Monkeying about in the jungle
Trip Start
Apr 03, 2003
1
6
16
Trip End
Oct 01, 2003
Santa Marta,
Colombia
Thursday, May 15, 2003
OK, here is a bit of background. The indigenous Indians in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta built a city high up in the mountains a good few hundred years ago, and for a very long time it lay undiscovered in the jungle. It was rediscovered sometime this century and you are now able to visit it, however the only way to get there is to trek for 6 days through the jungle or pay a ridiculous amount of money to get there by helicopter. Its kind of like a jungle covered version of Macchu Picchu (Inca Trail ruins in Peru) but without the bus loads of American tourists....
Days 1 - 3. Absolute paradise. I was the happiest kiwi in the world, trekking through the most gorgeous mountainous jungle (kind of like NZ bush but with loads more vines and screechy noises). Despite having fears of simply not being fit enough to do it my body managed to find some energy that has lain dormant for quite a few years now and I thoroughly enjoyed the 25km hike there over 3 days. It was bloody hard, eeeevil 45 min walks up realy steep muddy trails and back down again, time after time. Our guide only spoke Spanish, but I understood most of what he said and Helen and Chris managed to translate what I didnt understand. We stayed in little huts, sometimes attached to a small house and had our meals cooked over wood fires and slept in hammocks. If we were lucky there was running water (piped from the river) but no electricity. We were up at around 6-7am with the sun and didnt go to bed later than 7 or 8pm every night (usually driven there by the hoards of hungry mosquitoes!)
At the end of the jungle walk were 1200 stone steps leading up to the city. Oh my, they were tough.
The actual city itself was amazing. We were the only people there so it was great investigating all the different parts on our own.
Day 4. We spent a few hours walking amongst the terraces of the city and then prepared to walk back to the next nights hut. It was then that it started to rain. Not just any old rain, but buckets and buckets of the stuff, complete with thunder and everything! It was then that I started to regret taking my raincoat out of my backpack to make way for some biscuits......
So we made our way down the 1200 stairs (on my arse for a few of them) to the river which we had to cross several times on the way back to the hut. But this time instead of the quiet mid-shin deep river that we had crossed the previous day, we encountered white water rapids that were now mid-thigh high. Despite this our guide decided that we were still going to cross. I had other ideas and held back while he proceeded to tie a rope to a hanging vine that was supposedly going to help us across the river. He managed to persuade Helen and Chris to wade halfway across the river and perch on a rock while he thought about how he was going to get across the second half. By this point he was up to his armpits in white water, Helen was about to cry, her packpack (including camera and sleeping bag) was soaked and it became apparent that we were in deep shit. Apart from me who was still on the side of the river shaking my head at the ridiculousness of the situation. Then our guide got swept away by the water for a little bit (but hung onto the vine and managed to get back up), Helen and Chris now had to contend with getting back across the river in water that was now waist high and I had decided that a raincoat would have been useless anyway as I was soaked to the bone . So up the 1200 stone stairs we went. Again. We sat out the day in the hut eating biscuits....
Day 5-6. Made our way back to Santa Marta walking like biddies. I have never been so stiff in my entire life! But we made it and I loved it. I think I mustve lost at least a kilo off each buttock and have discovered muscles I never knew I had. Ive realised that I actually do really like trekking and doing exercise and am looking forward to doing loads more treks, and hopefully getting myself in shape. Now if it wasnt for the biscuits.....
So, off to Cali tomorrow, the salsa capital of Colombia, where Im going to swing my butt off (when it stops hurting that is)....
