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24.02.2020: Medellín to Santa Fe de Antioquia
We didn't get much sleep the night before, probably because we drank coffee way too late after our day out in Communa 13!! I made us fruit and muesli for breakfast whilst Kirsten wrote about our adventures from yesterday on the computer. We'd missed getting up to Barranquilla in the north for the carnival because our water pump failed on us. From Medellín we decided against taking the same road north through the mountains just before our pump problem forced our return to the city and instead, headed west along route 62 to get to Antioquia.
It was 10-45am by the time we left so we should have missed the rush hour but Medellín is the second city so we hit lots of traffic and it wasn't easy getting out. We drove past the area where the cable car was and went into a really long tunnel - 3 miles (5km). We didn't realise that, due to repairs, traffic coming the other way had to wait for us. There was a massive queue of 100 vehicles waiting on the other side!! Somehow we'd managed to time it right!
It meant a very long wait on the way back so I suggested we ask about the state of this road if we continued west and then north rather than backtracking to Medellín. According to our Reise Know-How (paper) map there was a large section of gravel road but maybe it's tarmac now. After the tunnel the road went continually downhill and it got hotter and hotter. We'd found a campground in Santa Fe de Antioquia on iOverlander called 1541 Contenedores. It sounded more like an address than a name - and it was!! At least we found it easy enough!
We only had to drive 35 miles (55km) so we got there at 1pm. We spoke to Devani, the manager, and got a price of 30,000 COPS per night incl. electricity (about $9). We manoeuvred and parked under a tree to get some shade and needed all 20m of our electric cable plus our 10m extension, and the cable for the 110V transformer to get plugged in! It was the first time we'd used our extension - we'd adapted our old electric cable by putting different plugs on each end. Good news ... no bang when we plugged in!!! Hey - we're not only amateur mechanics but amateur electricians aswell!!
The camping area is just a parking area at the back of a swimming pool which looked too dirty for us so we used the outdoor shower to cool down. It was 40°C in the shade!! Unfortunately we had to battle with bees congregating on the shower tap to switch it on and off. We didn't get stung because they knew if we turned it on they'd get water too!!
We asked Devani about the road and he said it's tarmac all the way west to the coast and then north. Super! That will save us hours of queuing for the tunnel and going back up into the hills via Santa Rosa de Osos where our water pump leaked. He also told us that the eastern route south from Santa Marta to Bucaramanga is safe. We'd planned to avoid it because of all the trouble with the ELN (kidnappings/vehicles set on fire). Apparently that only happens once a year on the same date!! So another change to our route plan.
We also booked a meal at his restaurant for the following evening - Kirsten's birthday. We had no idea if it was any good but Devani was a really nice host so, hopefully, we wouldn't be disappointed. We used the shade to cut each others hair and we were just cleaning up when 2 French RVs turned up. We recognised one from Cuenca - a short circuit from their fridge had cut the electricity for all the RVs parked there!! Fortunately there were no power problems whilst they were there! They went off for a swim in the dirty pool!! Kirsten spent an hour on the computer and I worked on our new route looking for places to stop etc.
At 5pm once it had cooled down a bit we walked into town. Santa Fe de Antioquia is the oldest town in Colombia, founded in 1541. Originally it was the country's capital. We picked up a map from the tourist office and wandered along the cobblestone streets, looking at the many balconies and carved wooden doorways. We went to see the oldest church from the 18th Century, Iglesia Santa Bárbara, famous for its baroque stone façade.
We went to a Chinese restaurant for fried rice along with chicken drumsticks and wings and then walked back. After another outdoor shower to cool down we wanted a rest ... but there were lots of mosquitoes!! We needed to set up our mosquito net above the bed and get out our fan and extension lead. It never went below 30°C, so we had the fan running all night!
25.02.2020: Santa Fe de Antioquia
The next morning I sang Happy Birthday to Kirsten 4 times - in English, Spanish, French and German!! She also got sung to by various family members and friends. They all got 10 points for entertainment if not for best singing!! So Kirsten was really happy. For me it was back to my every day duties, doing hand washing and hanging it out, washing up, filling up water bottles and I even mended one of our bed sheets but ran out of thread so I wasn't confident it would hold. In between I made us coffees which we had with apple cake and brownies.
Kirsten had a free pass today but she still took a look underneath Winnietwo and saw that our exhaust had a new hole next to where we'd had it soldered 4 months ago! We'd need to find somewhere to get it done but that wouldn't be in Antioquia. It was too small a place. We'd have to find somewhere along our route.
At 4-30pm we walked back into town and went to look at the bamboo bridge and another look at the quaint little town. It was still so hot that we ended up buying a 2 litre bottle of Quatro, a fizzy grapefruit drink. We don't like buying plastic but we would re-use it as a funnel for transferring drinking water into our large containers. We had to use our old one for coolant!
We walked back to our camping area and got to the restaurant for Kirsten's birthday dinner at 6-30pm. It's called Contenedores because the restaurant consists of two containers, remodelled to be used as a kitchen, with a seating area outside. It was extremely windy so we were looking for a table that had some wind protection. Devani came to greet us and wanted to show us to a flat pallet with cushions. We only glanced at it because we were looking for wind protection and picked a table right next to the kitchen container.
We ordered our food and then I looked over to the pallet and realised there were balloons on it! Devani had decorated it for Kirsten's birthday. Ahh! How sweet ... and we'd just ignored it!! We went over and took lots of photos and then apologised to Devani for not seeing it earlier. Unfortunately it started raining before our food was ready so we moved our table under the window opening which provided a bit of cover but even adding a table umbrella didn't work. I was still getting wet!! Just as our food was ready, the heavens opened.
Then it was all hands to the deck because the storm was wreaking havoc! I quickly put our food back into the kitchen and we helped the staff. All the cushions, pallets and decorations from Kirsten's birthday seating area had to be swiftly gathered and taken into the other container along with all the umbrellas and various other things. We considered taking the food back to Winnietwo but then just pulled two chairs inside the cooking area and ate there!! My chicken and chips had already got wet because the rain was so heavy, even though I had been really quick to grab our plates as soon as it started raining!!
We just had to laugh because we were sitting right next to the really hot oven, sweating buckets, watching the fierce storm outside!!! At least Kirsten enjoyed her hamburger with blue cheese sauce but the evening was a complete washout!! Devani was really sweet though, not just for making a birthday area but also because he gave Kirsten a basket of mangoes!!! We got soaked just getting back to Winnietwo so it took us a while to get ourselves sorted out. It was 33°C inside though, so we had to open up our back doors - good job we were under a tree!
26.02.2020: Santa Fe de Antioquia to Mutatá
The next day one of our fans stopped working. When it's around 40°C every day at the moment we need our fans!! Kirsten tried to mend it by cutting off a 12V plug from something else and attaching it. But it still didn't work!! Damn, we'll have to try and find a new one - not easy because most won't have 12V connections here, only electric plugs which are no use to us unless we are plugged in at a campground.
We packed up and had showers to cool us down, said goodbye to Devani and thanked him again, and left at noon. On our way out we wanted to drive to Puente de Occidente, at 291 metres the third longest suspension bridge in the world at the time of construction in 1895, and the longest in South America.
Our GPS was having fun with us again and wanted to take us up extremely steep roads! We did a U turn because I'd seen a side road that we'd passed that looked like it went in the general direction and was nowhere near as steep. There were still lots of potholes and (completely superfluous!) speed bumps but we finally got to a decent road to a viewpoint above the bridge.
After taking photos we drove out the same way, ignoring our GPS, and then headed west towards the coast. The road went up over 2,000 metres, and was extremely windy as we snaked uphill, but at least there wasn't much traffic. We stopped for a coffee break in the cooler air and then continued. We hit lots of construction on our way - they're building a new tunnel. Work started in 2018 but it'll take 10 years to complete!! The stops weren't long though, about 5 or 10 minutes each. But it added up. We finally started going downhill but it was already late and I ended up having to drive the last 60km (35 miles) in the dark. There were still lots of construction areas but they had left them all open because it was so late. It would have cost us a lot of time if we'd done that stretch during the day!!
We got to a Terpel petrol station at 7-45pm where we parked up for the night. A man at the station wanted to buy us a drink! We politely refused, but then another knocked on our door to give us two beers from Orlando, our new friend!! We'd said no but obviously that wasn't accepted!! We didn't drink them because the bottles were already open! Maybe we're too security conscious, and maybe Orlando was just being friendly, but it gave us an uneasy feeling. The heat and high humidity didn't help either!!
27.02.2020: Mutatá to Montería
After an uncomfortable night we filled up with diesel and then drove along a good road to get to Volcán de Lodo for a mud bath!!! There are lots of mud volcanoes along this stretch of coast. We've read reports from others about them but have never tried it before so we thought we'd give it a go. It was 3-15pm by the time we got there so we quickly got changed into old bathing stuff and walked up to the volcano. The changing rooms and showers were all closed but we were virtually the only ones there.
We had to go barefoot down extremely slippery wooden steps and then into the oozing mud. It was a really odd feeling, sort of floating in hot, thick sludge!! Plus you have to be really careful ... don't try turning on your front otherwise you'll do a nosedive into the mud and won't be able to get back upright!! Well you might but it wouldn't be easy!!
What really wasn't easy was taking photos and videos!!! I had to find a bit of water to wash my hands so I could take photos and videos of Kirsten!! I used our underwater camera so at least we could wash it afterwards!! We certainly had a lot of fun and we'd definitely recommend it. But then came the hard part. We had to walk along gravel down to the sea, slipping and sliding in our clogs. We didn't have water to wash our feet before putting them on!!
Then we had to climb down to the beach and try and wash off all the mud in the sea! But the sea was really dirty and sandy so we had to use lots of water when we got back to Winnietwo just to wash off all the sand!! Our old bathing stuff had to put into soak and washed several times but it still stunk of mud days later!!
It was 5pm by the time we left - almost 2 hours for about 10 minutes in the mud! We headed inland and stopped at a hotel/ truck stop near Montería at 6-45pm. We went through three toll stations and had 2 police checks on the way and then had to put up with a creepy security guard who kept staring into our motorhome!!
28.02.2020: Montería to San Juan Nepomuceno
We got woken up at 7-15am the following morning. A different security guard told us we had to move!! So I drove us to a larger parking area next to where we'd parked! We couldn't understand what the problem was.
Maybe it's a good job we only drove a few metres because the end of our exhaust fell off. Well actually it was still hanging underneath our vehicle but the end piece had broken away from the silencer!! We took it off and put it inside so we didn't lose it and looked up a mechanic on iOverlander. It meant driving back through a toll station but we got to a mechanic in Montería and they started working on us virtually straight away. It took 2 hours but that was because they needed to take off the rest of our exhaust first. The screws were too rusty and one broke off and they had to use the soldering iron to get the broken piece of screw out!
We needed new screws and then they soldered the end piece back on. It cost us only $30 US and I think it will hold for decades!! On the way back out we stopped at a hardware store and bought a new fan. It uses USB plugs for charging so we could run it off 12V. Then we drove back through the toll station a third time and headed north.
Our plan had been to visit Mompox, a little colonial town east of the main highway, but we were supposed to meet up with Janette, a friend of ours who was leading a large group of RVs along the Panamericana from South America through Central America and up to America. We had arranged to meet in Cartagena before they ship the RVs from Colombia to Panama so we didn't have time for Mompox. Not a problem because we could do that on our loop south from the eastern side.
Instead Kirsten decided to add a different stop, namely Sincelejo. Supposedly it's a colonial town. What we didn't know about was the horrendous traffic system, with no left turns that caused us lots of problems. We ended up in very busy, narrow streets in searing heat. We stopped to try and get money from an ATM but Kirsten's pin number didn't work and then she panicked in case money had been taken from her account. So we bought a Claro SIM card so we could look it up online but nothing had come through yet!!
Anyway, the whole excursion had cost us a lot of time for just a lot of stress. Definitely not worth it! Kirsten did actually take her camera with her but the town was so ugly she didn't use it!!! Back on the Panamerican Highway we headed north through more construction and road works and stopped at a truck stop at 8-45pm - really late for us! The good news was that we didn't have to cook because there was a restaurant there so we shared a plate of chicken, rice and chips with a drink for $4. Super!
We were surrounded by trucks but our new fan was really good. It runs off it's own battery and gets charged using a USB connection. We had it running on battery all night and it was still working the next morning on just one charge!!! Brilliant!! We didn't even get woken up by all the trucks leaving!!! Shows just how tired we were.
We got up at 8-15am and tried to get our football match online but no good. We couldn't watch and we lost 3-0. Not good, particularly as we want to go back up to the first division but we're too far behind other teams and it doesn't look like we're going to make it!! We left the truck stop and drove through lots more road works, heading for our next destination Cartagena.
Kirsten's washout birthday followed by a really muddy bath in a volcano.
