A lovely day out in Bogota

We travelled by bus from Puerto Lopez, in Ecuador, to Bogota, in Colombia. It was long, but with the assistance of some loud Colombian music, we made it. Puerto Lopez to Quito, then on to Tulcans, where we crossed the border into Colombia at Ipiales and straight to Bogota from there. We settled in a nice colonial house in the embassy district of town. The first picture is taken in Quito. The angel adorns the hill over looking the city.

We discovered that a trip on a steam train was available, so we wandered the city trying to get more info. It ran on Sunday....about 8ish....the office opens at 7am.....on Sunday?? So at 6.30am we climbed out of bed and wander through the streets of a Sunday morning Bogota. We arrived at the very run down pillared train station and went in the side door. A ticket counter and many colombians drinking coffee. Being the only true stangers there, we had discovered a wonder of Bogota. So, we bought tickets, had a coffee and TOOOOOOOTT , went our train outside. So we all squeezed out the door and found our carriage

and got comfortable in our seats. TOOT TOOOOTT went the engine and we slowly chugged out of the station. We started to pick up speed and crossed many road junctions. All the shops are closed on Sundays, so Bogatonians are heading to the park, kite ander arm or cycling or walking the dog or enjoying beers by the moring sun. Us, as passangers, were kept quite busy, dutifully waving at all the passers by. We were also entertained by a small jazz ense,ble. This meant they had to turn down the other music that was blaring on the train. All part of the colombian travel experience!

Our destination was Zipaquira a town which is home to a huge salt mine. Beneath the mountian in the salt mine is a huge cathedral. Well a huge labarintyh of passageways and large rooms. It is all lit by coloured lights and rammed with tourists wandering in the dark. We stayed a while and wandered about before getting back on our train.

Train entertainment!

Puerto Lopez

We made our way to Puerto Lopez which is on the Pacific coast of Ecuador, for a couple of reasons. The first being that you can take whale watching tours from here, the second was that there is meant to be some good diving around Machalilla National Park with the possibility of seeing Manta Rays (giant rays that grow up to a 6m wing span). With giant animals on our minds it took us a day of bus journeys to get from Cuenca to Guayaquil.

We spent two days diving and another walking the long beech that fronts the town. The diving was great, fully suited up in thick wetsuits, balaclavas, booties etc I could hardly move but I managed to stay warm in the cooler Pacific! It´s not that cold really, I reckon the Ecuadorians have gone a bit soft under the hot sun! We dived in four different locations but we unfortunately didn´t get to see Mantas! While we were eating our sandwiches on our dive boat the second day, we chatted to a couple of marine biologists who had seen the rays just beneath the boat not 20 minutes previous. I put on a mask and fins and jumped in for a snorkel, but alas none to be found!

We did get to see lots of hump back whales though on the boat trip out to Isla del Plata, I have posted a short video below. Isla del Plata so called because Francis Drake used to stow his silver there, treasure that he nicked off the Spanish who had in turned nicked it off the Bolivians. Legend has it there are chests of treasure still to be found on the island!