#travel #travelstr #hike #hikestr #LaCiudadPerdida #TheLostCity #Colombia #SantaMarta

#travel #travelstr #hike #hikestr #LaCiudadPerdida #TheLostCity #Colombia #SantaMarta

#travel #travelstr #hike #hikestr #LaCiudadPerdida #TheLostCity #Colombia #SantaMarta

Seems nice that you have USD, but not sure what apps you have to send money cheaply.

People in #Ecuador where do you buy #bitcoin ?

We met with a nice travel agent, who helped us arrange a nice Galapagos itinary, and we would like to suggest him a way to easily buy it.

#asknostr #grownostr #travel #travelstr

Colombian itinary

# Bogota

Bogota is not the most exciting city to visit, but your international flight will arrive here. Spend some days here to accommodate to the high altitude. We would suggest to concentrate on trying Colombian drinks and foods while visiting the few things.

Suggested days: 4 days

## Things we suggest

- Monserrat mountain and funicular

- See the old town

- Plaza de Bolivar

- Botero museum

- Get used to the different behavior for security

- Museo del Oro

- This is a giant one compared to other cities. Almost every city has one.

- It is not really in English

- But still it was really informative to us

- Learn spanish

## Additional things

- Catedral Primada de Bogota

- Museo Inglesia Santa Clara

## Foods/drinks to try

- Limonada de Coco (coconut lemonade)

- Chocolate con queso or Chocolate Santafereño (hot chocolate with cheese)

- Colombian coffee

- Not all places offer good Colombian coffee

- Usually colombians drink their second class coffee and export the first class ones

- Second class coffee is mostly burnt to cover the bad taste of it, that makes it bitter, even with milk. So colombians put sugar in it also.

- Natural jugo en leche (natural juice with milk)

- Really nice with combinations of fruits

- Platano chips (banana chips)

- You can try the green version (platano verde)

- Try beer from bogotá at BBC (Bogota Beer Company)

- Try "menu del dia" (Cheap menu option if you want to save. Contains a lemonade, soup, main dish and sometimes a small dessert)

- etc...

## Accommodation

- AC is not needed. You are at 2600m. You have generally a colder weather here compared to sea level.

- Be sure to look for something safe. Using booking.com is a nice choice, and look for reviews mentioning the area's safeness.

- We went for a cheap but safe accommodation with non-private bathroom

- But we brought our sleeping bags, and we used it, because the rooms had bad insulation, and the cold could come in.

# Santa Marta

As next, go south to Santa Marta to the center of many programs. Santa Marta itself is not that much fun, but it is on the east coast of Colombia with beaches in the Caribbean sea. So already better than Bogotá, and also close to many nearby fun options.

Suggested days: 8 days

## Travel

A direct plane is suggested from Bogotá to Santa Marta, because they are really far away.

## Suggested things to do:

- Visit the street Carrera 3 starting from the edge of Parque Simon Bolivar

- It has many restaurants, ice cream places, and nice decor on the street

- Good to live close to this

- Sometimes also live music in some places

- Go to Playa Grande beach in Taganga (You can see nicer beaches in Tayrona) (1 day)

- Go to the Tayrona National park (2 days)

- This is basically a jungle with natural sandy beaches with palm trees (super nice)

- It is muddy, has some hills, big stones (not the beaches!)

- So you have to hike to get to the beaches

- You can sleep in hammocks, tents or houses (prices increase in this order)

- It is more expensive than Colombia because they have to bring the things in with boat or mules

- Go for a 4 day tour to the Lost City (4 days)

- This is more about hiking, seeing nature, and sleeping in the jungle

- You will walk around 59km in 4 days

- The lost city part is approximately 2 hours compared to the 4 days

- It is a nice experience if you are not afraid of hiking, performance tours

- It is extremely tiring!!!

- Plan a recovery day afterwards. Also there is a chance you get sick during or afterwards of the hike. So plan accordingly.

## Additional things to do

- Do a coffee farm tour in Minca (1 day)

- Salento has better coffee farms

- But it is also nice

- La Victoria is suggested, however we visited a small family business instead, so we have no experience

## Foods/drinks to try

- There is no specific food you shall try in Santa Marta

- You can try to tick from the list of Colombian drinks and foods

## Accommodation

- Close to Carrera 3 from Bolivar square

- AC is a must. There is 30°C and high humidity making it feel more.

- We lived in Comfort House

- Close to the street Carrera 3

- Grocery store nearby, and even a big shopping mall is in 10 mins by foot

- They have laundry service.

- Washed even our dirty/muddy boots after the Lost city tour

- They didn't have breakfast at the time, but made us Tinto. Basically an americano, but the house lady also added sugar cane sugar. Tasted nice. But not the general coffee lover taste.

- They also had AC.

- Rooms have no window. But maybe many are like this. But this way it does not warm up fast.

- Room sizes are good compared to price

# Cartagena

Cartagena is one of the most beautiful cities in this itiniary. You have nice colonial buildings, nice history. Really a good place to just wander in the city. Of course with safety in mind.

Suggested days: 2-3 days

## Travel

Take a direct bus from Santa Marta to Cartagena. Around 4.5-6hours, depending on the delay. It may stop in Baranquilla for longer. We took the bus from Flota Occidental. They showed movies during the drive on a central TV in spanish.

## Suggested things to do:

- Go to a beach (1 day)

- Cartagena beach

- Baru island beach (this is super nice )

- Do a full day beach tour on the Rosario islands (Finishes on Baru island)

- Depending on your type it can worth it

- If you want to see Baru island, the party island Cholón, do water jetski-ing, do coral reef watching in the ocean, this will worth it. Be sure the trip includes the fluorescent algae watching

- Do a free city tour in the old city(2 hours)

- Visit Getsemani: you can do a free tour here too (2-4 hours)

- People in Cartagena likes to party, so you could plan your trip there when there is something. E.g.: Nov 11 is the indepence day, and they started partying from Nov 2 until Nov 12 this year.

## Additional things to visit

- Visit the Castillo San Felipe de Barajas

- Palacio de la Inquision (Inquisition palace)

- Museo Naval del Caribe

## Accommodation

- AC is a must here.

- Have an accommodation in Centro, San Diego or Getsemaní, then you are close to the old city, and the fun

- We lived in Getsemaní, which was good, gave good restaurants and bars, as it is the fun district of Cartagena, where local people go to have fun

- We lived in Seven Nights would not directly suggest it, but was not bad for the price

- Included breakfast

- Was in good location

- But the room door was locked with a tiny lock

- The things in the bathroom were moving and broken. We think there is a difference between cheap and shitty.

- But for the price it was okayish (if things are not broken and room door is more safe, we would gladly suggest it)

# Medellin

Medellin is a really big city with many opportunities. You can easily spend 4-5 days here if you want.

Suggested: 4-5 days

## Travel

Suggested by direct plane from Cartagena to Medellin, as they are far away.

## Suggested things to do:

- Pablo Escobar tour (half day)

- Communa 13 tour (2 hours)

- Visit Parque Arví (half - full day)

- Guatapé - El peñol tour (full day)

- See the city in the evening from a cable car

## Additional things to do

- Visit Parque Explora (science museum)

- Visit Jardín Botanico

## Foods to try

- Bandeja paisa (Peasant plate)

- Mix of meaty stuff with rice and vegetables originated from Medellin

- It is really a fatty food. 2 of us shared a plate, and it was enough.

- Water fruity ice cream (if you do a tour in Communal 13, they will show it to you)

- Try other general Columbian foods and drinks

## Accommodation

- No AC is necessary, as it is at 1600m, where the weather is really nice.

- Usually El Poblado is suggested for tourists

- It is really a nice and safe area.

- Most tours start at the Poblado square

- We lived in Ayenda 1224 Pixel house

- Nice area

- Nice rooms

- Private bathroom

- You can buy breakfast from 5 options as extra, even order in the morning. (Coffee is from instant coffee)

- Laundry service is available. But ignored our ask to not dry our jacket, and it hurt it a bit, but not fully ruined.

# Salento

Salento is a small but really nice village. It is a well-known backpacker destination. Maybe this is the reason why most people speaks here English.

## Travel

By direct bus from Cartagena to Salento. It takes around 6,5 hours.

## Suggested things to do:

- Visit Cocora valley to see the tall wax palm trees and kolibris, and nice bridges and trek (during the long tour 12km)

- Do a coffee tour and tasting (We did it with Ocaso and it was really nice)

- You can do coffee tasting in coffee shops as well which is cheaper if you combine it with the cheap coffee tour without tasting. But have not tried, so we don't know if the coffee places do good tasting or not.

- Watch the sunset from Alto De La Cruz

## Additional things to do

- Visit Filandia

- Play Tejo: A game with gunpower

## Foods/drinks to try

- Coffeequipe: Arequipe (caramel) with coffee flavor

- Chocolate with coffee bean in it

- Coffee from the region

## Restaurants

- The Brunch: You can get a really nice packed lunch from them (sandwich, water/juice, granola, peanut butter, peanut butter brownie, cracker, banana). They open from 6, and have good coffee too. Also Togo. So you can get a bruch for your hike in cocora valley e.g.

- Their brownie is really nice!

- They are highly recommended

- Coco bowl: Vegan place to eat and drink nice vegan bowls, smoothies.

- Beta Town Restaurant: Great option for good priced restaurant with huge selection. They have great selection of juices, smoothies and even beers.

## Accommodation

- No AC is required

- The city is not big, so almost does not matter where you book

- We booked Casa La Eliana

- The host was nice provided tips and a map for the cocora valley

- It had good balcony

- It had non-private bathroom

- The hotel had a small curry and pizza restaurant in the evening

- It is close to the bus station (5 mins walk)

# Cali

Cali is called the salsa capital of Colombia. Not usually a destination of travellers but you can find dancing, special foods and drinks and nature here. So worth a visit.

## Travel

You have to take a bus from Salento to Armenia, which takes around 30 minutes and starts in every 15 minutes. Then from Armenia to Cali, which takes 3.5-4 hours, which starts every 30 minutes.

## Suggested things to do:

- Hike to the Cruz del tres cruses

- The view is not the best, so it worth it for the hike, and then the juices at the top

- Many local people do it in the morning, so really nice to see it

- It is a difficult hike though, tiring

- Go to a salsa bar with a class

- Interesting experience

- Usually these are only in Spanish, and hard to follow if you are not close to the instructor

- If you like dancing could be a good program

- Go to a rooftop next to San Antonio park and drink a coctail and watch the sunset

- Go to Ecoparque Rio Pance

- Locals like to go here to cool down and chill

- Visit the old city

## Additional things to do

- Visit the zoo

- Not many zoos in colombia, and this is the best among all

- Similar to a European zoo

- Be aware that they only let in water, and maybe smaller snacks. But maybe we sneaked them in 😂, so you can only bring in water.

## Foods/drinks to try

- Lulado

- Cholado

- Fruit salad

## Accommodation

- You don't necessarily need a AC, but good to have.

# Bogotá

Then you have to go back to Bogotá to fly back home.

## Travel

You can travel with a direct overnight bus. It takes 10.5 hours, but the chairs on the buses are really comfy.

# General tips

- Bus tips

- You can usually buy the ticket before travel for buses.

- Sometimes online is cheaper, sometimes not, but you remain flexible if you buy it directly before travel.

- You most of the time cannot buy online same day tickets, but it does not mean that the bus is full.

- Buses usually leave later (Colombian timing) if it is not full, so you can buy tickets e.g. at 10:55 to the 11:00 bus, or even later.

- Long distance buses are quite comfortable with bigger leg space and tiltable chairs. So you can sleep quite okay in them. Although we suggest to have eyecovers and neck pillows for more comfortable sleep experience

- In some cities, you will only find taxies in the uber app

- Flight tips

- For domestic flights, you seem to be able to bring more than 100ml liquid/bottle into the waiting area

- Cheap flights might be put into smaller terminals, where you have less shop options in the waiting area. E.g. in Bogotá, terminal 2 is small, so you better get your coffee outside.

- There is usually a Juan Valdez coffeeshop in all airports, and they usually make good coffee, if you need.

- Food and drinks

- Menu del dia is usually in all restaurants even if it is not on the menu.

- You can drink nice juices and smoothies in many places in Colombia

- Be careful with pizzas because Colombians like to put really sweet stuff on it like caramellized onion, sweet banana (platano madurro), etc

- Always have cash on you, not every place accepts cards, and sometimes they have hefty 5-10-15% fee on card payments

- Many hostal on booking only accepts cash

#colombia #travel #backpacking #citiestovisit #tips

Some chilling in the park, nice! 💜

GM! ☕

Great! As everyone seems to be a businessmen in Colombia, I am sure they will find ways to utilize it. And even more bitcoin.

GM ☕️

Cool!

People living in colombia raise your hands. 🙋🙋‍♂️🙋‍♀️

Is nostr already in Colombia?

#asknostr #colombia

Urban Legend:

Maybe it started with selling all first grade coffee abroad, so only second grade left.

The second grade coffee are from the defected beans. So they mostly roast it long/strong, so the taste of the defects are hided by the stronger roasting.

This gave the coffee not a good, but a bitter taste.

People thought that this is the taste of colombian coffee. To hide this flavor they put sugarcane sugar (panela) and/or milk in their coffee.

This is why they drink Tinto (long coffee) in Colombia with sugarcane sugar, to hide the taste of the detected beans.

But it is changing, because more and more coffeeshops open where they pay attention to make good coffee. Especially in the coffee regions like Salento.

#coffee #coffeeroasting #colombia #coffeestr #urbanlegend

nostr:nevent1qqs8jmnpn3q62cjxs3xxcf3s70mf2d32rm6mcc6u03dqtuyzxhedkccpzpmhxue69uhkummnw3ezumt0d5hsygzkn4fk6fwd3s7zxwcuzaj8fs8cnnff6g6ujetwm5jdvxlt5pp7s5psgqqqqqqsyd0g4j

I was today years old, when I realized columbians are not drinking their awesome coffee.

As #Colombia is the 3rd largest coffee grower, we expected to drink amazing coffee everywhere.

But it turned out, that they export the first grade coffee, and only consume the second grade in the country.

Mostly!

Of course there are coffee places where you can drink amazing coffee. But local people don't really know the difference, therefore they got used to the second grade coffee, and they could sell the first grade coffee abroad for higher markups.

#todayyearsold #coffee #coffeestr #grownostr

Looks amazing 🤙

And then you never go half paired 😂

#colombia #asknostr

Which is your favourite colombian beer?

#Colombia #LifeHack

In Colombia, in some places you can only buy Agua Potable Tratada, meaning treated drinking water. And some has bad taste, also can become stinky after half a day. Who likes to drink such water.

Solution:

We bought a grayl water filter. It is heavy, and seemed kind of overkill at the beginning of our trip, because we did not use it, and it needs a lot of space.

But we realized that filtering the bottled water removes the bad after taste of the treatment, and it does not stink after half a day.

#grownostr #plebchain #waterfilter #grayl #travel

GM! ☕

We have a super power. If we sit in a restaurant where practically nobody is eating, after 10 minutes of us sitting in, people start filling in the place.

We were thinking about monetizing this skill. 😂

So hit us up if you have a great bar or restaurant, and want more customers. Everything for the nice places 🫡

#superpower #grownostr #travel #plebchain

Our first country in South America was Colombia. Really a nice country. Really travelable. We really enjoyed the time there.

They have nice and friendly people. It can fulfill nature, food, history, scenic spots, beach lovers.

They export really good coffee too, but you cannot drink good coffee everywhere, because for domestic consumption they most of the time use the cheaper beans. So if you want to drink good coffee you have to select your spots.

#Colombia #travel #backpacking #latinamerica #southamerica