KIDNAPPED!
(Crossing Colombia Part 3)
Travel Tales Index - Crossing Colombia Index - Colombia Pix
After spending New Year's day in Popayan, we headed to San Andres De Pisimbala, the home of the Tierradentro ruins. This involved a bus ride across the Andes with the bus winding in and out along the side of the mountain. We had a number of stops along the way, including Inza where it was market day. Unlike some of the open air, crowded, slow moving Chivas that we saw there, we had a very comfortable 22 passenger bus but it still took 5 hours to travel the 65 mile dirt road to Tierradentro.
Tierradentro is a set of ruins, mostly burial sites for a civilization that existed in this remote region from the seventh through ninth century. Little is known about the people other than they had a complex civilization that covered a very large mountainous area. We hiked almost straight up 1400 feet to the top of Aguacate mountain and then along the manually flattened ridge where some of the tombs were. This part of the ruins was the least impressive, but we had a 360° view of the surrounding mountains and valleys below, including the towns of San Andres and Inza.
Toward the end of our seven hour hike, we encountered the best and most interesting of the tombs. These were large, underground, vaults with three columns. The vaults were painted in white, black and red geometrical patterns. The park built "steps" so that you could get down to look inside the tombs which were as deep as 30 feet. This was a great way to end our tour of Tierradentro. When we finally got back to town, we celebrated with some chocolate and freshly squeezed mango juice for Paul and lulo juice for Lois.
San Andres was such a beautiful spot that we decided to stay an extra day and go to La Piramide. We took a half hour bus ride out of town and found a mountain that was all stone on the top. The stone was carved by a pre Colombian civilization into the shape of a pyramid with steps going up the side of it. While we were enjoying the spectacular views over the valley, a family of Colombians arrived. We chatted a little bit and started taking pictures of each other together. We then went to the base of the pyramid where the Spanish had forced slaves to carve two tunnels about forty feet through the solid rock in search of treasure.
When we finished exploring, our new found friends invited us to have a cervecita (little beer) with them. It was 10:30 AM, but we figured they were a fun, friendly group so, why not?. After the beer, we headed back to the road where their jeep was. On the way, we met a few guys who were a little toasted and carrying a bucket of guarapo - a fermented sugar cane juice. They offered each of us some. In fact, they insisted that we each have a cupful with them. Then, another cupful. Fears of a repeat of Vietnam and rice whiskey crossed our minds. Luckily, this time, there were some responsible adults there. Our friends thanked the guys who shared the guarapo with us and we staggered on. If you ever get a chance, guarapo goes down very easy, is somewhat sweet, is about 20% alcohol and really hits the spot...
After they gave us a ride back to San Andres, Alicia, the leader of the pack, found out we wanted to explore a nearby waterfall. She decided it was her mission to make sure we got to the waterfall. First, Alicia insisted on another cervecita. We then drove a half hour out of town in another direction, parked and Alicia lead the charge through jungle paths for two hours looking for the falls. Finally, with a little help from a local boy, we were rewarded with the sight of a beautiful 200 foot waterfall. We relaxed, waded in the pools and took some pictures.
We headed back to San Andres, where we stopped for a very late lunch (it was 4:30). As good kidnappers do, they insisted on buying lunch for us. Next, they insisted on taking us back with them to La Plata, a good hour and a half drive, so that we could be closer to San Agustin, our next destination. When we got to La Plata, they granted us our freedom and dropped us off at a very nice, economical hotel in front of the central plaza.
The next morning we went to San Agustin, an archaeological site with some similarities to Tierradentro. The sites at San Agustin consist of carved stones, tombs and petroglyphs, dating from before 600 A.D. Our first stop was Parque Nacional San Agustin. The carved stone statues were all in beautiful settings. One area, Bosque de las Estatuas (Forest of the Statues) was reminiscent of La Venta park in Villahermosa, Mexico where we had seem Olmec stone carvings. We followed a trail through the forest and about every fifty feet we came across another statue. However, after a while the statues did seem to blend into each other.
Just because Paul was suffering from statue fatigue did not mean Lois was. So the following day, we set out for Alto de Los Idolos, another hilltop site with statues. A number of companies offer circle tours via jeep for $15 to the site with some other stops as well. We figured there was no reason we could not do the same loop using local buses. We waited five minutes for a bus, got impatient and stuck out our thumbs. Within two minutes we had met Orlando and Eugenia, a couple on vacation from Bogota. They were doing the exact loop that we had hoped to do and even more importantly, had an empty back seat in their jeep!
We spent the entire day with Orlando and Eugenia, visiting a number of sites, stopping for lunch and enjoying their company. First was a spot where the Rio Magdalena which crosses all of Colombia, flowing South to North, goes through some narrow rocks and its entire force is squeezed into a six foot wide sluice.
Our longest stop was the Alto de Los Idolos park. There were many fine carved stone statues, all with commanding views of the surrounding valleys. Some of the tombs had sarcophagi carved out of a single piece of stone. We could not imagine how difficult they must have been to carve, or to move! Our final stop was Salto de Bordones, a 1200 foot high waterfall. You might call this the second time we were kidnapped in Colombia. But, they too granted us our freedom just around nightfall...
At the end of the day, looking back, we realized that if we had any clue how rough the roads were, or how far apart the sites were, or how impossible it would have been to do everything on our own, we never would have tried. We would have taken a jeep tour and never had the pleasure of meeting Orlando and Eugenia. So, as the saying goes, "ignorance is bliss". We took a chance on two different occasions, met some warm, wonderful people and have fond memories.
Paul
& Lois
Villa De Leyva, Colombia
January 28, 2010