Bogota was much like I remember.  In fact, when I was walking down a street in La Candelaria, I had an intense feeling of DejaVu, only it wasn’t DejaVu.  I had actually walked down the same street some time back.  The little shops and restaurants along the colonial street looked exactly as they had 12 years prior, and I wondered momentarily if I had stepped through a time portal.   

After a memorable stay in Bogota (save for the traffic), I ventured into the countryside to find a small colonial village named Salento, located near the heart of Colombia’s coffee growing region. To get there, I had to ride over an 11,000 foot pass.  The road was perhaps one of the best I’d ever ridden in all my travels. The name of the road is Highway 40. Its an ingeniously constructed highway consisting of two completely segregated one-way thoroughfares, each with two lanes so you have ample room to pass slower vehicles and “twist the throttle hard!”  Even the “Thumper” (KLR) was laughing all the way up and down the mountain.  I took some time lapse video of the ride.

We (we, being the Thumper (KLR), me, and Little Kama on the front fender), arrived in Salento where I dismounted my steel horse and ordered a beer at one of the restaurants lining the perimeter of the plaza. 

After befriending the staff at the Balcones Del Ayer, and showing-off the Thumper, I departed Salento and made my way through Colombia’s Southwest region. After a few miles, I came upon my first toll booth in Colombia, but when I pulled up to the gate the attendant frowned and waved me back while pointing to the side of the road. I was completely confused, as usual, but noticed the narrow traffic lane just wide enough for a motorcycle on the side of the road. I pushed the bike backwards and then proceeded through the tight space never stopping to pay the toll.  It took me a few seconds to figure out what was going on, and then it dawned on me.  Motorcycles don’t pay tolls in Colombia!  If you read one of my earlier posts about Mexico I’d said I believed that I funded Mexico’s annual highway budget with all the tolls I paid there.  As all adventure riders know, it’s a PITA to go through tolls on a motorcycle!  So when I say that there are no rules for motorcycles in Latin America, its really true in Colombia.  I went through at least a dozen tolls from Salento to Cali and I was overjoyed not having to pay a single peso! 

I eventually arrived in Cali, the Salsa capitol of Colombia.  Earlier in the day I had reserved a room at Hotel Villa Casuarinas and it turned out to be another Booking.com home run – more like a grand slam!  This place was amazing.  As I arrived, the giant gate guarding the property opened up and I rode into the compound feeling like a Knight returning to his castle after an adventure.  It was a spectacular Cali estate, like something a Colombian Cartel boss might have owned in the heydays of the Colombian drug trade.  My room was a palatial suite with a walk in closet and large marble bathroom.  I stayed there for two nights at $50.00 U.S. per night. 

After Cali, I headed south into the Department of Cauca, where I stayed on a farm for a few days. Cauca is a level 4 (no go zone), according to the U.S. State Department, due to crime, kidnapping, homicide, and drug trafficking. As I rode into the property there were two young men on the side of the gravel road holding machine guns who smiled at me and waved me through.  You are probably thinking at this point that I have a death wish, but believe me, this was the last thing I was expecting.  When I arrived at the farm, a wonderful young lady came out to greet me. We went into the house where she poured me a cup of that wonderful Colombian coffee.  I asked her about the dudes with the guns and she explained that they were Colombian Army soldiers who were there to deter crime in the area. Apparently the farm was on the fringe of an area that was a hot spot for drug traffickers. They warned me not to venture any farther into the hills.

Once in the house, some of the other family members appeared. There was one other tourist on the property – a young Swedish woman (Frida). Frida had arrived from the south (Ecuador) and told me that the bus that she had been traveling on the prior day had been detained for 24 hours by protesters. “Another thing to look forward to on my way south, I mused.”

The family invited Frida and I to go out to dinner with them. We jumped into a couple cars and drove back down to the main road where about 15 uniformed soldiers were on patrol.  Needless to say, I was a bit restless laying in my bed at night with soldiers milling about outside my door. Despite all of this, the farm was one of the most peaceful places I had been.  

We had a wonderful dinner, went back to the house and had some cake (and more coffee).  These folks were the salt of the earth.  Frida and I felt like we were part of the family.

Under other circumstances, I might have gone somewhere else, but my hosts made me feel safe.  And where would I have gone? I was in the middle of Colombia for God’s sake! So I just hung out with these wonderful people (and their darling baby) for a few days, writing or sleeping in the afternoons and praying that those soldiers out there in the dark were good guys.  

That is why they call it an adventure folks!