Getting Down and Dirty!

  Ipiales, Colombia
Saturday, January 6, 2007

By the time I cleared immigration in Colombia, it was too late to get the 2 hr bus to Pasto (road a bit dodgy at night & also would have missed stunning views), so with a last minute change of plan, I ended up staying the night in Ipiales, a little town near the border, but this turned out to be the best thing! The carnival I was going to Pasto for was also in this town. I found quite a luxury hotel with HOT water, cable TV etc for only $20 (12 pounds), & they even opened the gym just for me!

I had a nap until 930pm but then decided to pop out to see what the party in the plaza was all about... & got back at 130am ! It was the famous & crazy "Blancos y Negros" carnival (white & black) & was a VERY VERY messy affair, with different colour face-paints, flour, lime (Calcium Carbonate) powder & talc being smeared/thrown ON everyone BY everyone else, friday being vaguely negro paint & saturday sort of blanco. And then there´s the constant foam sprays, it was like it was snowing & just walking down the street meant you´d get sprayed!!!!!! The carnival is to celebrate the end of slavery in the region.

Everyone was incredibly friendly there, I just wandered into the heaving dancing crowd & stood next to people that looked nice & they soon started talking to me & sharing wine from cartons! Being possibly the only foreign tourist in town, I had a never ending supply of dancing partners for the live salsa & merengue music , the best of which was Deiby, a local lad who was an amazing dancer & a gentleman too, escorting me home each night! All totally loco ("crazy"), innocent fun, I danced constantly both fri & sat nights AND saturday afternoon with different groups of amigos, meeting some of them again & being driven around the town in Deiby`s dodgy old Citroen! I ended up exhausted but totally happy, with some hideously dirty clothes! The hot water shower (a luxury here) was absolutely essential for the 2a.m showers to scrub off the paint! I Colombia!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I did manage a couple of slightly more clean hours, with a trip to Las Lajas Sanctuario, an amazing gothic-style church created between 1916-48 where the image of the Virgin Mary had allegedly appeared in the rock face.