Colombia Day 5

Today we took a day trip to Guatapé and Peñal. For some reason the tours there are really cheap.  For the low price of $30 they pick you up at your hotel, feed you  breakfast after 2 hours on the bus, take you to a couple small towns (not super interesting), take you on a boat ride to see the ruins of Pablo Escobar’s house, feed you lunch, and take you to the best selfie pueblito in the world.  How can you pass up a deal like that? thetwinsontour love a great deal! We probably could have taken public transportation to get there, but thetwinsontour also love convenient travel as much as they love a great deal, but not as much as they love ice cream.  

Anyways we took a boat ride on a lake they created in 1977 when they built a damn and flooded the town of Old Peñol.  The main purpose of this is to float past the ruins of Pablo Escobar’s bombed out house and take lots of pictures. But there are also several nice houses that belonged to drug dealers in the 80s and 90s. Now one of them belongs to a famous Colombian soccer player.  

The next activity on the itenary was lunch with a beautiful view of Guatapé lake, so that we would have the energy to climb 744 steps to the top of El Peñol, “the rock with the best view in the world.” That part was not included. We had to pay $18,000 (about 6 dollars) for that torture, I mean pleasure.  The stairs are nice, evenly spaced, cement stairs with a separate stairway for the ascent and descent. Every 25th stair has the number spray painted on it which is both very discouraging and encouraging at the same time.  For example, step 100 seems to scream at you, “Why are you out of breathe already fatty? You still have 644 steps to go.” The same with 125 and 150. Then when you make it to 300, the labored breathing makes you do bad math because you tell yourself that you are halfway there.  The steps don’t get encouraging until about 600 when you realize how far you have come and there’s only a few (like 144) left. Our guide had said it would take 15 minutes to get to the top. It took us 20, and someone stopped every 25 steps to breathe and read the signs telling you what number to call for rescue if you start to feel nauseous or light headed, or vomit. We were moving at a marathon snails pace. Once we made it to the top, we realized how breathtaking it was — both literally and figuratively. On the one hand, you are out of breath and sweaty. On the other hand, you are awestruck by the amazing views. From the top of the rock (which is privately owned by the way.) you can get a great 360 view of the surrounding area. The lake/damn is huge with little islets of land that break up the monotany of water give it the appearance of happy little islets and trees. Truly a sight not to be missed. 

After what felt like just a few seconds of gazing at the bucolic countryside– actually I don’t know if a lake can be bucolic, may be that is just verdant grasslands with herds of grazing Shetland Kuhs– anyways it looked peaceful and serene and not at all like a former stronghold of the number one enemy of the USA, Pablo Escobar– we decided it was time to head down the rock. Because if you climb 744 stairs up, you have to climb 744 stairs down. There is no elevator, escalator, or zip line to get down. Just your own two feet. The down stairs are to the inside of the up stairs, so they are dark and dank with no view to enjoy at all. Which is a good thing because thetwinsontour had one thing on their mind. No, we are not talking about a sale at Kohl’s. We are talking about local ice cream snacks in local flavors! Hot, diggity dog!  Yum yum!  

What flavors did thetwinsontour settle on? Arequipa con pasas and Maracuya. Say what? Arequipa is like a dulce de leche/caramel flavor which evidently pairs nicely with raisins. Maracuya is passion fruit. Obviously, we opted for the local ice cream treat. They were kind of like a popsicle or one of those fruit bars, but they were cone shaped.  Interestingly, the popsicle stick is at an angle.  I was too busy devouring my ice cream to study the physics and logic behind this.  Maybe it’s so you don’t lose so much while you are eating it? Or maybe it’s so it doesn’t take up as much space in the freezer. I don’t know.  I just know that thetwinsontour love ice cream in any shape or form.

After that we went to the town of Guatapé which is known for its colorful houses. I may be wrong about this because our guide spoke in the biggest mix of Spanglish I have ever heard. His English wasn’t great, but then again neither was his Spanish.  I don’t think Guatapé was always colorful.  I think they added the color after the drug wars because color means life.  Anyways, the part that makes it even more colorful are the zocolos, decorative carvings along the bottom of the building.  They vary in content from llamas to sunflowers to pastoral scenes to the Virgin Mary. We took so many pictures, but you should know that. Selfie heaven.  All too quick our time was over and we had to head back to Medellin.  

And just like that, we are done with Day 5 in Colombia.  

Love,

thetwinsontour

PS. Don’t forget to tell all of your friends to like thetwinsontour on Facebook.  We need your help to get to a million followers. We are so close! Only about 999,640 to go.  Let’s do this! We figure the more likes we get, the closer we get to our ultimate goal of a TV show travelling the world eating ice cream and candy.  I know that you all want to watch that!