Salento. Cali. Colombia

2013.02.24. It is 33rd day of our travels. We reached Salento, Colombia.This town is located in the center of Cafetera - coffee growing area. After short walk, we reached the hostel. It was recommended by Australians from Medellin - hostel La Floresta, paid 35,000 pesos. The owner of this hostel was very polite, atmosphere was very welcoming, so we enjoyed our stay there.

Next day we went took the coffee tour. We went to Don Ellias farm, met with the owner´s grandson - Jose. He gave us a tour of their family farm.
Coffee plants give fruit twice a year after 1 year. Farmers gather 70% of the coffee fruit in May and 30% in October. It takes 3 months to gather coffee fruit each time. Then fruit goes through grinder, which separates coffee beans from coffee fruit skin. Skin becomes compost, and coffee beans go to special location to dry. After 20-30 days of drying coffee beans go to another town Armenia for some automatic processing separating coffee beans.  Then they are being fried in pans for 1 hour stirring all the time. About 4-5kg of coffee fruit are gathered from 1 plant.
Owner´s grandson Jose gave this information in Spanish, but he was so good at explaining that we understood everything. He showed us how pineapples are growing (it takes 1.5 year to grow one pineapple!). He gave us fresh Colombian coffee to taste. We enjoyed it.

Next day we went to Cocora park. The park is famous for the tallest wax palm trees. It was a nice hike, we met Australian couple, who we were walking with half way, crossing through 6 wobbling bridges. Then Australians went to see hummingbirds, and we went up to the mountain. On the way we met another traveler -black dog, who followed us all the way down the mountain. Going up, it started getting cold, we went into the cloud. When we were headed downhill, we saw a lot of huge palm trees, it was an incredible view, felt like some giants surround you...

Huge temperature differences during this hike: cold, hot, and some rain, made Jotvinge sick. But we already made 2 main trips in Salento, so we could relax and do nothing for couple of days. We bought antibiotics for Jotvinge. It was strange that medicine in Colombia is very cheap and no prescriptions required!

We met a lot of travelers, nice people in Salento. Now the best part: We met a couple: a guy from Poland and a girl from Belgium. They were trying to get south of Salento, towards Ecuador and they were unable due to coffee farmers strike. The roads were blocked everywhere. That´s when we found out about the strike, and it was not a good news for us. We did not know at that time, that we were going to be stuck for 9 days in Salento and Cali. But still we had great time in Salento, especially in hostel La Floresta!  We made some friends there: Chris from Germany who was studying Spanish, and Vera from Argentina who was healing after teeth surgery. 

We heard that roads open up to Cali, Colombia, so we took two buses to Cali. Arrived there with no problems, went to the recommended in the guidebook hostel -Tostaky, paid 45,000 pesos. After this we decided not to trust our guidebook (at least accommodation-wise) because this hostel was dirty, loud, people were chatting until 3:30am, and hostel staff was very rude.

Anyways, next day we started searching for another hostel online and found one nearby, so we moved to CALI Hostel, paid 35,000 pesos. This hostel was way more our style, although rooms were small, but it was quiet, and the staff -Fabian and Andres were very helpful and gave us suggestions were to go, and what to see. Every day we received information that coffee farmers' strike is almost over, at first we believed it, but days went by and nothing was happening, even worse - we read that truckers went on strike also, then sugarcane farmers.... It was frustrating, but we did not have any airplane tickets, we could wait. The English couple Elin and Flin who were also staying in our hostel had airplane tickets to London some time soon. I called to American Embassy in Bogota about the strike and spoke with lady named Megan. At first she did not understand what strikes in Colombia I was talking about, and after awhile she said that she cannot do anything to help me. While the British embassy was contacting Colombian government trying to find out what was happening and trying to put our English friends on the Colombian air force plane to Ecuador. Interesting Bureaucracy in American Embassy in Bogota!! We tried to figure out how we could go south: by bicycle, walk (9 days to open roads). Another option locals (and American Embassy) suggested was to find a local guy with the car, pay him to go through guerilla territory, where the road was open, but very dangerous.  And of course, the obvious and expensive option was to just buy an airplane ticket.

Although other people told us not to go to Cali, but we were forced to, and we liked the city. They say it is dangerous, but we did not feel like it. We went to dance salsa (Jotvinge sprained her ankle), and an art museum.
We met Argentinian couple, who travel on foot for 3 days to reach Cali from Popayan. We met German guy Johannes, British couple Elin and Fin, who we hope to still meet in Quito.

Last day we were in Cali, we met our Lithuanian friend Kestutis who lives in Chicago. It was very nice to meet him. Although we had a few hours together, it was interesting to listen to his stories and experiences in South America (he was traveling from December and will be flying back to Chicago in a week).

Saturday evening we said good buy to Cali hostel staff (Fabian and Andres), to Kestutis, to Cali and together with German friend Johannes left for Ecuador....