Minca, Colombia 🇨🇴

On 17 December 1830, at the age of 47, Simon Bolivar died of tuberculosis in the Quinta de San Pedro, Santa Marta. Simon Bolivar was one of the leading figures in South American independence, first president of several countries he died before he could sail to Europe disillusioned with the countries he had freed. In Santa Marta they have preserved the Quinta de San Pedro and it sits alongside a art gallery and gardens on the outskirts. 

We checkout and take a taxi up to the estate, stepping down the commonwealth plaza lined with flags first. This leads us to the art museum, which unfortunately has had a power cut, so viewing art by phone torch is difficult. The gardens are a mix of huge trees and cactus, I quite enjoyed spotting geckos and iguanas in the grass. The historical Quinta buildings show a little of how they would have farmed sugarcane at that time.

We head back to the hotel late morning and have a snack at the Cathedral cafe before getting a taxi to the market to join a collectivo for Minca. The taxi driver offers to take us all the way for a reasonable amount, so we jump at the chance to stay in the air conditioning. The road up is fairly windy but we make it and are safely dropped off into small town. We know we need to grab a mototaxi up to the hostel but I hadn’t realised they would be just a motorbike. We hopped on the back of one each and paid for another one for our luggage. Finally my wheely bag got its rucksack straps out as a poor guy got stuck with it on his back and Polly’s on the front as we road up ahead of him. It was a hairy ride up a muddy dirt road, past several waterfalls and my driver just told me to hold on tight as we skidded across stones trying to maintain momentum on the trail. The hostel was found after about 20minutes and we rescued the guy drowning under our luggage before checking in. The hostel seems very chilled with lots of sustainability projects and places to chill out.

The heavens opened at about 3pm and so we read for the rest of the day. The dinner gong sounded at 7pm for our homemade pasta, very tasty. Early night ensured after our travel and the peacefulness of the mountain.