Erin & Regan's South American Adventure

Hola,

From Bogota we headed into the coffee region. We had two options, one expensive, one cheap. The expensive option was an all inclusive coffee farm/ranch with horse riding, a swimming pool and food included (70,000 pesos, per person, per night NZ$46). The cheap option was to head to Salento, stay in a hostal (15,000 pesos, per person, per night) and visit two nearby coffee farms (7,000 pesos) and do a day walk through the cloud forest.

In the end we chose the cheap option, not because it was cheap but because it allowed us to see the cloud forest and the wax palms (Colombia`s national tree).

Getting to Salento was not as easy as we`d first imagined, we spent too long in Bogota and caught a later bus which was then delayed by bad traffic arriving in Armenia at 11:30pm. The last bus to Salento was at 8pm. As a result we stayed the night in a cheap (pay by the hour?) hostal in central Armenia (which had only cold water for showers) and took an early bus the next morning to Salento.

Salento is a lovely little town. The hostal most travellers stay in is called The Plantation House (because it was once a coffee farm itself). It is run by an Englishman and his Colombian wife. They have 3 children, 3 dogs, 2 cats and goldfish. The hostal itself is very relaxed (no formal checkout time) and the owner is full of useful information and maps for the various sites in the area.

The afternoon we arrived we decided to tour the two coffee farms. They were both within easy walking distance and the countryside and walk along the way was interesting.

The first farm was a small farm still run in the traditional manner which is to grow coffee but also have other means of income and sustenance like livestock i.e. chickens, a pig, etc. At this farm a young boy gave us the tour showing us the different trees they use. Colombian (taller, shorter lived, with yellow beans).

and Arabic (smaller, longer lived, with red beans).

Although the skins of the fruit are different colours they both contain a small white bean covered in a gelatinous membrane.

They also grow banana trees in amongst the coffee plantation to provide shade for the coffee trees from the direct sun. In addition he showed us another denizen on the plantation which they are pleased to have... a small spider shaped a little like a coffee bean which preys on the insects which destroy the bean crops.

As well as coffee this area has a type of bamboo which grows really large and fast. They use it for constructing houses and fences and so on.

The small farm has a small hand-powered machine for removing the yellow and red skins from the white bean.

We were told that both types of bean (Colombian and Arabic) produce the same flavour coffee, however the Arabic, in general, grows larger and therefore higher quality beans.

From that farm it was a short walk to the larger farm, run in a more businesslike style. It turns out the owner actually studied in Hamilton, New Zealand!

Along the way we passed a small farm where they had an interesting collection of animals.

The larger farm had many more coffee trees and therefore required a much larger machine for shelling the beans.

They produce a much larger amount of coffee. These farms shell and dry the beans but do not carry out the roasting, grinding or packaging.

The farm homestead itself was a beautiful building surrounded by many flowering plants. After our tour they treated us to a coffee and we purchased some ground coffee (but not instant Mum!).

From here we followed a path down to the river and walked along the river to a small village where we flagged down a bus back to Salento.

The hostal had recently obtained 2 kittens, one was particularly small and probably shouldn`t have been without its mother. That night Erin took a liking to it and would have packed it away in our bags if I hadn´t been keeping a close eye on her.

The next morning we were up early to catch the jeep to the start of the day walk through the cloud forest. It was then Erin discovered the kitten dead in the corner of the kitchen, perhaps from a broken neck. It seems likely one of the dogs got it during the night.

Due to the upsetting event of finding the kitten we only just made it in time to catch the jeep. Jeeps here function like buses, picking up and dropping off passengers. I ended up standing on the back and holding on but Erin got a seat. The jeep dropped us off just down the road from the start of the trail into the cloud forest. The trail itself began as a small dirt road/track through farm land.

It also contained a number of bridges over the stream which we followed up into the hills. This was the first.

The view from the valley floor up into the hills was impressive, the wax palms (the worlds 2nd tallest tree?) give the hills a "hairy" appearance.

The 2nd bridge.

The 3rd bridge, this one was a little in need of repair!

The 4th bridge.

The 5th bridge.

The 6th bridge, also in need of repair.

The 7th bridge.

We reached the end of the valley and a place called Acaime where a local couple run a hostal and cafe in addition to collecting the park entrace fee. They have a number of hummingbird feeders allowing us to get a few good shots of the birds themselves. Apparently there are 6 distinct types in this area. One type of hummingbird, about the size of a bumblebee, is the world´s smallest bird. We also learnt that they have hummingbirds in France!

From Acaime we walked back and up the valley side to a lookout point called simply "El Mirador". The view was good but not amazing (despite Erin being in the photo) as we were not at the high point.

From here we dropped back into the valley retracing our steps a little back across one of the bridges and then climbed another ridge to a place called "La Montaña", another hostal/cafe establishment.

The view from here was much more impressive.

At this point you enter the cloud forest where the wax palms (seen earlier as a hairy hillside) grow.

From here we descended back down to the start of the walk and waited for a lift back to Salento, also by jeep. We arrived back just in time to avoid the rain!

That was all we had time for in Salento. Our next destination was south to Popayan and from there to Tierradentro (ancient burial tombs) and San Agustin (ancient stone sculptures/statues).