Taganga and the Lost City

Taganga, Colombia

At the moment, I am trying not to itch the loads of mosquito bites (EZE, say it, BITEEES) all over my body! Arriving to Taganga was well, interesting. The bus I was on, to total a whopping 16 hours, broke down, and the entire bus had to wait for 45 min. and transfer to another bus. Well, that bus like the previous one was FREEEEZING! Everyone was cuddling with a blanket or something, all I had was a scarf, (it was 90F and I figured they wouldn’t put the air conditioning up so high, but they did!) I arrived in Taganga, a small coastal town, got off the bus and immediately started to sweat! HOT and HUMID! I checked in to an amazing hostel, met loads of fun people, Germans, aussies, English, and such people. We spent the day on the beach trying to cool off. While at the back town I arranged what I would be doing for the next 6 days, a trek to a lost city in the jungles of Colombia.

The 6 day trek to the Lost City (La Ciudad Perdida)

The hike entailed 6 days of roughing it… sleeping in hammocks, eating loads of rice and beans, being bitten by hoards of mosquitoes, gnats, and other crazy jungle bugs, hiking between 4-7hrs a day, through mud, rivers, uphill climbs, slippery downhill slopes and what not.

Miguel, a local guide, led our fabulous group: a couple from Australia, AL the Israeli, Steve, the English man, and Micah from Holland.

A 3 hrs ride into the jungle, lunch in a small town at the edge of the jungle and then the beginning of the trek. About 10 min. into the trek we ran into a group who was just finishing there trek, they were wet, muddy, smelly, filled with bug bites and torn apart, one girl’s shoes were basically falling apart. FUN! The first day the heat got to us, sunny, hot, and humid, we were all walking balls of sweat! Thank goodness for the river, we were halfway into the days hike, and our guide Miguel asked us if we wanted to swim in the river, Heck yeah! It was deep enough to do cannon balls and what not. Getting out of the river I almost stepped on a BIG spider, yuck! 4 hrs later, we arrived at out camp. It a shelter situated along a river. There was a make-shift stove with wood for fuel, room to hang at least 15 hammocks, a table and a bathroom, well just the bowl and wood around to create some privacy. We had a snack, watermelon, and then went to a nearby waterfall and jumped in for a refreshing end to day one. Dinner, rice, beans, meat, and salad, a game of cards and time for bed, I carefully got into my hammock, pulled the mosquito net over me, and hoped that I would be able to fall asleep (it was my first time sleeping in a hammock).

The rest of the 6 days was similar, hiking long hours in the heat, crossing rivers, swimming in the river, being eaten alive and what not. One highlight was when we arrived at the homes of indigenous people from the area. They all had long hair, spoke hardly any Spanish, wore long white cloth, and survived off the land. Other bizarre sights, the army ants carrying leafs to their castle, fresh pineapple, bananas, watermelon, and other fruit unique to the area, getting my feet wet every chance I could to cool myself down, waking up in the middle of the night having, itching attacks, the jungle noises at night, and of course the endless hours of card games with the group!

The third day however, was spectacular. We arrived to the ´Lost City´. At the entrance there were about 6 soldiers with big guns, kind of scary. As I hiked up the 2,000 stairs leading to the lost city, I spoke with one of the soldiers and he informed me that they were mostly there to protect the tourists from the FARC, good news. After my entire body was about to give up, these stairs were killers, I arrived at the top. There were terraces of rocks that were once home to many indigenous. We spent the night in the Lost City, without a care in the world, it was so peaceful there. The next two days we made our way back to civilization. All in all we were very lucky, we missed the hard rainfall every day, and no one got hurt badly. It is weird, sitting in front of a computer after spending the past 6 days in the jungle filled with animal noises and no worries.

2 days until Eze comes, super jazzed! A shout out to Maria and Maggie R, happy BIRTHDAY!!!!