Last Day in Colombia

Today we set off back to Quito, by bus from Popayan. It is going to take ages. At least four buses and a border crossing.

Our last days in Colombia were during Popayan's 'Blancos y Negros' festival. Supposedly a celebration of racial diversity, it is mainly a big fight where people hurl water bombs, throw talc and squirt 'fun foam' at each other. Some people carry pots of paint to smear on the faces of strangers. It's loco. Below are a few photos from the festival.

Pavement skirmish

Foam spray attack from a balcony

I might have got somewhat
involved in the fun

Group mayhem at an open-air concert

A drive-by foaming

Cali, Popayan and San Agustín (Colombian Christmas Continued)

After Medellín we came to Cali, the bus ride wasn´t too bad, and Cali turned out to be somewhat nicer than Medellín. Still hot though, and lots of nibbling insects. From Cali we took another bus to Popayan, which has been the real gem so far. It is a very nice small town, with lots of colonial style buildings.

Popayan

Popayan

We were there for New Year´s Eve. The tradition here is to build a human effigy to represent the problems of the past year, and then blow it up at midnight. Our hostel was run by a Scot and so we had tatties and neeps for our dinner. This hogmany celebration was of course completed by draging the effigy into the street, dousing it with petrol and lighting it at midnight. The guts are stuffed with fireworks so after a couple of minutes it starts to explode.

We only stayed one night in Popayan as we wanted to get to San Agustín, a small town with lots of archeological sites nearby. The route to San Agustín is rough, a long dusty dirt road, it takes 6 hours by bus and four by camioneta (a 4 x 4 pick-up truck with seats in the back). It is hard travelling at the best of times, but we had a particularly loony driver who was taking shots of whiskey whilst driving. But we got there. After two nights we are now heading back to Popayan, via a stop over in San Jose, which has some more archelogical sights to visit.  

Statue at San Agustin
archaeological  park

Horses on the central plaza, San Jose

San Agustín as seen from our hotel