The deep canyons dig incurable wounds along the Andean ridge and mark the border between Colombia and Equador: we reach Ipiales following the Pan-American highway from Popayan through Pasto. We greet therefore Colombia, a large and wonderfully wild country, sad and crazy, happy and “thief”… Colombia, a country that more than every other Andean state, has been underestimating its most precious treasure, the wisdom of its indigenous peoples, asphyxiating their culture in a logic of useless conflict. Colombia, the country that condenses all its seducing fascination in the novel One Hundred Years of Solitude (Cien Años de Soledad), written by the Colombian genius, Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

“Bienvenidos al Ecuador” (Welcome to Equador), says the enormous cartel: the next challenge and many projects to realize, our dream to discover the Amazon. After traveling for so many months we reach the half of the world: a foot to north and the other one to south, or vice versa, we cut the line of the Equator.

From Tierradentro the unpaved road goes down to the the bottom of impressive valleys, towards the pueblo of La Plata. The heat increases, entering in the department of Huila: after Garzon and Pitalito, two dusty cities, we reach San Agustin, the “archaeological capital” of Colombia. Reputation due to the traces left by a mysterious Pre-Colombian civilization, clearly related with the cultures of Ecuador and Peru. The monolithic statues narrate the history of a people who underwent the cultural influence of the Andean world and the fascination of the gorgeous Amazonian nature, thanks to the strategic position of San Agustin. Here, the most diffused means of transporting is still the horse, while the typical Colombian chivas transport merchandise and campesinos in unbelievable number, during market days.

The return travel towards Popayan is a a hard trip in camioneta, crossing fields, paramo and forests, flanking tired volcanoes and swallowing kilos of powder… we dream a shower, but what a privilege to visit such remote places.

The archaeological site of Tierradentro is an impressive and mysterious artwork, from an unknown but refined civilization. Located in the esplanades of Segovia, El Duende, El Tablòn, Alto de San Andres and El Aguacate, the hipogeos of Tierradentro are oval burial chambers, with a deepness that reaches nine meters. A winding staircase, built using volcanic stones, leads to the entrance, while two columns support the circular vault inside of each tomb. The walls are richly decorated with geometric and anthropomorphic figures, using red and black (life and death respectively), on white background. Nearly nothing was found in the chambers when they were discovered, because of the thieves activity (guaqueros), but what remains gives a clear idea of how incredible were these architecture artworks, able to resist the tremendous earthquakes that periodically hit the region of Tierradentro.

A friend, beyond that many beautiful photos, left trace of our nights in San Andres Pisimbalà, follow this link: www.flickr.com/photos/mariusencolombia.

In a day of movements with buses and camionetas we cover the whole Cauca valley, from Armenia (eje cafetero) to Popayan, passing through the lively city of Cali. Our goal is the region of Tierradentro, an archaeological site, almost unknown by tourists for problems of security, but particularly interesting for the presence of underground burial chambers, unique example of Pre-Columbian art (V-VII sec D.c.). The village of San Andres Pisimbalà is a charming place, inhabited by extremely nice people, belonging to the Paèz indigenous community. It remembers to us Chiapas and Guatemala, where we lived unforgettable experiences. To reach this pueblo an entire day of travel on unpaved roads is needed, but just for this reason the region conserves its authentic beauty. Here, the nature is wild and strong, leaving no satisfactions to the campesinos, nevertheless you can breathe an incredible peacefulness. We stay at Doña Marta’s casa familiar: she’s a nice old woman who loves cooking us the best arepas of Colombia.

Rising towards the peaks of the Nevado Ruiz, we discover the small village of Salento, a island of peacefulness in the middle of the wonderful Colombian coffee growing region (eje cafetero). A pueblo lost in the past and dominated by the rhythms of nature, that shows its most impressive side here. In direction of the Andean nevados in fact extends the “Valle de Cocora” (Cocora Valley), an Alpine-like valley, where the wax palms, a biological species heading towards extinction that catches up considerable heights (until 80 meters), grow numerous. Dipped in the mountain jungle, we find the ideal place to go for a walk, trek and horse-ride.

Armenia is one of the most desolated cities we’ve visited during our travel: in the gray buildings and in the looks of the people, in wide measure of Slavic origin, hides a piece of Balkans. In the evening, the center gets full of street nomads, everyone with his “mistaken history” to tell. We get lost in Rosalba’s silences, a girl from Cali with three sons, two recently born and the last one still in her womb, the husband in jail and an ocean of loneliness to carry, heavy as a cross. She gives us all she can, a smile and two splendid bracelets, how to return this kindness?

Medellin is the city of the Colombian social-economic supremacy, risen in the middle of nowhere and exploded under the protecting wing of the drug traffics. The utopian project of Pablo Escobar: a modern and efficient center, enclosed in a wonderful and green valley, where the Andes become bluffer. Medellin and the skyscrapers, the metropolitan, the suburbs and the favelas, where young people can’t see a future and have as unique hope sniffing glue. Medellin and the extension of our visa, a real bureaucratic odyssey. Medellin and the portrait that Fernando Botero paints, a colorful and eccentric society, animated from voluptuous, sensually opulent personages. The 50′s, the time of the flowers and the brothels (www.museodeantioquia.org).

Afro Caribbean soul, far and neglected spirit, that let seduce itself just beyond the border of the world. In the land of no one, where every man is owner of his life… the land strip that extends from Cartagena towards Playa Blanca and Islas del Rosario, is a dusty fireside of underbrushes and doggone lives, where the whole population it’s of African origin and survives of expedients in the extreme heat. The travelers who cross this border without law get transformed in victims and guilty of a cruel system, money and power. “When you left to us this desert of skeletal cows and foul ponds”. Then, the dancing girls appear from the powder, a frenetic and echoing African rhythm, a cumbia or makulele, a skillful and enchanting dance, mockingly put up in front of a cartel saying: “Don’t give money to the dancing girls who charm the tourists”.

The passage between Central America and South America is a problem that many travellers are forced to face. The Pan-American Carretera is interrupted in the region of jungle and swamps called Darien Gap, making impossible land connections between Panama and Colombia. From the experience of other travelers we have collected some information, that we publish hoping it will be useful to someone in the future. The options in order to exceed the Darien Gap, avoiding the dangerous passage by land (in the Colombian region of the Choco are present groups of guerrillas and paramilitary), are substantially three:

• sailing ship or boat from Cartagena (Colombia) directly to Panamanian territory, passing for the Islas de San Blas (cost: approximately 250$)
• flight between Panama City and Bogotá, Medellin or Cartagena (cost: variable according to the season, 150-300$)
• bus from Medellin or Cartagena to Turbo (23$), traveling by night in order to reach Turbo in the morning and to go up on lancha or boat until Capurganà (20$, 2hours) where there are economic lodgings and the Caribbean is wonderful. From Capurgana’ you can take another lancha for Puerto Obaldia (10$, 40 min), that is already in Panamanian territory and there is an immigration office. From Puerto Obaldia there are two flights every week towards Panama City (57$).

Barranquilla is a chaotic industrial port, famous in Colombia as the center of the craziest carnival of the country. A short travel takes us to Cartagena de Indias, one of the most beautiful historical cities of America… actually the old town, enclosed in the Spanish walls, is an open sky museum: the characteristic wooden balconies run out on the narrow streets, richly adorned by colourful bougainvillea. But just outside the walls, it emerges the melancholic and forgotten soul of the seaport cities, especially the Caribbean ones. Lodged in the prophetically biblical quarter of Getsemani, we perceive the feeling of living an underground world, surely neglectful, but equally authentic. Here the black spirit voices its suffocated complain…

From the entrance, a short trip by bicycle leads us to the beach of Cañaveral, along a road dipped in the jungle. Finally we are in the Parque nacional Tayrona, a natural reservoir unique for beauty, pure example of uncontaminated Caribbean coast. The first contact with the Atlantic ocean is impressive indeed: a lonely sand strip, delimited by smooth rocks and coconut palms. The tropical paradise, therefore… a long walk leads us to Arrecifes, every step a surprise, until we newly hear the waves breaking up on the coast: before our eyes another wonderful inlet, designed by a turquoise and crystalline sea. We abandon ourselves to the beauty of the landscape, impressed by such a wild ecosystem. We think about the legitimate inhabitants of this region, the indigenous people of the Tayrona, the first civilization met by the Europeans in the South American continent. From them just remain the wonderful looks of some girls who work in the park and the characteristic huts made in stone and wood, with palm leaves roofs. People perfectly adapted to an impressive nature: the open and uncontrollable sea, the peaks steep and covered by the jungle, and the covered by snow summits of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. Between these mountains flowered their culture of skillful gold craftsmen, whose most meaningful expression was the Ciudad Perdida, a Tayrona pueblo forgotten and rediscovered in the 70′s.

Adiós vereda, hasta luego amigos… finally the travel resumes, after a long pause full of unforgettable moments. From Villa de Leyva, the bus goes up quickly until about the 3000 meters of the town of Tunja, from where we continue towards the North. After hours of mountain roads, exceeding foggy slopes covered by jungle, we reach San Gil and then Bucaramanga, intermediate stop of our travel, a city unexpectedly modern but with a pleasant climate. Travelling by night we finally reach Santa Marta, on the coast of the Colombian Caribbean: the popularity of the people and their unflappable peacefulness clearly indicate that we got to a new world, all to discover. At first sight, we find the same semi-desertic climate to which we survived for beyond a month, but hidden by the hills covered by cacti, the Tayrona National Park, Caribbean pearl of white beaches, wild jungle and turquoise sea.

Clouds, clouds, fast clouds; then sun, starred skies. And full moon, sparkling… The semi-desertic hills that encircle Villa de Leyva hide many surprises. The astronomical observatory of the Muiscas, indigenous people almost completely disappeared, but in the looks of some “campesinos”, is a ceremonial site (El infiernito) dipped in the green of the olive trees. In the proximities, a small museum (El fosil) guards the very well conserved fossil of a kronosaurus, prehistoric crocodile lived when in the region an ancient sea extended. Where the Andes grow in altitude and the vegetation disappear definitively, in the so-called paramo, some splendid lakes hide (Iguaque Sanctuary), encircled by a hostile environment. The Laguna de Iguaque was sacred place for the Muiscas, who believed it was the place where the goddess Bauché had awaken, sustaining with her own arms a child, destined to give origin to their people.

Here is a taste of our gastronomic regional specialties, made with Colombian ingredients and fantasy!

Since the first days spent in Villa de Leyva, we were curious about the frenetic activity of some masons who, in open countryside, were building a house of unusual aspect, perhaps not particularly nice, but above all burning it. Now we discover that what seemed a game it’s in reality a project of bioarchitecture developed by Octavio Mendoza, a boyacense architect. The concept is very simple: the argillaceous soil, found in large amount directly in the construction place, is used as unique material to model the building. Piece after piece it’s given shape to the structure, that at last is burnt in order to confer it mechanical resistance. The result is a low-cost house of adobe, eco-sostenible, with optimal thermo-regulation properties, of minimal environment impact and antiseismic. The plan seems so brilliant that it has received attention in Europe too, for the moment in Spain and France. The idea is suggested by the example of the indigenous population, in particular the Andean one, that used adobe (a mixture of mud and straw) in order to construct its own buildings for thousands of years.

Coming from the North, Bogotá appears like an enormous and shapeless strip of lights and skyscrapers, colorful in the customary wealth and extreme poor islands. In the traffic of the evening we recognize the frenzy that characterizes all the big capitals, but what hits us is the massive presence of soldiers: at every crossing stops a group of young men in uniform that control people, appealing terrible weapons as they were toys… with the distracted habit of who is born with the violence in the eyes. They remember us that Colombia is a country suffocated by a bloody war, begun so many years ago that many people seem resigned to live with it.

Bogotá do not seduce at first sight, but it is for sure a dynamic modern city, vibrant and cosmopolitan, extremely careful about culture (from 2007 Bogotá will be the World Book Capital) and about art, maybe less interested in the poorest part of its population, abandoned here as in all the Latin American countries to a very difficult existence. In the Candelaria, the historical heart of the city, the roads leave their geometric distribution and in the maze of colorful houses takes shape the artistic inspiration which belongs to the Colombian young people. Bars, cultural centers and theaters are attended by musicians, painters, artesanos and undergraduates coming from every part of the country. During the weekend and the holidays, the traffic in the streets of the center is blocked in order to leave space to pedestrians and cyclists: Bogotá transforms in an enormous bicycle path, with many stops to assist to concerts and theater exhibitions.