we take everything BACK out of the camper, put it on the ground, then put it all back after inspection.  Oh JOY! After that, we are free to MAKE our plane reservations!

We are camped in a parking lot where they told another couple from France that they couldn’t stay here all night?!?  Every RVer stays here! Fortunately, they haven’t chased us out.  Of course, we didn’t ask permission, either.  We are parked right across the road from the ocean and can watch the waves all day.  Nice shade trees for our lawn chairs  — but it’s still too darn hot.

Our parking spot in Cartagena for five days

View of the ocean from our camera

Love the orange and ochre colors of this building that
 we can see from our camper

We are within just a short block of “Old Town” Cartagena, the walled city.  There are two beautiful churches and many, many old buildings.  The Christmas lights are fabulous.  We’ve eaten out twice, but the prices are more than we like.  One meal was a nice shared salad, 2 small glasses of limeade and a tiny chicken kabob appetizer.  Cost $24.  Another was a small papaya smoothie, a roll, small glass of lemonade and two small slices of French toast — $15.

Old Town Cartegena

Some lovely metal sculptures in front of the church.

Saturday

We are now in a hotel, rather nice one for not too much more money than the first one.  The previous hotel was little more than a step-up from a hostel; very rustic.  Mike is on call this morning to go out to the dock for the tear-out of the camper for the drug inspection.  Because we had to leave it yesterday with the key, we had to remove all the stuff in the cab before taking it out there.

We bought life insurance for me, as well as Mike. which you must have to go into the dock area.  But now, I have an infection in the nail of my big toe (stubbed it) and I can’t wear shoes.  Long pants and closed-toes shoes are mandatory  And they probably wouldn’t have let me in anyway to help.  Women are pretty third rate around the docks and that whole of that side of town.

I went to the drogaria (not right spelling, farmacia in Mexico) to attempt to get some epsom salts to soak my toe in.  Took a bit, but the lady was very nice and patient.  Because of the soaking, my toe is much better.  It only hurts if it is directly touched, not while walking.  So while Mike is at the docks, I will go walking around.  We are in a much nicer part of town now.

We have plane tickets on Spirit (the worst record of all airlines) for tomorrow at 2:37 to Ft. Lauderdale, then on to Denver, supposedy arriving at 10:30 pm.  We’ll grab a hotel, then tomorrow take the bus from Denver to Poncha Springs, arriving at 5:30 — in theory.  This is 6 miles from home.  Then it will be a call to friends for a ride home!  Below is the view of the Cartegana skyline from our camper parking spot.

Across Colombian Countryside

Our great campsite in a semi-trailer parking lot.

Look hard (center) to find our rig.  At night
we were surrounded by semis.

Two lovely churches in Medellin as seen from the metro.

Mike's college friend, Jim, who showed us around Medellin.
He took us on the metro through the valley and up the valley wall
on the cable car. 

Taken from the cable car . . . 

Colombian family on the car with us.

A lovely bridge during the day . . . 

. . . and at night.  Medellin has wonderful Christmas lights.

Karolina, with whom we visited one night, along with her father.
He was waiting for batteries for his truck which was
parked next to our camper.  

A photo Karolina took of me.

After leaving Medellin, we drove one hundred miles in five hours over torturous curves up to 8000 feet and down to 2000, through some of the most beautiful, mountainous countryside.  This alone was not unexpected.  The finca (coffee farm) that I had hoped to rest up at for a few days, was about 7 miles up a narrow, twisty road.  After about 6 miles, we were off the GPS and the turns were getting tighter, the road narrower and wet and soft on the edges.  We found a spot and pulled off.

It turns out, we weren’t allowed to stop. We had to go on to the finch (farm) campground or leave. Mike didn’t want to continue because of the road, so we drove out at almost-dark.  I felt a back wheel give a little as the dirt under that tire at the edge of the road gave way.  I gunned it and we were fine, but it made us catch our breath. . . 

We looked for a restaurant or hotel to park, but in the dark, we found only a tilted lot at a gas station on the outskirts of Manizales and happy to have that. There simply are no places in Columbia that we have found, for RVer’s to stay.

Another problem resurfaced.  Mike has a long history of back problems, and unfortunately, his back began hurting from all day of the back and forth of the road curves. Mike can’t handle the twisty roads.  Unfortunately, the shortest way out of Manizales was through more of the same. . . 

We awoke from our tilted gas station parking spot to one of the most beautiful soft, morning views of the valley and the high rises of Manizales one could ever imagine!  The wide expanse of the valley, with hills receding into the distance and tall buildings of the city center off on a hillside to the left — stunning in the early morning mist!

Overlooking Manizales

But back to the problem at hand: we had to figure out the logistics of getting out of Manizales without injuring Mike’s back further.  He wanted to find a secure parking spot for the pickup and fly out, because every direction is nothing but more twisty curves.  I just couldn’t get my head around that solution!  I finally said, “We HAVE to get out of here and back to Cartagena!”

So, I grabbed an old dishtowel, ripped it in half lengthwise, got out needle and thread and sewed it together end to end.  Mike then used this to bind his back, ready for the trip down to the river valley.

The day actually turned out glorious!  I drove an average of 12 mph for 7 hours up and over the spine of the mountain.  It was so interesting and beautiful, I wasn’t really that tired at the end.  We began at Manizales at about 7000 feet and climbed to 12,000 feet, then back down to Honda at 1500.

The road surface was wonderful, except for a few spots of construction; there was little traffic, and I could generally get vehicles behind me to pass.  The drive did not exacerbate Mike’s back situation.

But the views!  We’ve never seen anything like the ridges and canyons we were passing. We know the Grand Canyon, USA intimately, we’ve been to Copper Canyon, northern Mexico twice, and this was equal to those.

Just imagine steep canyons, top to bottom that appeared to be 40 to 45 degrees steep.  And yet, these hillside were covered with roads, homes, villages.  . .  No wonder the drug cartels could control these mountains; they are nearly inaccessible.

And all were covered in vegetation.  Green, everywhere.  Even at 12,000 feet!  Being from Colorado, with our several 14,000 peaks, we know what 12,000 feet should look like — rocks, and mosses, even snow.  Twelve thousand fee here looks like low elevation.

12,000 ft elevation in Colombia!

No brahmas here, just these lovely creatures.

We arrived in Honda at 3 pm, got a hotel room with air as the outside temp was 100 degrees.  We drank a beer, swam in the pool and went out to dinner via cab.  We decided to spend another day.  FINALLY!  A  lovely day in Colombia.

Ferns and mosses along the roadway

Headed back to the US

This one is a hard one to write.  Sometimes you just have to know when to pull the plug, and that’s what we are doing. I am sorry that we are not truly as adventurous as you all think we are!

Our apologies to our world-traveler friends, but we just don’t have what it takes to do this type of travel.  We just don’t want to drive, day after day after day.  We’ve reached our limit.  We’re, safe but not happy.  We’re heading home.

There are two reasons, and they happened simultaneously.  The previously published “No-Send Trip Report” explained many of the problems, but the last straw was not finding a place to rest for a few days.  And then Mike’s back began to give problems.  He can’t afford to chance any further trouble. 

This is not a country for RVer’s.  Backpackers, motorcyclists, destination travelers — yes.  But there are nothing but gas stations and restaurant parking lots in which to spend the night, then hit the road the next day:  just keep traveling!

We hear Ecuador may be much better in that regard.  We did our research, but could not find enough information.  I wish someone had written or said to us, “Get your rig in Cartagen, then head straight for Ecuador as quickly as possible.” 

This was a very, very expensive experiment that just didn’t work. So far, the trip has been about as interesting as going from one really BAD Wal-Mart parking lot after another, without any side trips. The scenery in between is lovely, but scenery does not a trip make.

In cities with the traffic, any side trips are difficult because of the size of this rig (Ford F350 with camper in the bed).  In the countryside all side roads are small and twisty, forcing you to stay on the main roads.

We have found almost nothing of interest to us, no mercados, no artisans works, nothing, except some of the most beautiful, exquisite green countryside we’ve ever seen.  And, the Colombian people are so wonderful!  We can’t say enough nice things about them.  I have several lovely stories about our contacts with them, but I will get to them in a later “Observations of Colombia”. 

The No-Send Report

The No-Send Trip Report

(This is a report that I originally had no intention of sending.  It is all bad or downer news, which I report as little as possible.  But I’ve decided it is time to send it.  Travel is not always roses and smooth sailing.  My apologies for the length of this litany. Skim this report quickly, and go on to the next one.) No pics, here.

This will be an email I can’t send.  There have been far more downs than ups on this trip so far.  We just haven’t gotten our sea legs on this trip yet.  The logistics of procuring necessities, the navigation through far too large cities, the traffic in this cities, and a lot of traveling so far, with little of interest to us, to show for it.  

We left home in CO 40 days ago according to my “No Backups.. . “ on my computer.  We enjoyed visiting Kathy and Richard, Tom and Deb, Lynn and Roger and the Sequoia’s and King’s Canyon in CA.  

The dentist had to be done, but otherwise it felt like treading water, waiting to leave.  I don’t miss Mollie because I know she is fine, and I keep thanking God (and Tom, Deb, Kathy and Richard) that we don’t have her with us, particularly in THIS camper.  

Mike and I are best friends, but we don’t ALWAYS share everything, at least not at the moment of happening.  I, for example, did’t tell Mike of all my health issues.  Two days before flying out, my jaw began to ache ever so slightly — not enough TIME to do something about it, except take antibiotics.  I did, but they didn’t seem to help.  So tried stronger ones for a couple of days.  No difference, so I quit and hoped for the best.  It currently comes and goes, and I think it may be o.k.

My night leg cramps continued, and the pills I bought in the states seem to help a lot.  In the meantime, on the third day in the country, we were walking our papers from the dock to DIAN (immigration) on a lovely, perfect, new sidewalk.  Suddenly, I’m on the ground — hit my Sept ’11 replacement hip hard, skinned my elbow in two places and knocked the wind out of me.  

Mike kept walking, unknowing.  Two guys on a motorcycle stopped and got me up.  Still quite shaken, I waved at Mike when he finally turned around.  Now I had a pretty scraped and bruised arm, and a bruised hip again (fell HARD a month ago from the back of the pickup with I stepped onto a wet stepladder).  Didn’t think it hurt any else.  I was wrong.

Two days later, I had pain shooting from my lower buttocks down the top half of my hamstrings.  About an 8 out of 10 on pain scale.  I could barely stand, couldn’t bend down or do the motion of sitting down.  Horrible.  Mike got me started on prednisone and slowly over the next five days, it became less and less.  I am slowly going off it. The pain is finally gone from my back and thighs.

In the meantime, I was having raging headaches — and I NEVER get headaches.  We finally decided that I had heat exhaustion from putting the truck back together.  We were parked in the shade, but were pouring sweat for two hours in 99 degree heat.  Thank GOD, we each had a HUGE lemonade before, and another after, or it might have been much worse.  These headaches lasted for two days. 

Now Mike doesn’t always tell me when he has problems either.  After being in the country for about 9 days, he told me he was completely unhappy with everything.  He just didn’t want to just drive around for 6 months.  Except for Minca there had been nothing to do on that side of the country before we cut across the center to Medellin.  Pastures were beautiful but little else to see.

We had planned to go further south into the mountains, which we enjoy so much and they are cooler.  More to do.  But because at times I could barely walk, we decided it would be best to head for Medillian where Mike has a friend.  If I needed an MRI, it would be the place to get it. Now, that won’t be necessary, nor would it have been possible to get anyway.  Apparently the medical system here makes it very hard to get care.

Logistics of simple living have been difficult.  Propane “gaz” places are hard to locate, although Mike did locate more places.  I had hoped to buy 5 gallon garafones to fill the camper with good water.  Can’t find any,  — any!  No water filtering plants to be found.  

Finally had to begin using unknown water, chlorinating it for dishes and showers. We thought of putting in a filter this summer, but they are so large, Mike said he would have to tear out the battery box and use most of the space under the sink which I have FILLED with necessities. 

No doubt, should have done it anyway, but with all of the other work he did on the camper, especially the inverter and solar panels, he wasn’t looking forward to it. And, we had so many doc appointments all summer with me, plus a trip back to see the kids; we simply had no down-time.  

Of course, we are buying drinking water, but the largest we can find are 6 liter bottles, and they are rare and expensive at $2.50 US for each bottle.  Don’t know a way around it, now.   About the biggest easily available bottles are 1 liter.  Now how far will that go!!  We’ve gotten so sick several times from water in Mexico, we are very cautious. . . 

Mike hurt his foot the first week in Oct, and I fell on my hip a week later.  He is still wearing a brace 2 months later, and I had a bruise for a month, then fell on it again on that sidewalk, same hip.  After twelve days I can finally lay on that side — almost.  Horrible bruise on my hip still.  And both hips still hurt when walking too much.  Didn’t before the two times I fell.

Mike had read there are lots of WIFI places to stop at.  We’ve seen TWO — and that was in Minca and finally, Medellin, six days apart. I was SO annoyed that he didn’t bring the computer chips to buy G4 time here.  Couldn’t believe he’d even THINK of not bringing them.  

They are a good portion of our entertainment and ALL of our communication with family and friends, plus the only way to pay bills at home. We need these modems and finally got a handle on getting one in Medellin. 

We never have gotten a handle of Medellin.  Our collective maps are horrible.  Our map of the city is about the size of circled thumb and fingers.  The size of the city is the size of encircled arms.  No landmarks on map that I can coordinate with each other, and the GPS will not give an understandable overall picture.

Having difficulty finding laundries.  I put our very wet, sweaty clothes from reloading the pickup in the laundry bag and had them washed within two days.  But most are still so smelly from mildew, we can’t stand them.  I tried soaking overnight in clorox water.  Didn’t help.  Will try with a laundry that uses machines and see if that helps.  I only know how to find a laundry  in smaller towns. Yet, we’ve not stayed anyplace more than one night except in Minca and Medellin.  So far, it’s been two 1//2 weeks since I’ve had laundry done and no help in sight.

Mike realized the solar panels were not generating as much charge as they should have.  Stopped in a BUSY small town for parts. Mike fixed the panels the next morning at 6 AM before the heat got bad.  The fix seemed to work.

Then, what seemed like the last straw.  When arriving in Medellin, we turned on a faucet only to find there was no water — at all.  It had all drained out of the tank somehow. It had not drained into the gray or backwater tanks, but Mike found that the back bumper was wet.  

When straightening disheveled dishes in the cabinet, I remembered an unseen speed bump that we hit very hard.  We feared this must have truly broken something, and would have to remove the camper and the bottom of camper to find it.

So we refilled the water tank from a gas station.  Drove around.  Nothing.  No leaks, no water dripping from the bumper nor into the tanks.  That was two days ago and it still seems fine. . . .  

We have yet to figure out where the whole nearly-full tank of water went — how and where??  Haven’t got a solution to this problem yet.  . . nor at the moment, a problem either!!! 

(Later update.  We finally solved the mystery.  Two things were going on, making it hard to solve the problem.  First an added faucet for the water tank on the stool kept jiggling open and letting water drain into the floor of the bathroom.  Second, apparently the bad jolt from the speed bump broke the line from the bathroom floor drain to the gray water tank.  Therefore water disappeared down the drain and outside, not going into the gray tank.)

Our apologies to our well-traveled friends for not rolling with the flow gracefully, here.  There are always ups and downs on a trip; we know that.  But we’ve also traveled enough to know that one can usually fix or work out the logistic bugs.  Two weeks is becoming a little long for that to happen.  Things need to change for the better and more interestingly, soon.

Minca to Medellin

Colombia 2nd week

(I can't seem to edit this, so when I push "publish" I'm stuck with what I get.  Sorry if the layout is bad.")

We have been in a very non-touristy part of Columbia, going south from Santa Marta on the coast down along the central/eastern coast.  

Our laundress and cook of wonderful chicken and rice empanadas

Flower vendor outside church and playground in Minca

Kids alongside the road on the way down from Minca.

The night before we were leaving Minca a guy drove over the bottom step of our aluminum folding stairs to the back door of the camper.  At first he was convinced it wasn’t broken, then that he didn’t do it (he really didn’t think he did!).  Actually, a nice young man with a family; he left us $10 US equivalent.

Next morning, in town we hired a taxi to find a welder for aluminum in downtown Santa Marta.  While that was being welded, he took us to a phone store for a Columbia “chip” and minutes —only to find that we it doesn’t work for calling out of the country.  More to story, but not worth it.

All told, $60 US for the welding and reassembly (which took the welder, Mike and the taxi driver to do).  Then $18 for a phone that won't work except in Columbia, and $60 for the taxi driver who stayed with us for 4 hours.  We needed him!  Ah, well. . . 

Worse, was trying to find water.  No 5 gallon bottles to be found, no water from a hose, then when found; no pressure.  I had hoped to use drinking water for the camper tank, but now we’ll have to use chlorine in the tank and dish water, and buy 5 liter bottles of drinking water.  About like camping on the river.  Then we began having trouble buying anything more than 1 liter bottles!

At first, trying to understand the money was seemingly overwhelming, until I figured out:  $20,000 Col, is about $10 US.  $50 mil(lion) Col is a twenty-five dollar bill, and so on. Just knock off the last three zeros and divide by half.  Not bad.

“Eddie” saw us beside the truck and said hello.  He is from NY, been in Santa Marta a month and has a food truck with Mexican food.  Invited us by, but regrettably, we were leaving town (not wanting to drive downtown anyway).

Speaking of driving —everyone does — speak of it, I mean!!  One Australian’s comment was, the pedestrians have about as much road sense as a blind goat! Another couple wrote, the truck drivers own the road and they only agree to let you use it at their leisure.

Then there are the motorcycles — everywhere.  Hundreds.  Weaving, bobbing, passing every which direction.  I told Mike, I’m amazed they don’t run right over the top of our camper.  They do everything else!   When visiting with our friend, Jim,  we commented that we can’t believe there aren’t dozens of accidents every day.  “Oh, but there are!”  he commented, “They just breed faster than we can kill’em off!”  I’m sure most don’t really understand the complexities of driving a large rig as they dart around.

Line of cyclists without cars or trucks, for once.

Heading south, we saw some of the most beautiful pastures and spreading-branched trees I have ever seen.  Made some shots through the windows, but the traffic makes it impossible to stop. 

We really miss our ATV’s and Tracker.  This country is PERFECT for them in the mountains.  We’ll have to make do with taxis when we  want to go into town centers or markets.

There are many Brahma cattle, of course, but this afternoon we saw a herd of really black, weird African-looking cattle.

The Magdelena Valley is hot, hot, hot.  Ninety-eight this morning.  Hotter later.  We decided on a hotel room with AC — a real rat-hole, but cool.  The next night decided to go up into the mountains to gain altitude.  We drove 20 miles up into the mountains. This took one hour on tight curves to go 20 miles, from 300 feet elevation to 4200 feet,  but the views in this canyon were fabulous. 

 We stopped at an outdoor restaurant on a curve overlooking this canyon.  Very simple little place, but she was the most fabulous cook.  We had a tasty better-than-beef beef soup, very thin perfectly fried pork, cooked yucca, fried plantain and excellent beans and rice.  These pinto beans were the first we’d seen; no black beans  at all in Columbia, according to a friend.  We had enough leftover for a huge meal the next day.

The beautiful valley which drops right off their back patio at the restaurant.

Our great cook (right) and sister.

Burros for hire for delivering firewood and groceries up in the hills, after
people come home on the bus.

Pat giving yet another tour of the "casita"

A nice breeze came up and we stayed the night.  Had coffee and toast (and rice and pork empanadas and another delicious plantain (a special banana, fried). 

She and her daughters enjoyed asking us questions.  The eleven year old daughter is already a stunning beauty, dark eyes and hair and dimples.  I didn’t get very good pictures as she was curious, but shy.  It’s encounters like this that we love and travel for. 

Our travel across the Magdalena Valley  was lovely, but hot.  Cisneros was a trip.  Big pueblo, not city, in the mountains with narrow streets.  We wound around corners and up hills, following 2 trucks at 20 mph.  We finally pulled off, on again and caught up; pulled off again.

Burro train ready to hit the trail.

Unusual church in Cisneros in Magdalenga Valley

The next 60 miles were hair-raising turns in beautiful country.  In the city of Medellin (may-day-jean’), we were lost more than found.  I couldn’t tell from the GPS whether the signal was for an upcoming curve in the road, or if we were supposed to turn off!

Getting dark, spent the night in a Texaco, then moved to semi-truck parking lot. Lots of noise and trucks coming and going all day.

View from the back door of our camper in the truck parking lot