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.
Towards the Caribbean Sea
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.
Adiós Villa de Leyva
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.
Adobe houses
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.
Bogotá, young and modern
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.
Vereda Monquirá
Living in the field, wrapped by the silence and peacefulness, helps to think… and as background of our thoughts an isolated house, a green-pallet grass, a hot sun hidden by the clouds that quickly take shape and dissolve. An impressive landscape delimits our world in this land of silent shepherds, looks consumed by the altitude and the climate. So far to hear the lightest noise, the town of Villa de Leyva hides behind a wooded hill, feeble painting in colonial style, dusty like Latin America. Dearly beloved by the artists, otiose as only the province can be.
Once more the night comes and our world falls asleep, in the silence.
In Colombia
In the porthole of the airplane are condensed all our memories, so much time spent around these hard but green valleys, then suddenly we see again the ocean. Bouncing many times from the Pacific coast to the Atlantic one, we fly over the extended plantations of Nicaragua and Costa Rica; we observe the slow and giant merchant ships going cross the Channel of Panama (Panama Canal), passage for all the goods of the world. Under our feet the white beaches of Colombian Caribbean and finally the impact with the Andes, suave and fertile in this region… now Colombia is so near, crazy and unapproachable: the same vernal climate of Guatemala and the smiles of the children in the street. It’s night when the bus leaves us in Villa de Leyva, our backpack full of projects and many stories to tell, experiences to share and the emotion to meet each others after so much time.