Colombia: The Southern Highlands

Colombia: The Southern Highlands

Our goal after having been in the big cities, was going for a trip into the wild again. Los Nevados National Park was the ideal possibility. Right on our route and on high altitude; away from civilization.

We took a bus to Manizales, which was mainly known for it’s starting point for tours into the park. We spent a full day in Manizales getting/collecting information at different tour operators and even the official Park-Ranger Info Center. The contradicting information we got was depressive: not possible/possible but dangerous/possible but only with camping gear etc. Further on the estimated travel times and hiking hours varied tremendously. Getting there was almost impossible without official tour-operators.

In short: Our original plan was to get from Manizales to the Parks north entrance (about 2 hours), and from there hike to Salento, located at the southern end of the national park. The problem was that we didn’t have camping gear and therefore were dependent on lodges that offer sleeping places.

We found a cheap and very local alternative for transportation: El lechero, or “the milkman”. Together with a German couple from our hostel, Max and Ruth, we squeezed between the milk cans in the back of the truck at 5:30 in the morning. Although not very comfortable, it was definitely a unique experience. However, arriving at the lodge, which was the end-stop, we found out that we were still many more km’s away from the national park. Although very demotivated, due to lack of options we decided to stay that day at the lodge and figure out our net steps the next morning. We went for a hike with Max and Ruth in the area, a nice scenery that reminded us of European mountains.

The next morning Sven arranged a ride to the entrance of the park with a guided tour group. Although we had to pay for the transportation, the tour guide turned out to be very kind, and even offered us to join them to climb the glacier - a very nice free bonus. We started off in a very rough landscape at 4300m and made our way to the glacier at 4850m altitude. This time, both of us could feel the altitude a little bit more but reaching the snow-border at that height was very impressive. However, it was also shocking to see how fast the glacier had been retreated since the last 30 years.

After the hike, we would be brought to a lodge in the park for the night, but at that time we were told that it was fully booked and they didn’t even have extra blankets (We could have slept on our own mats but since we were on such high altitude and Pam had been sick for the last two days, warm blankets were a must). Luckily, again there was a local alternative. We could spend the night at a cattle farm, high up in the mountains! Here there was no electricity, they still milk the cows by hand, grow most of their own food and where the milk is still picked up by horses. Communication with the farmer and his son was hard: on the one hand because our Spanish is still not ideal, but mostly because they spoke in a very bad dialect, and just refused to (or couldn’t) talk any slower. Nevertheless, it was a very cool experience and we had a lot of fun with them. Here, we also got to know a very native drink: Tinto, boiled water with Panela sugar and a little bit of coffee.

The next morning we finally left on our own into the wilderness. We knew we had a long walk ahead to the next lodge, so we started off early. The different maps we had with us, were all not very accurate, but we knew about which direction to go to and met some park rangers on the way who we asked. The landscape was stunning and was changing throughout our hike into several different unique sceneries (Mountains, Highlands, Lakes and Jungle). The vegetation on such high altitude was completely different from anything we have seen so far, with the wax palm trees as highlights. We only met very few other people that day, which gave us a better connection with the loneliness of the nature..

After 9 hours of hiking we made it to the next lodge. We were completely done for the day and Pam’s ankles were badly swollen and painful. We had a very early night to be fit for the last part of our journey. Since we spent more time getting to the park as planned, we had changed our plan: Instead of going all the way to Salento, we hiked towards Pereira. From our lodge, that would be another 5 hours hike, followed by a two hour truck drive. During this part of the hike, we declined so much in altitude that we could slowly feel the air getting warmer and the plants getting more tropical again. As a perfect closure, we could lie down for two hours on the roof of the bus/truck while it brought us back into civilization. It was an amazing 5- day adventure with many ups and downs but overall we had a very euphoric feeling about it.

We went back to Manizales to pick up our luggage, and the next morning we took the bus to Salento. After being in a remote area between the locals for a couple of days, this typical backpackers village was a nice change again. Salento is located in a well-known coffee region and is mostly known for the Valle de Cocora, a beautiful valley with many tall palm trees up to 60meters. We stayed in a very laidback hostel, and went for a hike through this valley the next day. We soon met up with other travelers and formed a group for the rest of the day. After the hike we had a drink altogether and enjoyed a beautiful sunset on the top of the hill. The next day, we did a coffee-tour and had an easy afternoon, where we sorted out our way to the last destinations in Colombia.

The border area with Ecuador is rich of footprints of ancient civilizations, so we decided to go for tomb-haunting in Tierradentro. We had a stop-over in Popayan, and a crazy 5 hour bus ride over unpaved roads where we basically bounced our heads against the ceiling a few times. We found the cheapest sleeping place we had so far during our traveling (8 Euro for both of us in a private room). In the morning we set off very early again for the hike: a loop hike of about 14 km with many tombs and a historic museum on the way. Most of the tombs were empty, but some contained wall paintings and one even still contained pots. They were built between 400AC and 800AC. Furthermore, it was a beautiful but very wet and foggy hike.

After Tierradentro, we had our crazy bus ride back again, and then made our way to the border. After five weeks of Colombia, it was time for the next country: Bienvenidos en Ecuador.