Pacific Paradise

The Pacific coast of Colombia will never be a major tourist mecca.  This has nothing to do with the fact that it is mostly rural, jungle, severely under-developed, and a victim of much poverty.  Its the fact that it rains.  It rains a lot.  The Colombian coast on the Pacific ocean is one of the rainiest places on the planet.  However, last weekend the sun made a visit and decided to stick around.

Almost a year ago I took a trip to go sea kayaking with Julio Pérez and Bicivan Tours.  Despite sore shoulders and a bit a sea-sickness, I knew I needed to repeat the adventure once more before my time in Colombia came to a close.  Some new friends had visitors coming for the long weekend, so a group of us formed and set out for the coast.  The sun included.

I knew the excursion would be memorable and a perfect reprieve from the bustle, noise, and grime of Cali, but everything turned out amazingly.  Not only was there the aforementioned sun, but both boat rides from and to the port city of Buenaventura and Juanchaco were amongst the smoothest and shortest I've had the pleasure of taking.  The company was fantastic, the food delicious, and to top it all off, I didn't get more than a small sun burn on my wrist!  A winning weekend all around!

¡Bienvenidos a Juanchaco!

Julio orientating us to the area with a sand-map on the beach.

The kayaks in a secluded cove on one the islands.

Amanda and me surviving our sea cave exploration.

A beautiful day to kayak the Pacific!

*All photos are courtesy of Cassie Supilowski and Julio Pérez (the last one) since I shockingly forgot my camera. 

Falling For Argentina

Part II of VI 
Living in Colombia I have learned two words forwaterfall: cascada and chorrera.  Why I need more synonymous second-language vocabulary filling my brain, I don’t know, but now I have catarata and salto to contend with.  (Not being a “waterfall expert,” there may well be more than one English noun to describe a river that runs off a cliff, but four seems excessive.)

The Cataratas de Iguazú, located outside of the quiet tourist town of Puerto Iguazú,  are awe-inspiring to say the least.  At around 1.7 miles across with a total of 275 different individual falls*, this world-famous natural wonder straddles the border between Argentina and Brazil. To stand and watch the incredible quantity of water that rushes over the edge is bewildering.  If the pictures look familiar it may also be because the falls have been used in numerous Hollywood films including "The Mission" (1986) starring Robert DeNiro, "Mr. Magoo" (1997), and the most recent Indiana Jones sequel (2008), among others.

The first jaw-dropping view of the falls is usually from the upper ledges; I’m not exaggerating when I say I got goose bumps!  Further hiking trails allow you to climb down to the lower basin and gaze up into the powerful and refreshing mists as thousands of gallons of water surge toward you.  At the bottom we boarded a small boat and were driven underneath a few of the falls, which, while blinding, provided a welcome reprieve from the jungle heat of northern Argentina.  Another short distance by tram takes you to the Garganta del Diablo (Devil’s Throat), a U-shaped section of the falls where nearly half the fall’s water spills over 80 meters downward. 

This is one of those astoundingly beautiful places that no photograph could ever truly and completely capture.  Nevertheless, I tried…

*Gracias, Wikipedia

The coati is a relative of the raccoon native to the area

that enjoys stealing tourist lunches.

It is comparable in size to a medium-breed dog.

Tres Fronteras

At the far end of Puerto Iguazú is the confluence of two rivers.

From here you can see both Brazil (left) and Paraguay (right).

And then there is this video (courtesy of Kristin):

I'm On A Boat

Coincidentally, all of my vacations this past year have been to coastal areas where swimwear was required attire.  From the jungle area of the Chocó to the Caribbean island of San Andrés to the coastal desert department of La Guajira, I figured it didn't make sense to break from tradition.  The week following the end of school I packed my board shorts and headed with a small group of teachers and some of their visiting friends on a kayaking adventure along the Pacific coast.

Departing from the only large urban area on the Pacific coast, the port city of Buenaventura, we took a fiberglass lancha to the small fishing community of Juanchaco, which served as our base camp for the next three days.  Our guide, Julio, runs his own ecotourism business and trips like this are his life, so we were in good hands.

Admiring the orchids.

Over the next three days we enjoyed mostly sunny weather - unusual for the Pacific coast, which is one of the wettest places on the planet - with visits to the small islands off the mainland, some caves, secluded beaches, an estuary, and river going into the jungle.  We saw bats fluttering about in caves, crabs scrambling over wave-swept rocks, pelicans roosting in trees, and blue-footed boobies perched precariously on cliff ledges.  Julio also was fond of pointing out all kinds of species of orchids, which happens to be Colombia's national flower.

Boobies!

Ocean kayaking is strenuous, especially when your fighting the current or getting nauseous from large sea swells.  Despite the sore shoulders, near-blistered hands, chaffed butt, and one capsizing, nothing can compete with the stunning beauty of this region, especially sections only accessible by small boat.  With Julio's expertise, I will definitely be doing this trip again!

Group Hug!

In Colombia there is a word used to describe an event where people come together in unification.  In the U.S. we might refer to it as a "group retreat" or possibly a "team-building conference."  Here it is called a convivencia (literally, "living together").  Since the 9th graders I teach lost the privilege to go for a week to Isla Gorgona due to irresponsible behavior by many during a similar event as 8th graders and several incidences this current school year with theft and poor treatment of substitutes, it was decided several days away from school with the teachers in an isolated environment to work out some class issues, might be a positive thing.

So, off we headed to a finca ("farm") in the department of Quindio in the heart of the coffee region for two days and nights of "living together."  This region is popular for other trips by our school as the weather is normally comfortable and it is relatively close - about three hours by bus.  During this time the students attended a several workshops by either us or a couple of outside psychologists about team-building, confidence, responsibility, and inclusion, among other themes.  While the dividends of the experience are yet to be seen, I think the trip accomplished one major feat: it humanized some of the teachers for the students, and possibly vice versa.

The event flew by but we still found time to enjoy the space we were in which included several nice pools, a stream with a small waterfall, and a bonfire.  While its no whale-watching, snorkeling, or coral beach, it was a nice break from the daily school grind.

At my "empathy" workshop: Camila, Maria Paula, & Isabella

Nicolás at the "empathy" workshop.

Los Muchachos: Sebastián, Juan Camilo, Rodrigo, Andrés,
Henry, Lucas, Pablo, Juan Camilo, Luis, & Nicolás

How low can you go? Picking up a cut-off paper bag with
no hands and only your feet touching the ground

New challenge: How many 9th graders can you fit in one pool?

Welcome to the Quindío countryside.

Taking a dip in the stream near the waterfall.

Las chicas y la chorrera
(Andrea, Catalina, Juanita, María Antonia, Isabella, & Laura)

Singing at the bonfire...probably Miley Cyrus or Taylor Swift
(Note: Some kids using their BlackBerries to follow the lyrics.)

This Is Too Hard; Let's Just Quit! (Part I)

Nicaragua - A Visit In Two Parts
These were the proclamations uttered as we trekked and, as the guide book adequately put it, "scrumbled" our way toward the top of the Maderas Volcano, comprising the eastern side of Isla Omatepe on the expansive Lake Nicaragua.  While they were meant half in jest and half as perverse motivation, they seem to ring true to my impression of the tangled history and complex ppolitics that make up this fabulous country. After years of political strife, conflict, and wars, the people here seem tired.  They are seem happy to be in a time of peace and calm and want nothing more for things to remain that way, slowly improving towards a better future.

Isla Omatepe's twin volcanoes: Concepción (L) & Maderas (R)

Conflict is hard.  Death and war and poverty and locked doors and politics are hard.  Let's just quit and live our lives.   Take a break from civil wars and work on establishing a working government.  Smile and work and raise families and laugh.  Sounds like a good idea to me!

The "muddy scrumble" up Maderas.

Upon arriving at dark to the capital of Managua, I did not know what to expect.  After my taxista, who had a fondness for Johnny Cash, warned me that "eating trout from the lake would cause me to die from a tapeworm with three heads" I was even more perplexed as to what this week would bring.  However, I thoroughly enjoyed my six day vacation in Nicaragua, visiting with friends, both new and old.  An ex-colleague from my Manitowoc days, Lynn, just completed her two-year Peace Corps service in the Philippines and was visiting a couple other volunteers in Costa Rica for the New Year, so we decided to meet up across the border to the north, knowing little and expecting nothing.  It turned out to be one of the most rewarding "random" travel decisions I've ever made.

I met their foursome in the "cattle town" of Rivas on the Panamerican Highway - me coming from Managua, they from the southern border - and promptly boarded a ferry in the port town of San Jorge to reach Isla Omatepe on the enormous Lake Nicaragua.  The island was formed from the eruption of two volcanos, creating a disfigured "eight"-like shape.  One of the volcanos, Concepción, is still active though the last activity was a sputtering of red non-toxic gas a few months ago; it has since settled down.  We, however, stayed at a rustic lodging on the part of the isle dominated by the Maderas volcano which has a lake in it's crater as evidence of any recent activity.

A sunset dip near Mérida on Isla Omatepe.

Since it initially took a good 90 minutes to get from the dock on the other side of the island to our lodge, we stayed on our part of Omatepe the entire three days, filling the time with excursions to the San Ramón waterfall and the aforementioned beautifully strenuous climb up Maderas.

The hike to the crater ridge was one of the most stunning and challenging I've ever done.  It resulted in two sore legs and a left knee that is showing signs of not being twenty years old anymore, but the vistas and flora along the way were incomparable.  As we literally climbed hand over foot using cloud dampened roots as ladder rungs, the mist of the forest gave way to a secret world filled with ferns and dew-dropped, moss-covered vines.  Taking a breather on the narrow pathway up on the volcano's ridge, you couldn't help but notice the contrast in temperature between the breezy and moist cloud forest around you and the hotter summer-like lake shore a mere 1300 meters below.

The Song of the Sea

Many people often find Cali on a map and comment that I'm "pretty close to the Pacific."  This is both true and misleading.  Cali is close to the Pacific as the crow flies and relatively close - about three hours - by mini-bus.  However, if its a beach you're looking for, you'll be hard-pressed to find the white sands and sun-soaked umbrella-filled beaches of your southern-California dreams.  The entire western coast of Colombia is largely virginal tropical forest, dotted with a few small predominantly Afro-Colombian fishing communities.  The beaches are mostly black sand and it is almost guaranteed to rain at least part of every day, if not the majority.  The western coast of Colombia is one of the wettest places on Earth.

I've traveled here before, during my first year's Thanksgiving break I got to explore the port city of Buenaventura and take a boat north to the towns of Juanchaco and Ladrilleros but I haven't been back since.  This last weekend a few of us decided to explore the northern part of the Pacific coast, a region famous for its pristine beauty and secluded nature, called Chocó.  From Medellín we hoped on a small 18-seater prop-plane for an hour flight to the coast.  (You know its a small plane when the pilot hands you earplugs as you climb the steps.)  Watching the terrain change and the towns and roads below disappear as we approached the coast was exciting.


We landed outside the town of Bahía Solano and were met by a man who would drive us the rest of the way to the (unicorporated) village of El Valle.  (Good luck finding it labeled on a map.)  The road was terrible at beat and if not for the primitive power and experience of the "wooden" vehicle we were jammed into, along with crates of eggs and bags of fish, I'm not sure how we ever got trough the pot-holed muddy road.  Once in El Valle we were taken to our cabaña which was within sight and sound of the crashing waves.

For the next few days we enjoyed the warm climate, relaxed culture, warm and friendly people, and delicious Pacifico cuisine.  I, however, enjoyed the inside of my mosquito-netted bed after developing what was later diagnosed as a tonsil infection which caused me to throw up everything I ate for two days.  It's never fun being sick while on vacation but at least I had the sound of the waves crashing on the shore and the rain on the roof to lull me to sleep.

One of my colleagues, Tara, had a friend visiting from California.  He brought along his fancy water-proof, bulldozer-proof camera and made this video of our trip.  It pretty much sums up all the sights and sounds of the typical coastal community in Chocó.  Note my conspicuous absence from most of the "field trips":



The music is by a Colombian group called Chocquibtown, taking their name from both the department (state) of Chocó and the department's capital Quibdo.  The lead song is called "Somos Pacifico" ("We Are From the Pacific Region") and celebrates being from Chocó.  In the chorus are the words "...la pinta, la raza, y el don del sabor!"  Translated, this phrase is singing the praises that the colors and race of Chocó are what give it its flavor.  This could easily be the anthem of this unique region.

Waiting for Water

Recently I came across an interesting article on a social trend toward minimalistic living. While this twist on "green" lifestyles, leaning heavily on technology, is intriguing, I realized these last two weeks, that I could probably do it if I had to.

When I packed up and moved to Colombia three years ago - this past August first marks the beginning of year number four - I came with just two large suitcases and a pair of rubbermaid storage bins. This was much less than what I moved out of my apartment in
Manitowoc with by nearly a truck-load. Granted the school here has provided furniture, but some of it serves no real purpose for me other than marking the corners of a room. (The couches are nothing more than glorified dorm lobby pieces.)

Upon returning from the States a couple weeks ago I found I had no water in my home. This was not surprised, and half expected, as I hadn't had time to pay my utility bill before leaving for summer vacation. I was honestly excited when, after taking a deep hopeful breath, I flicked the light switch and the lights came on.

I paid my bill on Wednesday of last week, and it was only restored yesterday after a long holiday weekend and several phone calls. Now, when the utilities people said it would be turning on later on in the day that I paid, I in no way believed them - this is Colombia, c'mon! - but I honestly didn't think it would take over a week's time.

Living knowingly without water has been interesting. Showering at school at the end of the work day and then not over-extending myself for the next 24 hours was tricky, but doable. Having enough forethought to buy bottled water for the brushing of teeth or making tea was a definite mindshift. I already had several used bottles, filled from the tap, frozen in my freezer (as a way to conserve energy) and that was used for rinsing dishes, in moderation, and other chores like shaving and wiping down spills.

This way of doing things went quickly from an inconvenience to a mode de vie. I knew how much water I had stockpiled and how much was needed to do certain activities. I had worked out a bathing system that seemed to work advantageously to my schedule. I am very happy to have my water restored and available at the turn of a faucet, but I learned that perhaps I use more than I need in the first place. When people would ask if my water was back on and my response was that it was not, they gave me the expected exasperated face and "how terrible" comment. Really, though, it wasn't, but I am glad I can now stop feigning agreement.