ODO: 324,638
It’s our first day at the Port, day two of free the truck from the port. We have no idea what to expect, but we’re already too hot in pants at 8:30am. It turns out that only one person is allowed inside, so KoKo gets comfortable in the air conditioning while Berne gets his sweater ready. Oh yea, you have to have long sleeves too. But it doesn’t matter. Today is the day we get our house out of the container! Berne and our container buddy, guided by our fixer, enter the port and find our container. Berne gets the battery hooked back up, and our house rolls into Colombia. It comes out looking exactly like it went in, on the outside. Inside the cab there is some mold, but nothing tragic. We blame this on being told to leave the windows cracked when we loaded the truck. Once we finish at the port, it’s time to change hotels. We move into a room in a converted mansion. It’s….odd. Our room is strangely dark, and the caretaker who checks us in is a character. But it’s closer to the port, has lots of restaurants within walking distance, a comfy bed and private bathroom, and most importantly is $30 per night.
Day three of free the truck from the port starts with an early visit to a cafe so we can sign some more forms. At least we didn’t have to wear pants for this one. The process for getting the truck back involves doing one step a day, and then being on call in case they need you for anything, so we don’t get any exploring in. Which we’re happy about when we get a call at 3:30pm to be back at the port by 4:00pm to pick up the truck! Hooray! Shortly after we arrive, the payment system for the port goes down. We wait around until the port closes in hopes that it comes back online, but no luck. Interestingly, the port is full of parrots, so while we wait we get to watch them fly around and make a ruckus.
Back at the port at 8:30 am in our pants again, we finally drive out of there in the truck! We get some gas and start making our plan to deal with the mold as we head north towards Santa Marta. Along the way we discover our electrical gremlin is still with us. We manage to find a hotel with a big parking lot where we spend a few hours wiping down all the surfaces with vinegar and disinfectant. The worst part was the fridge. We forgot to open it after we turned it off, and the entire thing is filled with mold, plus a popped beer. With our house back in order, we walk to dinner, and then retire to our cave of a hotel room that has no windows. Seriously. It’s very weird, but we sleep amazingly.
Resupply day! Once we’re full of groceries, water and propane, we make for Parque Nacional Natural Tayrona. On our way a couple of cops pull us over and ask for a $50USD “donation for lunch money”. Berne says no, but offers them $5000 COP instead, which is roughly $1USD. Bribe paid, we carry on. The going is slow, so by the time we are nearing the park it’s dark. Which means no park today. We find a nice beach camp nearby just as the rain starts to fall. The bar at the camp is very mosquito-y so we turn in early.
Tiny, very aggressive biting bugs drive us out of camp in a hurry in the morning. Just like we’re used to. We are back to sweating, and bug spray, and beaches, and maximum adventure. Well, not maximum adventure all the time, that would get exhausting. Today is a low to medium size adventure to the west side of Tayrona National Park. There are several lovely beaches and vistas, but we decide not to stay. Instead we start a push for Los Estoraques Unique Natural Area, ten hours away. Between us and Los Estoraques is a camping no man’s land so we end up inside the walled parking lot of a small hotel for the night. The hotel has a very cute, very sweet grey kitty that gets lots of pets.
Another handful of hours on the road gets us to our destination before the sun goes down. A rare feat for us. In fact, we’re early enough to do the 1km hike. It’s a great loop through a landscape full of hoodoos, offshoots and small caves for us to explore. We finish just before sunset. While we set up for dinner a cow wanders down from the hoodoos and starts to menace us. Shaking it’s head and pawing the ground, and inching closer every time we look away, we aren’t sure what we did to make it mad. There are all kinds of new and weird night sounds here, which we assume/hope are birds. Our morning is very slow before we start another multi-day drive through another camping no man’s land to reach our next destination, Puente Negro which will be maximum Adventure.
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