We took a wrong turn and ended up in INDIA!

As most of you know, Brandon and I didn't originally plan on traveling through India this winter...it was more of a "plan B".
After lifeguarding ended, Brandon completed the courses for his Captain's license, we both took the STCW-95 course (the minimum qualification to crew on a yacht), and hopped a plane to Ft. Lauderdale, Florida with every intention of joining the super yacht community as crew.

Unfortunately, we picked the wrong year to break into ANY industry. We pounded the docks in Florida for about two months until we were, finally, offered a freelance position on a yacht over New Year's. The good news was that it was a great experience (hard work, but great) and the owners and captain offered us another freelance position in the Bahamas for about 6 weeks from May to June. The bad news was that the job situation in Florida was as dry as ever after the new year...we're talking experienced 1600 ton Captains out of work. So we took those lemons and made our version of lemonade...

We accepted the job in Bahamas and got the heck out of Florida!

We flew to New York, NY for a week to sort out our India visas with a quick stop in Syracuse to visit some friends from USC. Then, Jan 20th we hopped on an Emirates Airlines Airbus A380 (Brandon was really excited about this) to Chennai, India via Dubai, UAE.

Brandon's brother, Jason, met up with us in Chennai and we'll have exactly two months before Jason heads further east to Indonesia and Brandon and I fly back to L.A. to requalify for lifeguards before heading to the Bahamas.

Central Park

Bogota

We arrived in Bogota at about 1:30 in the morning after piecing together a free ride, a por puesto (mini-bus), and a bus from Rio Claro. Once again, we were at altitude accompanied by a constant drizzle...brrr! One more cold stop before heading to the much anticipated Colombian islands of San Andres and Providencia.

First shocking impression aside, Bogota has turned out to be a really enjoyable city. While you don't want to be walking around late at night, during the day it's a bustling center for business, university students, tourists and everyone in between. There's loads to look at given the interesting mix of architecture ranging from ultra-modern to colonial. The free museums and the many cafès, parks, and plazas yielded a wonderful way to spend a couple days.

Yesterday, we made our way around a few of the museums...the Military Museum, Museo del Oro, and the National Police Museum. We found the latter to be the most impressive. It had rooms featuring their anti-narcotic, anti-kidnapping, and anti-guerrilla forces. There was also an entire floor dedicated to the drama of Pablo Escobar, the Medellin drug cartel, the Cali drug cartel and how the police force finally took them down. There was even a ceramic roof tile soaked with Pablo Escobar's blood.

Last night, we took a ride up the teleferico to Cerro de Monserrate, a mountain bordering the city. We were able to catch a clear view of the city's lights and rub elbows with Colombia's high class over a couple drinks at a swanky, pianist accompanied restaurant.

Pablo Emilio Escobar Gaviria "El Doctor"

Rio Claro

On our way from Medellin to Bogota we decided to make a brief stop at El Rufugio Rio Claro. We were hoping to see some of Colombia's coffee zone, but unfortunately it was further south than we had time for this trip. While Rio Claro didn't have much in the way of coffee plantations, the refugio was in a killer location in the middle of the rainforest. To top it all off, our room had a close-up view of the jungle...well, I guess it was more like the jungle came right into our room.

Our first day there, we walked the river trail passing a cave called El Templo del Tiempo (The Temple of Time) and a couple different beaches. We played around a bit floating in the river's currents, but didn't attempt to cross it because there was a streak of umph in this river.

That night, there was a consistent downpour. Beside sleeping to the sound of rain in the rainforest, we were stoked because the second morning we were hoping to do a little river rafting. Get this...$10 US for two hours! When we awoke the river was moving much faster than the day before. While the rapids weren't crazy (probably only a level 2 at most), our driver was. Instead of steering the boat away from low-hanging trees, we would head straight for them. There were at least two times that my helmet came in handy preventing brain damage.

Unfortunately, we weren't aware that the first weekend in May is a national Colombian holiday. The refugio was booked full and our hopes for a second night there were quickly shot down. We hit the road to Bogota, but were pleasantly pleased with our experience in the Colombian jungle.

Medellin

First thing that comes to mind when the city Medellin is mentioned... Pablo Escobar, right? While we did know that Medellin is the second largest city in Colombia, we weren't exactly sure what to expect...maybe guerillas, maybe drug cartels, who knows?

Well, upon arrival it was confirmed that Medellin isn't on any lists of most charming cities in the world...let alone in Colombia. We started our search for a hotel in the city center. Turns out all of the hotels in the area rent rooms by the hour and most of them even have prostitutes in the front doorway ready to do business...gives one stop shop a whole new meaning, eh? Anyhoo, we were able to find a decent, clean, prostitute-free hotel to park our backpacks for a couple days.

I guess the highlights of Medellin would be the Museo Antioquia and it's surrounding plaza (both adorned with tons of Botero works), the metrocable (the city's public transport system includes cable cars), and most importantly its ultra-friendly citizens. Most people we met were pumped that we were giving Colombia and especially Medellin a looksee. I guess I can see where they were coming from because we didn't see any other foreign travelers while in Medellin.

Playa Blanca...Does it get any sweeter?

After spending the majority of this trip in and around the mountains, we arrived to Venezuela and Columbia dreaming of beautiful Caribbean beaches. We got lucky with Venezuela in Morocoy and were hoping that Columbia would be able to compete. Tayrona was beautiful, but we thought we would press our luck and look for a tropical beach near Cartagena.

We found it!!

We spent a day talking with the tour office and haggling with boat operators trying to figure out the best way to get to Playa Blanca on Isla Baru from Cartagena. In the end, we boarded a tour boat that sailed through Islas del Rosario and made an afternoon stop in Playa Blanca. Given our negative experience at La Boquilla, we wanted to have a way out if we found the place to be completely dodgy.

Luckily, plan B was completely unnecessary...Playa Blanca was absolutely what we had been looking for! Crystal clear water and a long white sand beach bordered by shady palm trees. All of this tropical beauty was topped off with palm huts to hang our sleeping bags aka hammocks. We were even more pumped when we found a place that let us tie our hammocks up and gave us a place to store our bags just as long as we ate our meals at their restaurant (surprisingly at a super reasonable price).

We settled into a daily routine ultra-fast. Wake up when it starts to get too hot to sleep, breakfast, swimsuit and sunblock up, walk the distance of the beach, settle into our books in the shade during the really hot part of the day, one last swim (otherwise known as a shower) before the sun got too low, sunset beers, dinner, back to the hammock.

We ended up spending 5 days on the island and would have spent more had we come prepared with more money, clothes, and most importantly shampoo and conditioner. Probably best we ran out of money or we might have scratched Medellin and Bogota.

Estamos en Cartagena

We spent the day exploring Old Town and then checked out a fishing town called La Boquilla. Some douche bags tried to charge us over $20 U.S. dollars for 4 beers. We threw 10,000 pesos at them (the equivilant of $5 U.S.) and walked away. Tomorrow, we plan to go to Playa Blanca and Las Islas del Rosario. We're really hoping to find a chilled out spot with a good beach...maybe even descent snorkeling...keeping our fingers crossed!

Parque Nacional Tayrona

We spent about a week in Venezuela and decided we needed to move on because the cost of living was well beyond our means. In a two day journy from Tucacas, we crossed the boarder and landed in Santa Marta via Maracaibo, Venezuela and Maicao, Columbia.

While in Santa Marta, we were able to witness a cruise ship make port and over-run Santa Marta. Now, we see why Latinos seem to think it's super easy to charge tourists an exhuberant amount higher than what a product is worth.

Anyhoo, after piddling around Santa Marta and Taganga for a few days we made our way to Parque Nacional Tayrona...named after the indigenious Tayrona Indians. Supposudly, this place is home to some of Columbia's most beautiful beaches.

After a short jeep ride and a 45 minute hike from the park's entrance we arrived at Arrecifes beach. While it's prohibited to swim here because of dangerous ocean currents, we did find a great place to park our backpacks and hang our hammocks.

We walked about 20 minutes further to a beach called La Piscina. We figure this place got its' name from the rock wall formed about 300 meters off the shore...both of us were not exactly sure where these huge rocks came from...maybe some volcanic activity. It's actually a very cool natural phenomenon...these huge rocks form a type of barrier reef which make this beach relatively calm compared to the surrounding beaches.

Another 20 minutes further was Cabo San Juan...a popular camping spot for hippie backpackers. We could totally see why. Apart from the fact we're in Colombia and any form of authority was left at the park entrance, this part of the park rented hammocks in a hut on a bluff overlooking two sides of the point...what a view! We hung out here until it looked like the sun was heading home for the evening...and we decided to do the same...back to Arricifes.

On our walk back through the palm groves we witnessed a pastel tropical sunset accompanied by an almost full moon rise. Life was good...