Day 2 in Columbia

Our second day in Columbia has confirmed my initial feelings, Columbia is simply spectacular. The standard of living is so much higher than else where in the region, and in a big contrast to say Chile, the people we meet are happy and eager to talk to us. We stopped for lunch at a road side restaurant after seeing smoked fish hanging over a fire. The freshness of the fish was confirmed when we saw that they all came from a small fish farm behind the owners house.

The road surfaces are often poor, but I have the right bike to deal with this. The long travel suspension soaking up the bumps with only the odd clunk from my still slightly maladjusted headstock causing issues. Eventually the twisting mountains gave way to flatter land and dual carriage way. After several hundred km of easy riding we arrived in the rough location of the hotel.

Unfortunately not one of the locals we asked really knew where the hotel was. The most intense storm of the trip then hit us. Previously I said it was like riding with a tap on over my head. This time it was like constantly having bucket of water emptied over us. The road turned in to a river and visibility was on occasion reduced to zero.

Eventually the rain subsided and after riding up and down the same road several times we eventually saw the faded sign, facing the wrong way for the directions we had, and made our way down a gravel track to the hotel. To our surprise we were the first riders to arrive.