During the 15 days spend on the bicycle in Ecuador, I climb more than 16.000 meters, which is almost two times the elevation of Mount Everest. I crossed the Continental Divide 8 times. And before all that, I went to play in the Amazon basin to cross from Colombia to Ecuador.
I haven’t used it often in the last months, but it lately took back all its utility. I took out my little blue jacket to protect myself from the cold in the high mountains around Pasto. Almost no wrinkled while it was pack as a ball in my luggage, it then served right to protect me from the rain. Lower, it was getting to hot, sweating more inside than anything else, so it was better to refresh from the Amazonian rain, but back in the mountains in Ecuador, the rain will go on, and I will be happy to be protected from this fresh Andean wind.
Leaving Cali and its valley already with nostalgy, I was throwing myself in what people here call “the knot”, the place where the Occidental Cordillera meet the Central one (the Oriental and the Central merged a little bit more North). Here I am in this mountainous mess, on a road trying its best to find a way to climb (and go down, and climb again) in this labyrinth. Continue reading
Colombia attracts you by the diversity of its geography, gastronomy and people. Moreover, competition cycling is largely practiced, meeting cyclists almost everyday on main roads. So people are used to see bicycles, but they are less used to see foreigners on the road though. Apart from a few touristic bubbles, tourism is more or less new since things have calm down since a few years. Faces will easily turn to look at you, people won’t hesitate to greet you, to ask you thousands of questions and even stop their motorcycle on the side of the road to talk to you. The majority of the population isn’t only around the capital, Bogotá. There are many good sized cities along the road. Regions are quite distinct from each other, convincing you to stop often along the way, and after a curve on the road the accent will change, food will have slight differences, and you’ll be told that “here, it’s the best place in the best country”. It’s hard to take off the Colombian proudness from a Colombian.
Letters and numbers
Colombia
From May 21 to July 6, 2013 Continue reading
Referring to a touristic promotion of Colombia, it takes it sense when going through those diverse regions and meeting these amazing people. Here are 74 pictures.
Colombia in 19 portraits, simply presented as it is.