Colombia, que chimba!

"Colombia is like someone has taken the beautiful rolling English hills, bunched them up into mountains and sprinkled dancing chicas all over them."

Dave Bailey 2014

After the long bus ride from Lima, we crossed the border into Ipiales for our final set of adventures. Adjusting to the heat and higher altitude we rolled out from Ipiales, transfixed by the surrounding lush green.
What ensued was a sudden unforgiving snap back to reality. Our last 5 days had been at sea level, on flat roads and with a slight tail wind. Here at the border we were 2900m up and immediately flew downhill. All the memories of difficult cycling disappeared with the wind through our back wheels and the landscape unfolded into our first of many beautiful valleys. If only it could had lasted.

The first valley down from Ipiales. A sign of things to come

Instead, we engineered a commonly used phrase in Colombia, "what goes down must come up." As after the descent we began a 24km, 1500m climb. Starting abruptly and finishing without haste, it was four hours of pedal bashing in significant heat. From our haircuts in Pasto to Popayan and our venue for the Brazil vs Colombia game. Two Brits surrounded by 5000 dancing, cheering Colombians. Que chimba!

No roads on a flat surface, all built into the mountains

A sharp Colombian haircut. Beard trimming included.

The next few days provided some of the most up and down cycling I have ever experienced. Long climbs 8-12km) at least twice a day, sometimes thrice. Every climb just served as a platform to descend into the next valley, down to the next river bed and then up to the next mountain-top village. Each of them had Dave's quote replaying in my head, 'someone has just folded this country up into mountains.’ 'Bastards,' we thought, 'It's completely ridiculous that people even live in this terrain.'

A standard day in the mountains

Both this extreme topography and the degree of peoples' warmth were equally emotive. At first sceptical, 'are they trying to rob/rape/kill us?', but after a few meetings that scepticism was shunned and replaced with a reflection of their warmth, enjoying the interaction with the friendly locals. We grew accustomed to rolling into a plaza and being quickly surrounded. People asking us what we needed and helping us find accomodation and food with no desire for anything themselves, just eager to ask what we thought about the country and for us to spread the news of its quality.
I've heard a few theories for the reasons for this warmth: 1. It was a successful World Cup fro the Colombians; 2. Cycling along with football is the national sport; 3. People are trying to reverse the bad image gained over the last few decades; and my favourite 4. It is just their culture. Whatever the reason, they managed to produce one of the warmest and most welcoming environments I have ever experienced.

The road that just climbs and climbs round the corner

We headed North with a large detour, off the main route to Medellin, hanging to the side of the mountains through the coffee country and beyond into the villages past Manizales. The roads lined with coffee plantations, banana trees and pinapple plants. At this point I started to notice a real change in my ability to keep up with Dave, the first time there had been a real difference in our speed since the depths of knee pain back in Chile. Strangely, sleep became less restful and each day saw my legs produce less power than previously. After 4.5 months, a variant of exhaustion seemed to be catching up with me.

A pinapple plant, who knew it grew so weirdly

The view from Salento, dubbed as one of the best in Colombia

Thankfully we made it from Salento to Medellin but a scheduled 3 day trip took 5 as the World Cup finals and my legs conspired to shorten our days. Unfortunately this also happened to include some of the best terrain and nicest towns we encountered in Colombia, a joy to cycle for Dave. Tired or not, it was undoubtably a great advert for the red spokes cycle tour taking that route.

Coming out of the mountains on the way to La Pintada

Ditto

Medellin gave us our first glimpse of big city Colombia, filled with music, alcohol and never ending dancing, a treat after the exhaustion of the bike. Medellin was also the location of our separation. Dave showed his loyalty to Colombia then took his flight home, and with a week extra, I planned to bomb on to Cartagena and the Caribbean Coast.

Vamos Colombia

What at first seemed just like another 5 days cycling turned into a fearsome battle with the tropical climate and with a continued weakness in my legs. Getting out of bed at 5 so I could miss the midday sun and the 35degree temperatures, I still emptied my blood vessels of fluid onto my skin and would watch my electrolytes drain into my socks. The tiredness did not abate and unfortunately not at one point during those 5 days did my legs feel good or feel that I had any sort of 'form'.
Such was the intense heat and humidity that I spent the 650km to Cartagena drinking water, being red/white from my sunburn/suncream combo and squelching as I walked. Despite my constant sweating and spidery white salt lines on all of my clothes, I still managed to find a few marriage proposals from fathers for their young daughters along the way.
Rolling into Cartagena at midday on the 5th day was a difficult end to the trip. Devastating hot, dehydrated, alone and no arrival band, I wanted to run around and tell everyone I was a champion but everyone just seemed to be busy partying. I took stock of the situation: 6500km cycled, exhausted and sunburnt. I cracked open a nice cold beer, started chatting to a chica and decided, 'if you can't beat them, join them.'

Thanks for all your support. If you'd still like to give then visit our justgiving page, anything you can spare is really helpful.

Kyle

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The climb, and the rewards

In retrospect it had all been a training camp for the biggest climb of them all and as a terribly underprepared duo we had stumbled across the perfect acclimatisation schedule. We first began climbing in Northern Argentina from Tucamán and over the following 6 weeks had been conquering hills with nothing in common except their altitude above sea level. Up into Bolivia, up further to Potosí, up and down to la Paz and the slow ascent around lake Titicaca.

Although a detour, takling the abra patapampa pass seemed like the only option. At 4910m above sea level, it is the highest paved pass in the Americas and once more tested whether we had bitten off more than we could chew. A nice challenge.

The day before was a wonderful preparation. Riding all day and into the night time, past deserted lakes and archetypal volcanoes, we arrived in Patahuasi and slept at sub zero temperatures around 3800m up.

High altitude deserted lake outside of Puno

 

Night time views on the ride into Putahuasi

 

 

Breakfast was a Hen soup with egg, rice, spaghetti and lemongrass. The second time we had eaten the strange but hugely popular 'caldo' in as many meals. Fed and with the usual slow feeling that we like to put down to the altitude rather than not being fit enough, we detoured off the main road for the first time in over a month and headed to Chivay, the gateway to the Colca canyon.

 

The hours ticked by as the road rolled, teasing us with a climb only to let us descend on the other side. Gloriously, that familiar and enevitable feeling of chest tightness and gasping was manageable as we passed sections of ice in the barren sunny wasteland. We thanked our training schedule.

 

The never ending road to the pass

It was really high

 

For the first time motivation was torn as every hour we moved closer to the top but further from our direction on the main road, a point that didn't make climbing easy. However, six hours past and we finally saw the welcoming site of tourists at the top. Much to Dave's pleasure, the only thing left was to get the obligatory and slightly underwhelming snap.

Delighted

 

The view of six volcanoes at 4910m

 

 

For me however, the climb will always be remembered for what came after:

First the descent into the spectacular Colca canyon with the setting sun, 40 minutes of free rolling joy with Jon Hopkins as my soundtrack. Second, finding ourselves in the canyon we decided to see the Condors, the birds with most in common to a finely tuned and super economical bicycle. Watching them soar effortlessly above us was a nice break from a particularly challenging section of road.

 

Descending in Chivay

 

Condor and Dave locked in a stare off. "You won.....you always do."

 

 

Third, the descent to sea level and it's reprecussions. In two days we descended from 4000m to 150m above sea level. My face wore a beaming smile as i overtook buses on the way into Arequipa and my legs had a self-satisfactory bounce as we worked out the kilometers covered. Cruising downhill at 40km/h is not a bad way to spend most of the day.

 

 

View from the Arequipan hostel

 

 

After we hit the pacific we had 850km until Lima and were keen to get there as soon as possible so we could get North (Columbia). Although not unexpected, it was still surprising to be at sea level and to be different men since Argentina. All of a sudden the gears we were using shifted 3 lower; the hills became fun distractions from the flat road as we jumped out of the saddle and bounced up them to the drum of our music; and the kilometers just flew by. Never have I felt such a profound change in my feeling of fitness and I immediately forgave Lance for his use of Epo, it felt damn good.

 

 

Pacific Ocean and mountains of sand. Everywhere.

 

The constant desire for Cerviche drove us on, past pockets of civilisation carved out from the omnipresent sand and under cloudy skies. We motored to Lima in 6 days, already bored of the repetitive ocean / sand scenery, keen for a Friday night and ready for our last set of adventures in Columbia.

 

The ultimate snack from a motorbike driven wagon riding up the panamericana

Thanks for your support.

 

Kyle

 

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