Sunday, June 21st, 2015

Happy Fathers Day!

I got up once during the night, didn’t check the time but couldn’t really sleep after that.  The alarm went off at 6am and Teresa told me she didn’t sleep well and wants to get up at 7am.  (That’s not the first time she’s done that!)  I told her that she told me we have to get up early because we’re going a long way.  I told her she can sleep on the bus.  Finally, she got up, we showered, had a quick breakfast and left the finca at 7:25.

It seemed like the killer dogs were waiting for us but the three of us kept them away.

On the way down the hill we were joined by Don Carlos and his dog and I learned her name is Malu.  I gave her my last dog biscuit.

We were on a bus after only a 5 minute wait.  The bus was full but we got seats a few minutes later when some people got off at the Caldas crossroads.

At the La Estrella metro station I used my plastic metro cards for entrance.

We took the metro 15 stops north to the Caribe station, walked the block to the North Terminal, found window 14 and bought our tickets for 12,500 COP ($5) each.  You won’t find any 2-hour bus rides in the US for $5.  We purchased our tickets at 9am and the bus left at 9:10.  The seats were two across separated by an aisle; Teresa and I sat together and Laura ended up sitting next to a gringo a couple rows back.  He was probably in his mid to late 20s and I found out later he is from England and teaches English at a university in Medellin.

I managed to sleep for probably an hour of the two hour trip.

We arrived in Guatape at 11am.

First, we had our traditional lunch in La Fogata for 73mil.  I took an Excedrin Migraine and then I had the ribs and Teresa and Laura each had some type of fish – trout I think it was.

At my encouragement, we walked back across the street to the bus station we bought tickets for 5pm for our return to Medellin.

Unlike the other times I was here there were vendor canopies set up all along the sidewalk on the lake side.  I noticed one of them was called, translated from Spanish, the Palace of Cholesterol.  As we were walking along, we passed a young woman who had her back to us.  She was in short shorts and had great legs and a great butt.  As we walked past I heard her talking to her friends and caught a glimpse at her profile and I understood it was a man.  Lol.  Probably a transsexual.

At the end of town, Laura and I had a 30 minute horseback ride for 20mil ($8).  Teresa had done it before when we visited here and wasn’t interested.

We took a mini taxi (similar to a golf cart) to El Penol for 5mil ($2).  I tried to get Laura to climb the rock but she didn’t want to go alone and I wasn’t going to do that again.  

We walked around the area and stopped at Restaurante La Piedra for a drink.  An America Cup game was going on between Peru and Colombia which had almost everyone’s attention.  We then took another mini taxi back to Guatape.

Laura and I then rode their zipline (Cable Vuelo Guatape) for 24mil.  First they got her setup in her seat, then they put me in a separate seat in front of her and tied us together.  Then they added another young lady who ended up sitting in front of us.  Then they dragged us over the lake to the other side where they have a tower.  Just before we arrived I look back over my shoulder and was surprised to see a young man who works there attached behind Laura, so there were 4 of us together.

At the tower, they unhooked each of us and then sent the girl in front of me on her way.  They they told me to raise my legs and they gave me a shove.  I should have timed the ride – was it only 30 seconds or maybe a full minute to the other side.  When I got back to the other side I was surprised that I hit some exercise mats that were hung up to stop me.

We went across the street where we had a fresh juice at Cosechas.

We walked around the pueblo where it seemed all TV sets were turned to the Peru vs Colombia game.  At one point we passed a bar where people were standing in the street watching the game.  I noticed a young man, I think probably a gringo, who had a map of America tattooed on his left arm and it looked like the rest of the world may have continued under his t-shirt.  Btw, the game ended 0-0; how exciting!

Back at the bus station we had almost an hour until our 5pm bus.  We were very glad we already had our tickets because there were a lot of people at the station and there was a line to buy tickets.

The bus left at 5:05 and I rested my eyes most of the way back to Medellin.  We arrived back at the station just before 7pm.  We walked to the Caribe station and I used my metro cards but, after Teresa got entry, I found I only had something like 1,600 pesos left on each.  I think what happened is the metro fee this year went up from 1,900 pesos to 2,000 pesos so I didn’t have enough left for the last entry on each.  I did have the separate tickets I bought the day of the communion so I used two of those.

We got off the metro at Aguacatala and after a 10 minute wait we caught a direct bus back to the finca.

The killer dogs heard us coming so we didn’t even bother to turn off our flashlights.  We got back to the finca by 8:15.

I received an email from my son Jim that he is coming for a visit with his friend Michael early this August.  Yeah!

I took my prostate pill at 9:30, took my sleeping pills at 10pm and went to bed.