On Monday the four of us (plus Clo and Dominique) woke up early to get a bus to playa Palomino – a little beach paradise further east along the coast and not too far from the boarder with Venezuela. Securing transport was chaos and we were separated from Chloe’s friends (Chuch and FJ) with whom we were supposed to travel. We started the journey in a rather uncomfortable minibus, with a crazy driver who drove at ludicrous speeds. We were delighted to change minibus at Santa Marta and joined our friends Paul and Tom from Germany, who we had met in Cartagena. After the Parque Tayrona, we were asked to change minibus yet again, which took us the rest of the way.

Upon arriving in Palomino the only transport option to get to our hotel was a moto-taxi, (a motorbike – nothing more) which isn’t ideal with large suitcases and heavy backpacks – where’s an Uber when you need one? A few minutes later the van had left and the rest of the passengers too, so we were left with no option but to chose a bike, hop on the back and point towards the beach – “Dreamer’s hostel, por favor”…

 

The Dreamer hostel was a nice surprise. Lovely, clean, with well decorated rooms, a decent pool, cool bar and access to the beach. The perfect place for a few days of “farniente” (basically, doing very little)! Apart from long walks on the beach, siestas in the hammocks, swimming in the pool, taking advantage of happy hour and eating, we really didn’t do much and it was bliss!

The reason why we had chosen Palomino was because Lolo stayed there a few years ago and loved it. However, the awesome hotel where she had stayed was unfortunately occupied by a group of American yoga enthusiasts… you could hear the ‘hummmmm-ing’ a mile away!

After two nights at the Dreamer, we headed to their brother/sister hotel, the Dreamer in Santa Marta, where we caught-up with our friends Tom and Katie, who we had met when hiking the “W” in Chile. We also saw a young group of Englishman that we realised we had seen continuously over the course of our trip, including Atacama, Uyuni, Copacabana, Cuzco, Lima and now Santa Marta – clearly, great minds think alike when it comes to itinerary!

 

An hour or so later we were picked-up by a jeep that would take us to our next destination: Minca – a small coffee region in the mountains above Santa Marta. We had booked two private huts in a hostel called Casa Elemento and the only way to get there was by 4×4, since the road quickly gave way to steep dirt tracks. That said, we did see a number of moto-taxis embarking on the climb – some poor tourist with one hand around their luggage and the other clasped to the handle behind them, hanging on for dear life.

A Dutch girl with whom we did the Death Road in Bolivia had recommended Casa Elemento and the website certainly backed-up her good reviews, so we booked it. You couldn’t fault the setting – the Casa was perched on the top of a hill, surrounded by jungle, with massive views of the valley towards the coast in the far distance. Indeed, the Casa had even designed giant hammocks, from which you could laze and soak-up the views.

 

Sadly, it was probably our biggest failure of the entire trip… we immediately noticed that we had penetrated “Hippy Central” and this was so much worse than what we’d experienced before. The place was just one enormous dive and our “private rooms” were mini huts made of plywood, perched on the edge of a precipice – not ideal when it gets dark. Again, you couldn’t fault the views but we would soon to discover that we would not be sleeping well, thanks to the non-stop chatter of marijuana-fuelled philosophy and try-hard guitar playing that seemed to drone on all night. Furthermore, it seemed that half the Israeli military had descended on leave from their military service and they were dreadful singers!

We felt bad for Clo and Dominique, who had been promised an adventure and a fabulous holiday but they, thankfully, saw the funny side and continued to paddle around the pool with their pliable Longchamp bags. We felt out of place and hopelessly under qualified to engage in any sort of conversation (which mostly surrounded drugs).

Diner portions were absolutely massive and we all struggled to finish our lasagnas. But fellow table neighbours were so stoned that they happily finished all our plates!

The next day we simply had to get out, so, after breakfast we signed ourselves up to the all-day jeep excursion. It was quite pricey so we had the jeep to ourselves! We saw cascades, dipped our toes in natural baths and enjoyed a decent lunch, prepared by a fine old man, who had a great big BBQ and was constantly smoking marijuana! The restaurant was full of chickens – no doubt they would also grace the menu at some stage. We didn’t really know whether we should find that amusing or terrifying. When it came to dessert, the owner simply offered us marijuana!

 

After lunch we visited one of the local coffee factories. It was an impressive set-up and we thoroughly enjoyed the guided tour, which concluded with a tasting of as much coffee as we wanted and some delicious cakes. Next door was a brewery, so we bought some beers and went on our way.

At the end of the day, we stopped at the top of a hill to watch the sunset – an opportune time to crack open the beers. We saw a wonderful array of wildlife, including a very friendly dog that came and sat with us for a while.

After a last night without too much sleep at Casa Elemento, we were ready for our return trip to Bogota but the journey to the airport ended up being incredibly stressful. While waiting for our jeep, one of the owners of the hotel told us that we would have to stay because no taxi or moto-taxi was working. Cue frenzied panic…

 

 

 

Apparently a fight had erupted between the police and a local gang. The police had killed 4 members of a gang the day before and as revenge, the gang had bought Santa Marta to a standstill, threatening to shoot at anyone that dared take to the roads. People were too terrified to go to work, including the taxi drivers and moto-taxi drivers.

 

 

 

 

Ed went nuts and a ridiculous conversation with the owner ensued. Clearly sensing our desperation to escape, he agreed to drive us down to Minca to see if we could find some transport that would take us the rest of the way. Upon arriving, we started negotiating with the local moto drivers but nobody was prepared to venture any further.

Prospects were not looking good until, minutes later, a few Santa Marta taxis arrived and thankfully one of them accepted to take us to the airport via the back roads. We happily agreed to pay the double-fare but the taxi was ridiculously small. Poor Clo was sitting in the front with her suitcase on her lap because there was zero space. This proved uncomfortable but decent protection to any bullets that might be fired in our direction! Luckily, we arrived in one piece and on time for our flight to Bogota.

Highlights:

• Dreamers’ hostel in Playa Palomino which was awesome
• The long walks on the vast Playa Palomino
• The jeep tour around Minca

Gastro Highlights:

• Asadero Camarita – the owner knew how to BBQ, pity there wasn’t any Pimm’s