Hotel Villavicencio Plaza

... a laid back time. To stay in this Estadero called Estadero Playa Rica was $5,000 Colombian pesos per night per person in a tent; also they have a few rooms, in low season it's not necessary to make a reservation, basically the place was for us only. Talking about the restaurant service, the typical fish to eat is called "Cachama", has very good flavor and can be cooked in different ways, deep fried, or with "guiso" (onions, tomatoes, herbs, garlic, and more ...

I bought a little book with nice pictures of places in Colombia, and Cano Cristales really jumped out at me. I googled it and it looked amazing, i asked people had they been and nobody had heard of it. Even the Colombians had not heard of it , so we decided to head towards it , thinking there would be more information closer to the National Park. We had to get a bus 5hours to a town from Villavicencio.We eventually got a bit of information ,i was begging to understand ...

Paraglide in Villavicencio Before heading out of Colombia though I met up with my friend Pablo and his girlfriend Andrea. Pablo, an ambitious paraglider and adrenaline junkie like myself convinced me to spend the weekend with them in Villavicencio to go paragliding. Wow! Wow! Wow ...

... with my other good friend Adam Moody. The two had sidled up to one of the city´s many beautiful plazas to watch a street performer. As a distraction one of the muggers had the brilliant idea of spitting in Pete´s face while the other took his wallet. But Pete must have asked for it. He hadn´t been on his guard for the infamous spitting muggers. All of these examples happened within a week and just one degree of separation from yours truly. Even Lili herself had ...

... temporada estaban en remodelación así que fuimos a parar a un pequeño hotel, bastante humilde en el centro, llamado Hotel Boston, donde pagamos máximo $8.000 la noche por los dos. Como no habíamos planeado muy bien el presupuesto y teníamos ya muy pocos pesos colombianos, decidimos no excedernos en gastos y esa noche cenamos empanaditas de pipian, y cerveza. Al otro día nos levantamos con tanta ...

... streets to wander, and the rain, which has been a bit of a pain, but hey now that I am leaving the sun is coming out once again. Why am I not surprised? Because it can be no other way... Not really much travel stuff in here, only that the bus from Medellin was delayed and took 20h instead of 12, due to some landslide, but that is the way it goes, I am used to it now. So leaving on the ...

... was the rate. Had 2 TV rooms, lots of DVDs and a good kitchen. There were also the regular contingent of low term loggers, that one finds in these sort of hostels, which are set up to get you to stay on longer than one might normally. While there I looked around the town, which has a good collection of Botero´s (Medellin´s favourite son) sculptures in a square in the center of town. The metro also ...

... Villavicencio just in time to meet our hired driver for the weekend, Juan, and the rest of our crew, which are relatives of my friend Ana.. (Name was changed and photos of my friend and her family were removed at her request for fear of exposure and possible retaliation!?!) First we hit the zoo, which boasted a wide variety of species from all over Colombia, amidst an impressive jungle environment. There were lots of animals I had never seen before, plenty of killers and a ...

... of 3100m with a great view of the Andes, especially Aconcagua. We then drove down an exceptionally windy road to the small village iteself. Once there, we saw the disused Hotel de Termas and the viewpoint down the valley. Afterwards we had a fine lunch of chivito and wine, and our waiter Roberto was a top lad. Belongs on the stage. Very Bruce Forsyth.

... here...) Anyway, I made it to the top, and my reward was what has to be surely the world´s most wonderful descent. The road, cut into the mountainside, swooped down through glorious scenery with literally hundreds of hairpin bends. There were no safety barriers, so had I got sidetracked by the view and missed a corner, or had a brake cable snap or a tyre blow out, I would have ended up taking the fast, painful and unrecommended way ...