Bogota and Foo Fighters

It's been a while since I've posted anything here lately. I had both camera and computer troubles so I had to wait until I went home to NY for Christmas to get those things fixed. But I think I have everything working well now!

For most of January we didn't really do much besides get back into work and hang out around Pereira. Dereek got a new job teaching social studies at Pino Verde, so we were really just adjusting to some changes and trying to save a bit of money because last weekend we flew to Bogota for the Foo Fighters concert!

Immediately after school last Friday I took a cab to the airport to meet Dereek and fly to Bogota. Bogota actually turned out to be a really easy weekend trip because the flight is only about 30 minutes long. When we got to Bogota we took a cab straight to our hotel, which was in La Candelaria, or the old, historic section of the city. The little hotel we stayed in was called the Muisca Hotel. It was really cute.

Where we ate breakfast

Nice little outside area and the stairs to our room

Our room

On Saturday we didn't do too much besides go out for Indian food. Pereira does not have a huge variety in types of food and Dereek has never had Indian food before, so when I heard that there was a good Indian place in Bogota I decided we had to go. It was pretty delicious, not the best Indian food I've ever had, but better than I was expecting it to be.

The next day we had all morning to roam around Bogota. We spent all morning wandering around the area of our hotel and going to some museums. We went to a police museum, a gold museum, and the Botero museum. The police museum was pretty cool and even had a free tour in English. We got to see a bunch of old Pablo Escobar things. 

Pablo Escobar glasses, watch, and video camera

Wanted Sign

After the police museum we went to the gold museum. It was neat to see so many gold artifacts, but definitely wasn't a museum you could spent all day it. Cost of entry was only 3,000 pesos or about $1.50 per person though. So it was totally worth it. 

The last museum we went to was a Botero art museum. Botero paintings are pretty much all of fat people and honestly, aren't really my style, but they were cool to see and there were some other great artists there too like Picasso and Monet. 

All these museums were cool, but I think one of the best parts was just getting to walk around the city. The old streets and houses were beautiful and it was peaceful to just get to walk around and look at the buildings around us. 

Plaza Bolivar

View from the top of the police museum

church

Saturday night was the Foo Fighters concert and the reason we had come to Bogota. We got to the venue in time for the opening band, which was a South American band of some sort. They were okay, but nothing too special in my opinion. When Foo Fighters came on though, it was amazing. People in the stadium were handed out balloons in Colombian colors so different sections had different colors (red, blue and yellow) and were throwing them all over when they came on stage. They are really amazing performers and tons of fun to watch. At one point, the sound cut out and everyone in the stadium kept singing with Dave Grohl conducting. He really is a lot of fun to watch. You can tell he's very comfortable on stage and it makes the concert super entertaining. They played for almost 3 hours straight. It was great and a really good first concert for Dereek. Getting home after the concert was a bit of a pain because it took FOREVER to get a taxi, but other than that it was AWESOME. 

You can see the different colored balloons right before the start of the concert here.

After the concert, we were pretty tired so we went home and went to bed. The next morning we had a bit of time before we had to fly back to Pereira so we went and took the cable car up the mountain to get some views of Bogota. It was SO CROWDED and took so much longer than we thought it would. The views were great, but the mobs of people were not. We didn't have time to wait to take the cable car back down, so we did the 45 minute walk, which was also horribly crowded. It would've been so peaceful and pleasant if it wasn't for all the people. The views really were amazing, but the crowds kind of ruined it a little. Still glad we went though because I got some really good pictures. 

Waiting for the cable car

We did get a picture together while we were there!

The top of the mountain has a church. I think that's part of why it was so crowded the Sunday we went.

Overall we had a really great weekend and I'm hoping to get back to Bogota and see a bit more of the city and all the amazing things that are just outside of it. If you ever have the chance, I'd definitely recommend visiting. 

Hiking in Valle De Cocora (and field trip)

Most of this will be about Dereek and I's time spent in Salento last weekend, but before I get to that, I just want to mention that Angela and I took second grade on a field trip to the zoo on Friday. The kids really loved it. The zoo itself isn't really anything special, but it was nice to see the kids so excited and having fun. I was also really happy to see some of the kids talking about what we were learning. The trip was done to conclude a unit on classifying animals, so I had many kids coming up to me telling me what animals were mammals, amphibians, reptiles, fish, and birds.

Looking at a parrot

Waving to a monkey. She was waving to all the animals. =) 

Listening to our guide tell us about the animals. 

Happy second graders at the zoo. 

Now, more exciting, is that Dereek and I went to Salento this past weekend for the three day weekend. We had really wanted to do some hiking and had heard about a great hike in the Valle De Cocora, which is right next to Salento. We didn't really know much about it besides it was long. Valle De Cocora is known for it's wax palm trees, which are the tallest palm trees in the world. They can grow to 160 ft and live for 120 years. They're amazing and beautiful trees. We also knew that there was a hummingbird reserve that gave out free drinks when you pay the 5,000 pesos (2.50 dollars) for admission. Besides that we didn't know what to expect. 

The night before our hike, Dereek and I just did a bit of shopping, had some dinner, and then learned how to play tejo. Tejo is a traditional Colombian game where you have small heavy circles that you have to throw to a clay pit and try to hit one of four small packets of gun powder and make them explode. You play this game while drinking. It makes the explosions that much more fun, and throwing heavy metal disks that much more dangerous. Here's a little bit of what tejo looks like. 

The clay pit and gun powder

This guy was much better at tejo then us. Here is what it's like when a gun powder packet explodes. (Thanks to Dereek for getting this video!)

The night before we had met another American teacher who was traveling and planning on hiking the valley, so we met up with him in the morning and we did the hike together, along with another girl who was from Poland and a man who was originally from the Philippines, but is now living in Florida. It was a very diverse group. The hike starts off pretty easy, just really muddy. Not too much up hill but A LOT of small bridge crossings. These were pretty fun as they didn't look too stable and there were signs for only one person at a time, so they swung quite a bit, but weren't so high that it was scary. 

The jeep that took us into the valley next to one of the tall wax palm trees. 

Beginning our hike, pretty but muddy. 

Definitely gorgeous views.

Lots of wax palms in the mountains

The first sign of the Acaime casa de las colibris (or Acaime house of hummingbirds)

Dereek and I next to a pretty waterfall

Crossing a bridge

Crossing another bridge

If you were on a horse, you couldn't take the bridge, so they just waded across the river. 

Looking at a waterfall while on one of the bridges

A slightly different looking bridge

A bridge? 

After hiking for a while, we began to see more and more signs for the Acaime hummingbird reserve. The bit of the hike up to the reserve was pretty steep and we were getting pretty tired, but it was well worth it. We got up and were given either hot chocolate or agua panela with cheese as a recovery snack. While we ate we were surrounded by hummingbirds. It was amazing how many there were. They were not forced to be there, but rather were simply wild hummingbirds at the bird feeders. After drinking/eating I spent quite a bit of time trying to snap some good pictures; and I got a lot! I never thought I'd have such nice pictures of hummingbirds since they're so small and fast, but there were so many and they'd let people get close to them. Dereek even got one to sit on his finger! It was a really cool place. We learned that you could stay over at the reserve for 45,000 pesos ($23 dollars) a night that includes all food. We're definitely keeping it in mind for our next visit. 

Sign for the entrance of the reserve!

My aguapanela (like a warm brown sugar drink) with cheese

The beginning of my hummingbird pictures. There's a lot. 

Three hummingbirds and some more hikers

Check out the colors and tail on this one!

This is what a hummingbird looks like when it flies away apparently. lol

Just to get a glimpse of how many hummingbirds there were and how close they would come to people!

After the hummingbirds, we continued our hike. This part was probably the toughest part. We hiked up to a lookout that was beautiful, but definitely had a lot of uphill to get there. Once there we ate some sandwiches and watched the clouds roll passed the mountains. 

Hiking up to the lookout

This part of the hike felt a little like a hobbit should live there

Views of the mountain from the lookout before the clouds came

Dereek looking out as the clouds rolled in

Watching more and more clouds come into the valley

Dereek and I

Some pretty flowers with the mountain and clouds behind them

After our break at the lookout, we began our hike back down into the valley. This was the part of the hike where we got the best views of the wax palms. The valley truly looked like a place that dinosaurs might live. There's not too much to say about the hike down, since it was relatively uneventful, but one of the most beautiful places I've been to. We couldn't help but keep stopping for more and more pictures of the valley and palms. 

The beginning our hike down through a pine forest

Looking down into the valley

So beautiful. But couldn't you picture a dinosaur in there somewhere?

Two lone, tall, palm trees

Lots of palms

A little dark, but I still like it 

I love Dereek and Gary just looking up at the tall trees in this picture

Entering into the valley. 

Dereek and I

It's hard to see, but note that there are people in the bottom left center of this picture. These palm trees really were huge!

So that was about it for our adventure. The hike in total (including stops) took us probably about 6 hours. It was definitely 6 hours well spent though. Dereek and I went back to Pereira that night. We were considering camping for a second night, but after a six hour hike, we really wanted to sleep in a bed and get a good nights sleep instead of in a tent on the ground.