Grinder backpacking South America

I am headed to South America today and my plan is to post here every few days with details of my adventures.

Quote: PokerGrinder

I am headed to South America today and my plan is to post here every few days with details of my adventures.

I am hoping you make it to the Salt Hotel in the Salar de Uyuni., Bolivia.
Don't miss flying in a small plane over the Nazca Lines, Peru.
Climb to the top of Machu Picchu.
Buy a souvenir in Otavalo, Ecuador.
Visit Chacaltaya, the highest ski 'resort' in the world. (Over 17,000 feet)
Open your purse strings and stay 1 night in the only hotel in the actual park of Iguazu Falls.

Details on any if you want.....

Quote: PokerGrinder

I am headed to South America today and my plan is to post here every few days with details of my adventures.

Have a nice trip.
We won't be bugging you for updates, hope your internet access is good
Bluff like crazy!!

Will you be visiting Buenos Aires?

I ask because a buddy of mine, a world traveler, surprised me recently by saying he's heading down there soon, almost on a whim.

Soopoo we will be staying in the salt hotel in Uyuni and we will be climbing Machu Picchu.

We are hitting Colombia, Peru, Bolivia and then I’m doing Chile and Aruba by myself.

Quote: PokerGrinder

Soopoo we will be staying in the salt hotel in Uyuni and we will be climbing Machu Picchu.

We are hitting Colombia, Peru, Bolivia and then I’m doing Chile and Aruba by myself.

As usual, I am EFFFING JEALOUS of you! I guess I had my turn when I was young.......

Aruba is the shizzz!! Machine-pro paradise and the bus system is great despite being government run ;) Do enjoy!

Quote: SOOPOO

Visit Chacaltaya, the highest ski 'resort' in the world. (Over 17,000 feet)

I recently read an article about this. Apparently it's gone and not coming back:

https://www.snow-forecast.com/whiteroom/chacaltaya-bolivia-worlds-highest-ski-resort/

They claim climate change but Jim Inhofe says it's just fine; people just need to adjust to skiing on dirt.

What's the line on Grinder actually making posts every 3 days? I'm guessing at least one 10 day break between posts.

(Just kidding! I appreciate all the effort and time you spend on the reports and yes, I actually LEARN things from them. Thanks for your efforts!)

Quote: PokerGrinder

Soopoo we will be staying in the salt hotel in Uyuni and we will be climbing Machu Picchu.

We are hitting Colombia, Peru, Bolivia and then I’m doing Chile and Aruba by myself.

Have a great, safe, trip PG! I am looking forward to following your adventures. By "we" do you mean your sister is coming along too? I enjoyed her perspectives on the Asia trip. I'm really curious how the hostels there compare to those in other areas.

Any plans to drop in on Venezuela? Heh... Maybe you can give them a dollar and bring back a couple billion Bolivars?

Quote: Ayecarumba

Have a great, safe, trip PG! I am looking forward to following your adventures. By "we" do you mean your sister is coming along too? I enjoyed her perspectives on the Asia trip. I'm really curious how the hostels there compare to those in other areas.

Any plans to drop in on Venezuela? Heh... Maybe you can give them a dollar and bring back a couple billion Bolivars?

Don't do it, not for a minute. It's really really bad there right now. You would be targeted so fast...(shudder).

Quote: beachbumbabs

Don't do it, not for a minute. It's really really bad there right now. You would be targeted so fast...(shudder).

Naw, it's a socialist paradise. I remember a
guy from there 10 years ago on the gambling
forums who crowed and crowed about how
his country rocked and USA sucked. I wonder
what he's saying now.

Quote: PokerGrinder

I am headed to South America today and my plan is to post here every few days with details of my adventures.

when the temps drop to below zero a boys got to travel...............

https://weather.gc.ca/city/pages/mb-38_metric_e.html?unit=imperial

I have finished my write up of the first two days but I won’t post it until tomorrow. The wifi in the room is crap and I don’t feel like getting out of bed to upload pictures to imgur for the post so you must all wait lol.

Quote: Ayecarumba

Have a great, safe, trip PG! I am looking forward to following your adventures. By "we" do you mean your sister is coming along too? I enjoyed her perspectives on the Asia trip. I'm really curious how the hostels there compare to those in other areas.

Any plans to drop in on Venezuela? Heh... Maybe you can give them a dollar and bring back a couple billion Bolivars?

We is my friend Kyle, his girlfriend and myself. No Venezuela for me and I don’t think I would travel with my sister again. She’s a lot to deal with for an extended period of time.

I'm in Mexico City myself. I think it's safe to say that you partially inspired me PG. I did use to travel a lot. Then I was married to someone who hated to travel. Then I was broke. But I was kind of living vicariously through your posts.

Not sure if I will do a MC trip report. But, in brief, it is great. Everything you could want in a big city, and the parks district, where I am staying, is prettier than anything in most big cities. The people are nice and eager to help a tourist. The women are hot. Prices range from cheap, to virtually free. The food is excellent.

The pollution and altitude combo are kicking my butt, though. I have no idea how athletes make it through a game when they come here.

Someone told me, "yeah, but you'll be able to run a marathon when you get back."

Quote: EvenBob

Naw, it's a socialist paradise. I remember a guy from there 10 years ago . . . . . .

Prices, bribes and rumors change every ten minutes down there.

Quote: Rigondeaux

I'm in Mexico City myself. I think it's safe to say that you partially inspired me PG. I did use to travel a lot. Then I was married to someone who hated to travel. Then I was broke. But I was kind of living vicariously through your posts.

Not sure if I will do a MC trip report. But, in brief, it is great. Everything you could want in a big city, and the parks district, where I am staying, is prettier than anything in most big cities. The people are nice and eager to help a tourist. The women are hot. Prices range from cheap, to virtually free. The food is excellent.

The pollution and altitude combo are kicking my butt, though. I have no idea how athletes make it through a game when they come here.

Someone told me, "yeah, but you'll be able to run a marathon when you get back."

I encourage you to do a write up Rigondeaux. Trip reports are enjoyed by a wide audience. Also, you can't claim "The women are hot" without evidence...hehe.

Wait are you going to caravan back up north?

I've had some interesting experiences. Here's one.

I have a former online friend, now real friend down here. That's always a big plus for traveling.

We were out all night and were in some kind of plaza and decided to have one last beer. I didn't realize that drinking in public was illegal so, I cracked it open. He followed suit but told me to keep it hidden, as he'd planned to take them home.

Nonetheless, the cops spotted us and there was an exchange that I didn't understand too well. A couple times I said something like, "maybe we can just take care of it here," in English. Before, long we were being marched off to see a superior officer. I'm like, thanks man, now we gonna die.

I kid. The officers were very civil and we had clearly broken the law. I made a little small talk in extremely limited Spanish with one, as my friend plead our case to another.

We got to the boss cop and my friend was really going off, almost yelling at him. I couldn't follow. Then, we were let go without a bribe or ticket.

My friend told me he'd given them a big speech about how we weren't hurting anyone. He said, "do you really want him to go back to America and tell everyone the police are corrupt? This is why people don't come to Mexico!" etc. etc.

I said, Jesus, tienes heuvos.

Not sure that woulda played in the states.

I thought about it a little more, and it's not so different here. A friend of mine was pulled over for warrant on a felony that he obviously didn't commit. They impounded his car. He could sit in jail for 30 days awaiting trial, or post $30k in bond. He didn't have 30k, but he did have 3k to give to a bail bondsman. So after a night in jail he got out. Later, when he met the DA they agreed he was obviously innocent and let him go. He was out about 5% of his pretax income. If he'd been poor, he'd have done 30 days. And lost his car. The Mexican police only wanted like $50.

For those who don’t know I am travelling with my friend Kyle and his girlfriend Amy. We left Winnipeg around 11 am and had a quick flight to Toronto. We were delayed leaving Winnipeg though so our 75 minute layover in Toronto turned into a 30 minute run through the airport to catch our connecting flight to Bogota, Colombia. I’m not in good shape so my shins hurt and I was a little sweaty when we arrived on time at our departure gate.

The flight to Bogota was just under 6 hours and went by pretty quickly. I watched a new show on Netflix called You which I would highly suggest to everyone. We arrived in Bogota around 11 pm, got our bags and headed to customs. The customs line took way longer than it should have for some reason. When I finally got my turn it took less than 2 minutes and I found out that it costs 201,000 pesos to enter the country. 2365 pesos is $1 Canadian.

I found a place in the airport to buy a SIM card (45,000 pesos) and I ordered us an Uber. The Uber was 24,000 to the hostel. The driver clearly didn’t know the area that our hostel was in because he kept backtracking. The last 5 minutes of driving took over 15 minutes. The funniest part of the drive was when the driver decided that instead of driving the wrong way down a one way street that he would instead drive down that one way street in REVERSE! Then 3/4 of the way down that street he decided that was a bad idea and went back to start of the street and took a different direction. About 5 mins later we were 3 blocks from the hostel so I told the driver to let us out because clearly we would be able to walk to the hostel faster than he could navigate the streets.

We checked in and dropped our bags in our 3 bed private room that is running us 108,000 a night. We hadn’t eaten dinner so the hostel worker sent us to the closest food available at almost midnight. We then proceeded to buy a massive pizza that was well over the size of a normal XL pizza. We also grabbed 6 beers all for only 64,000. The pizza was sooooo mediocre. We had a spicy piece each which I’m not sure what was on it exactly but it was average, the other half of the pizza had this weird cut up pepperoni sticks on it that tasted more like hotdogs. Overall not a great first meal in Bogota but nothing else was open.

This morning we woke up and tried the free hostel breakfast. The plate consisted of some cut up fruits, a corn pancake with cheese on it and hot chocolate. The pancake thing would have been better without the cheese. We then made a half hearted attempt at making it to the free tour in time, big surprise we didn’t! We walked around for a few hours, looking at graffiti, checking out a market and sampling street food. I had this fried corn thing that looked like a pizza pocket with meat, egg and some veggies inside. It was very tasty!
















Just an interesting building in the business area.


Around lunch time we found ourselves in this locals restaurant. We ordered 2 meals to share between the three of us. The first one was carne asada which is basically meat in sauce. It came with rice, beans and fried banana. The other dish was horse meat with sauce and an egg on top. The horse meat was tasty but fatty. The horse meat also came with rice, fried plantain and French fries, overall an enjoyable meal. It was amusing when we realized that Kyle (6 foot 5) couldn’t stand up straight because the ceiling was too low, that gave Amy and I a good laugh.



One of the local beers is called Poker, seems about right lol.


After lunch I took a nap for a couple hours while they went to the store. I always feel sluggish after a travel day. I woke up and decided to do some casino hopping (chip collecting) and Kyle decided to join me while Amy relaxed at the hostel. We took an Uber for 6,800 pesos to the Aladdin Casino where I broke even and Kyle won 50,000. We then took an Uber (17,000 pesos) that took us on an odd route that avoided all freeways and got us caught in traffic for close to an hour. At Rock n’ Jazz Casino I had an interesting spot where I got a BJ playing heads up with the dealer, she had a face card showing and pulls a 2 and for some reason pulls an ace after that. She puts the ace back by the continuous shuffler and pays my BJ. I asked if the ace would be the first card of the next hand and she says yes. I don’t know what the advantage in this spot is but I know it’s big, I bet max and bust on 4 cards lol. Pretty standard for how good a spot it was but I’d take it every time. I won 20,000 at the Rock n’ Jazz Casino and then we walked over to the Crown Casino. We passed by it twice because we didn’t see it with all the lights off, it has gone out of business. We walked over to the last casino, Casino Luckia where I played an odd form of BJ. The dealer dealt both of her cards face up which made acting on my hand a lot weirder. I enjoyed the BJ variation and left up 10,000.

I ordered an Uber (21,300 pesos) to take us back to the hostel to meet Amy for dinner. This driver definitely didn’t waste any time. He drove down the freeways like an absolute crazy person. He was doing almost 100 on the freeway and was passing everyone. I also think the driver might have been tweaking because of his mannerisms and the way he kept rubbing his face from his forehead to his chin. Luckily we made it in one piece and got to have dinner at the place Amy found online.

Dinner was absolutely amazing! Honestly it was one of the best meals that I’ve ever had. We went to a fancy restaurant called El Gato Gris. They had menus in English and managed to find a server whose English was pretty solid. We started with a caprese salad, mini empanadas and mushrooms in a gravy with pollack and cheese on top. The empanadas were good, the mushrooms were absolutely amazing and the caprese salad is pretty hard to screw up.



I ordered the peppered sirloin as an entree and it didn’t disappoint. The only problem I had with it was that it wasn’t rare like I ordered it, closer to a medium rare but I didn’t care to wait for a new one. The gravy on the steak was excellent but the risotto! The quinoa risotto was the star of the plate! It was the best risotto that I’ve ever had. My portion of the bill at this fancy restaurant only came to 55,000 pesos which is extremely cheap in my opinion.



We walked back to the hostel and took it easy. We are planning on actually getting to the free tour tomorrow morning.

Until next time, adios amigos! (I’m learning some Spanish)

The streets seem really empty. Were you in the business district on an off day?

Is it graffiti, or "urban art"? Seems like the stuff in your pictures was actually intended as art.

Glad to see everything seems to be going fine. Is it okay to drink the tap water in Columbia, or do you need to stick to bottles like in Mexico?

Quote: Ayecarumba

The streets seem really empty. Were you in the business district on an off day?

Is it graffiti, or "urban art"? Seems like the stuff in your pictures was actually intended as art.

Glad to see everything seems to be going fine. Is it okay to drink the tap water in Columbia, or do you need to stick to bottles like in Mexico?

We were in a slow area so there wasn’t a lot of foot traffic. A few blocks away there were tons of people.

They call all of it graffiti but it’s done by artists. I would just call that art but they choose not to. We are going on a graffiti tour tomorrow.

The water in Colombia is safe to drink. I think Peru and Bolivia are a big no no on drinking the water.

Glad you are off to a fairly good start.
i'll have to go back and try to figure out all that daunting math, but it sounds like fun to pay 55,000 pesos for a meal.
Going to take me longer to do the math of pesos into Canadian Dollars than it took you to eat the meal!!
Tnx.


NOTE; I rounded off 2365 to 2000. that makes your share $cdn 27.50. A real bargain.
Only took me a short time using pen and paper. No hope of getting it otherwise, so i'm just going to stick with the rounded off figure.
Have no idea if actual is higher or lower, but figure rounded off is close enough.

As always your reports and pictures are enjoyable to me
keep them coming.

Axel and Romes want you to bring them back a couple
of souvenirs, they said something about white bricks?

Looking forward to an update from PG. Columbia's a pretty violent place. Reports of 21 dead after a police academy was shot up. Who shoots up a police academy and expects to get away with it?

Well luckily pg visited forum today so he wasnt there

Quote: PokerGrinder

Can somome PM me when this gets good. Like when PG is in an extremely dangerous situation, preferably when he is about to get attacked by a dangerous animal or he has been taken hostage.

Quote: Ayecarumba

Looking forward to an update from PG. Columbia's a pretty violent place. Reports of 21 dead after a police academy was shot up. Who shoots up a police academy and expects to get away with it?

Your whiteness is showing:) Colombia is a country not a university or outdoors gear company. It’s so dangerous they’ll threaten to cut your hand off if you spell the country name wrong.

It's been about 10 days now since you've updated your trip and even though I did see you post here recently I'm getting worried.

You didn't accidentally cross the border into Venezuela did you?

If you're being held captive just post "Viva la revolución" so we'll know you are in trouble and then we can get the Mounties on their way to rescue you.

Quote: Hullabaloo

It's been about 10 days now since you've updated your trip and even though I did see you post here recently I'm getting worried.

You didn't accidentally cross the border into Venezuela did you?

If you're being held captive just post "Viva la revolución" so we'll know you are in trouble and then we can get the Mounties on their way to rescue you.

Viva la revolución!!!!

I’ve just been busy, I actually have a 3.5 hour layover right now so I was going to do some writing.

You think the Mounties would come all the way to Venezuela lol?

Quote: PokerGrinder

Viva la revolución!!!!

AHA! I knew it.

I've sent a message to Dudley Do-Right who I'm sure will hop on his horse, (who is named Horse, of course), and be in Venezuela before they start torturing you. (That is providing Dudley isn't riding Horse backwards as he usually is in which case you might want to shift your location to Russia).

I knew something was up because you wrote in the first message on this page:

Quote: PokerGrinder

I am headed to South America today and my plan is to post here every few days with details of my adventures.

Oddly enough, apparently I'm not just psycho, but psychic as well:

Quote: Hullabaloo

What's the line on Grinder actually making posts every 3 days? I'm guessing at least one 10 day break between posts.

Quote: Hullabaloo

AHA! I knew it.

I've sent a message to Dudley Do-Right who I'm sure will hop on his horse, (who is named Horse, of course), and be in Venezuela before they start torturing you. (That is providing Dudley isn't riding Horse backwards as he usually is in which case you might want to shift your location to Russia).

I knew something was up because you wrote in the first message on this page:



Oddly enough, apparently I'm not just psycho, but psychic as well:

Well I mean you can look at my past TR history and see I’m anything but prompt.

So far the food looks unappetizing and boring
and mundane. One of the many reasons I loathe
traveling. Whenever I travel, I constantly wish
it was over and I was home. Which makes me
a very bad travel companion.

I can see and hear any place in the world right
here online. I can't smell it or feel it, which
most of the time is a good thing.

Ok so I did a write up at the airport but I had no wifi so I couldn’t upload the pictures. Then I lost my phone in an Uber and spent the next 6 hours worrying. I got it back, I love that Uber driver!!! Update most likely tomorrow!

Quote: PokerGrinder

You think the Mounties would come all the way to Venezuela lol?

When I was running my Maritime and Trans-National Search and Rescue consultancy, I formed a very low opinion of those otherwise much admired "Horsemen".

Quote: PokerGrinder

Ok so I did a write up at the airport but I had no wifi so I couldn’t upload the pictures. Then I lost my phone in an Uber and spent the next 6 hours worrying. I got it back, I love that Uber driver!!! Update most likely tomorrow!

I'd think that's a better "win" than any of your casino visits :)

And nice to know there are still honest people in the world. (Or did he charge you $500 to get it back?)

Grinder living the WARM LIFE got to be what about 130*F warmer where he is compared to back home

Warnings
4:25 AM CST Monday 28 January 2019
Extreme Cold Warning in effect for:

City of Winnipeg
A period of very cold wind chills is expected.

A cold front moving through Manitoba today will bring a frigid Arctic airmass into southern Manitoba this evening. Widespread extreme wind chill values of -40 to -50 are expected to begin late this evening and last through Thursday afternoon.

I'm not sure what's worse, Winnipeg or Siberia. Anything below zero qualifies as being on another planet in my book.

Quote: Hullabaloo

I'd think that's a better "win" than any of your casino visits :)

And nice to know there are still honest people in the world. (Or did he charge you $500 to get it back?)

I'm sure they came to an amenable oral agreement.

We woke up around 9 am for the free tour of Bogotá. Kyle and Amy were not ready to leave on time (this is a reoccurring theme) so we got to breakfast late which got us to the tour late. Luckily the tour was late leaving itself so it wasn’t a big deal. For breakfast I ordered tamal which is corn dough and chickpeas with chicken (bone and all) steamed inside a banana leaf. Not the best food but they gave us a whole basket of the most amazing croissants, they were so buttery.



The tour was a bit underwhelming as I usually expect city tours to venture out of a tiny area of the city. Our tour was just a mini tour of a couple of businesses in the area. The guide explained a few pieces of graffiti near the square where the tour started and then we went to a juice bar.



The guide explained what a bunch of fruits were and we got to try them plus a little juice shot. The fruits were tasty and different than anything I’ve had before. I was still stuffed from the mediocre breakfast so I didn’t buy a juice.

Our next stop was a Chicha bar. Chicha is a corn and alcohol drink (2% alcohol) that Colombians enjoy. The taste is quite sweet but the aftertaste isn’t good at all. I’ll pass.

Our third stop was a coco shop where they use the coco plant in different ways. They chew the leaf (again didn’t taste good) or bake it into cake or make tea. The tea and cake were ok at least.

On our way to the next stop I found a clock tower, if you’ve followed my other trips I love clock towers.


Our final stop on the tour was a coffee tasting of course because this is Colombia. We got to try one of the most rare coffee crops in Colombia that only yields beans once every 3-4 years. The coffee was served black and was way way way too strong for me to drink. I don’t drink coffee but if I did that sure wouldn’t be how I would drink it. Amy happily drank my cup of coffee.

After the tour we went for lunch in the area where the juice and fruit tasting was earlier in the day. They all had a plate of chicken, rice, beets, plantain and soup, I was still stuffed from breakfast so I passed on the food. I did however find some street food to munch on on our way back to the hostel. It was a fried corn dough ball with meat, rice and a half a hard boiled egg in it. Very tasty indeed!



That afternoon we took an Uber to Monserrate Hill to get a good view of the city. Kyle managed to drop his phone in the car and ten days later we haven’t heard back from Uber regarding our 3 emails. We took the funicular (large cable car looking thing) up to the top (10,400 feet high) for sunset. We checked out the church and took pictures of the view. I then checked out the shops which were just over priced crap as I figured they would be in a tourist spot. One of the shop owners offered me a chocolate covered coffee bean which I knew I would hate but I didn’t want to be rude, it was so nasty!

The sunset over the city was beautiful but it was hard to get great pictures even from so high up. After the sun set we headed back down the hill. I stopped and grabbed this arepa with cheesy dough inside, very much like these cheese muffins that my mom makes. We grabbed the funicular back down before taking an Uber back to the hostel, don’t worry Kyle didn’t lose anything else.







We couldn’t agree on where to eat for dinner which led to us eating at a crappy tourist restaurant. You can always tell it’s a crappy tourist restaurant if they have an English menu in an area that doesn’t speak English. Well I had mediocre steak that didn’t seem to be seasoned and had a splash of BBQ sauce on it. It came with a tiny potato and 3 tiny weird wieners. We stopped at a bakery on the way back and I got a chocolate croissant.





We spent the rest of the night in the hostel courtyard having a couple of drinks and laughing a lot with a couple people that we met on the tour. It was relaxing and a lot of fun. Mory (the guy we met) was leaning back on the flimsy plastic chair and managed to break it, lesson learned right? No! He proceeded to break another one, nobody ever said Americans were too bright 🤣.

The next morning we ate the free breakfast at the hostel, scrambled egg and a croissant. We had a queso arepa from a street cart. It’s a corn dough with crap tons of cheese inside, it’s gets grilled and has a glob of butter and salt on top. It tasted amazing but by the end I was getting nauseas. It also didn’t agree with my stomach as I don’t deal great with dairy. I know it wasn’t a good idea but it looked so good. I would regret the decision about half way through our free graffiti tour.





The graffiti tour was amazing! Our guide is an artist herself and knows so much about the local scene. She gave us the history of graffiti/street art and how the scene is now as well. Luckily I was able to make it through the whole tour and get back to the hostel bathroom before something bad happened.




Fish

Corporate greed










For lunch we went to Azahar Cafe where we tried the coffee the day before. I had the chicken chilequiles which is nachoesque. It had chicken, goat cheese, avocado, a egg and a gravy on top of chips. It was ok, not great. There weren’t enough chips and too much of the sauce.



We walked around a bit and had cake (I had chocolate moose cake) and then a street donut which had Colombian caramel inside. Their caramel is a much lighter flavour then what we are used to in North America. Kyle and Amy went to a museum while I went back to the hostel to rest. I’m not a big fan of museums.

That night we went with Mory and his girlfriend Meredith to Dos Gatos Y Simone which is a Mexican-Colombian fusion restaurant. I got the variety plate (as did Kyle and Mory) which included a taco with amazing beef, a small taco bowl with cubed chicken and salad, quesadilla with mushrooms and chips. Everything was excellent.



The plan for the night was to go to the largest night club in the world or was it South America, I don’t remember. It’s called Theatron de Palatonic and it used to be a massive theatre. There are about 40 rooms although not all of them are always open. Each room has a different DJ or a live band. The cover was 40,000 pesos and that includes free drinks all night. We drank and played drinking games at the hostel before heading to the club around 11.



The club was a lot of fun but it was extremely crowded. The live band in the outside area was really good and the DJ’s weren’t half bad either. We left around two and ordered an Uber. We got street food while we waited, I had an empanada which still had a chicken bone in it and another corn ball with meat, rice and egg. The first one of these the other day was much better but when you’re drunk everything tastes good.









We got back to the hostel and got a little sleep before waking up early for our flight to Medellin.

I woke up the morning after the Theatron club feeling a little sluggish but overall my body was just tired. Amy was hungover and Kyle had managed to recreate the worst hangover ever. He was puking in the bathroom and looked like absolute death. The flight to Medellin had a lot of turbulence that made me a bit nauseas but apparently Kyle had it much worse as he kept puking right through the flight, drinking is cool!

Our friend Ollie and his wife picked us up at the airport. Ollie met Yinna (pronounced Gina) in Colombia 4 years ago and they got married about a year ago. We stopped a few minutes away from the airport for lunch. Yinna told me that her favourite Colombian dish was chicharron so that’s what I got. Chicharron is a long chunk of pork. Sort of a cross between bacon and pork belly with the skin on and then they fry it. It was so good!



They drove us to our hostel where we napped for the next 3 hours. When I woke up Kyle had met Ollie for a beer down the street so I went and met them. Amy showed up a little later and then the tool came. A guy Ollie knows from Alberta Bernie joined us for a drink. If I never have to see that “thing” again I’ll consider myself blessed lol.

We took an Uber to this area that Ollie suggested. We had street shawarma that wasn’t really shawarma. It had cheese on it and no hummus or tomato. It tasted good but I’m pretty sure that’s what made Amy and I sick for the next 6 days or so. Luckily I didn’t feel sick I just had bad stomach/pooping problems lol.
The death shawarma!


We found one of the casinos that I wanted to visit so we went in. The casino was called Havana Casino on google, Broadway Casino on the door and they were using chips from their sister casino, Casino Caribe. Kyle and I both lost a couple hundred thousand which is less than $100.

After the casino we took an Uber back to the hostel where we were so lucky (not!) to have a DJ playing music. It literally sounded like straight noise, I’m not sure how anyone listens to that crap.

By the next morning I was having stomach issues from I assume the shawarma. I slept in, my plan for the day was to go to a gringo bar down the street and watch the NFL championship games. I tried to reload data onto my SIM card but the place doesn’t open on Sunday. I watched Netflix in this giant hammock that was more like a giant spider’s nest.



I ended up at Medellin Brewing Company for the two football games. They had a special where burgers were 2/1 so I asked if I could have one now and one in 3-4 hours during the second game. The bartender checked and had no issue with my request. The weird part about the offer was that they had 5 burgers all at the same price but you couldn’t mix and match, I had to get two of the same. I chose the Argentinian burger that was basically a cheeseburger with chorizo on top of it. The burger was fine, nothing special. I was fully into my stomach issues at this point in the day and each time I ate the burger I was in the bathroom within 15 minutes. I had the brewery’s amber beer with each burger and it was very good. I’m not usually a big fan of amber beer but this had a really nice taste to it.

The first game was great, ended up going to OT when the Saints got ripped off by the referees. The second game is what I cared about as a die hard Patriots fan. The Patriots dominated early and then the Chiefs came roaring back. The lead changed 4 times in the final 7.5 minutes and I was up and down emotion wise like a roller coaster. The Spanish speaking staff thought I was absolutely nuts with how loud and animated I was but they seemed amused. The patriots ended up winning in OT and I got a congratulations and a handshake from the bartender (I sat at the bar top all day). Ollie, Kyle and Amy showed up sometime in the 4th quarter of the Pats game and were basically there to cheer for the Chiefs just to troll me.

We walked back to the hostel with me on cloud nine and the rest of them just laughing at how happy I was.

The next morning we woke up, I ate the free hostel breakfast of eggs and toast that was sweet. Breakfast didn’t stay in me for very long. I went back to the phone place to get data but my lack of Spanish made it impossible to buy data. My plan was to just get Ollie or Yinna to help me before we went to Cartagena.

We took an Uber to Ollie’s condo for lunch/so Amy and Kyle could do laundry. Ollie ordered this extremely tasty roasted chicken and made rice for lunch. The chicken was so tasty that I had seconds and then visited the bathroom 20 minutes later. We hung out at Ollie’s for a couple hours until he started work for the day. He plays online poker for a living so he started playing tournaments around 4:30. Amy and Kyle decided they would stay while Ollie played, I didn’t have the same interest.

I went casino hopping through Medellin. My first stop was Rio (Uber, they are dirt cheap in Colombia) where I won 55k and grabbed a very dirty chip that will need a good scrubbing when I get home. I then went to Casino Caribe (Uber) where I wasn’t sure what I’d find. They had removed their table games which is why their chips were at Broadway Casino. I then took an Uber to Gran Casino which is close to our hostel. I won 15k after they gave me 6 5k promo chips to play with, this was the only casino in Colombia that gave me anything free. The next couple places were within walking distance of where I was. These next two casinos weren’t on my collecting list, I just saw them a few days earlier. The information online about what casinos exist in South America is pretty unreliable. My next stop was Hollywood Casino where I won a whopping 2500 pesos or about $1 Canadian. My last stop of the night was San Fernando Casino where they were using Blue Space Casino chips. I found out later that they rebranded this casino recently from Blue Space. I won a whole 500 pesos here would is a solid 23 cents or so. I called an Uber to take me back to the hostel. First off he started driving away as I was getting in the car, the door was still open. Then he couldn’t navigate the 8 minute drive to the hostel even though Uber gives him step by step directions. Not the best Uber driver at all!

The next day we had tentative plans to go to Guatape about 2 hours from Medellin by bus but I was pretty much not planning on going since my stomach was not doing well. Amy was determined to go (she was having the same stomach issues), not my problem lol.
I didn’t sleep well because of my stomach so I passed on the long bus trip. I had breakfast at the hostel, I assume you know that didn’t do me very well. The problem was I was hungry like normal but no matter what I ate I ran to the bathroom. I even ate crackers and sprite for a day+ which didn’t do much to help. Yinna told Amy to buy these liquid pods that make you not poop, she was willing to try anything. I had one and went back to bed, I had booked a walking tour for 2 in the afternoon. Btw neither of us found that the liquid pods did anything to help.

The tour was amazing!!! The tour guide was the best that I’ve ever had, he loves his job. He is an electrical engineer and has a masters in business for he does this instead and has been for 6 years. The tour was over 4 hours and amazingly I was never bored. His knowledge was amazing and the way he presented it was fun and interactive.

Midway through the tour we stopped for a snack break. I had a buñuelo as suggested by the guide. Buñuelo is cheese dough that is fried in a ball. I also had what they call a churro, basically a donut with a mild version of caramel inside. I also had an empanada, I love street food even when my stomach is messed up.
Empanada


Pablo showed us this gothic building that was designed by a Belgium architect. There was a disagreement between the locals and the architect that ended with him being asked to leave. The locals figured they could easily finish the building. Turns out they overestimated themselves and they weren’t able to complete his blueprints. For this reason the beautiful partly finished building is still there with an ugly grey wall that the Colombians built in front of it. They didn’t even bother to finish the building.





Pablo was nice enough to help me reload my SIM card after the tour. I thanked him profusely for both the help and the tour and went on my way. I ordered an Uber and waited, and waited, and waited... After 30 minutes and many messages back and forth the driver decided he didn’t feel like coming. I canceled and got a driver in less than 5 minutes. I wish the original driver didn’t continue to tell me he was coming when he wasn’t as I needed a bathroom and I could have been back at the hostel already.

At the hostel I took a shower because a 4 hour walking tour in the crazy hot sun will make the best of us smell. Yinna picked the three of us up to go for dinner (Ollie was playing poker online at home) and took us to a new area where I could get the local dish called Bandeja Paisa. I really enjoyed the dish. The plate is huge, it comes with chicharron, chorizo (only bad thing on the plate), ground beef, rice, beans and plantain. I really enjoyed the dish and I would definitely eat it again.



Some random graffiti from Medellin.






The next day we have a 7 pm flight to Cartagena. We slept in and went in search of food. We ended up having cake for breakfast, for me it was amazing chocolate cake to be exact. We went to Casa de la Memoria museum and although it originally seemed interested I was reminded why I don’t like museums very much. Ollie met us at the museum about halfway through and then we went for lunch. This was a completely local area so the food was cheap and authentic. I had rice with chicken and veggies that was good. After lunch we said goodbye to Ollie, grabbed our stuff from the hostel and headed to the airport 45 minutes away.
It seems like they put egg in everything in Colombia.

On to Cartagena!

TLDR PokerGrinder is actually in Egypt.

Great post and pics PG! I'm glad to hear everything came out okay after the big ol grilled cheese incident.

Regarding the club scene... was it mostly tourists or locals? Did the hostel give you advice about areas to avoid? I've wondered if illicit drugs are as prevalent in Colombia as in El Norte? How do the prices compare? They are charging $1.50 for a little avocado at the market by my house.

Dropping an iPhone in a S American Uber
would be like dropping a gold coin in
an American Uber. Why would you think
you would get it back.

Good stuff. Glad I saw this TR early and can follow along.
I have always wanted to visit BOG and CTG. How did the altitude treat you in BOG? Some recommend chewing the coca leaves to offset the effects. The title of the trip so far should be "Donde esta el bano?" You say you took some great tours so include more tidbits about what you learned/saw. Maybe something like...Did you know the proper way to spell Columbia is actually Colombia?
I want to hear more about Ollie, sounds like a nice enough guy to take you around and stuff. Speaking of Ollie, here is a cute JRT named Ollie:

Disfruta la comida

Evenbob why do you bother when everything you post is negative? You’re such a downer lol. Btw I got my iPhone back from the driver.

Aye grilled cheese?
The club was more locals than tourists and it was a heavily LGBT crowd, I’d say nearing half of the people there that night. The hostel told us to be extremely careful at night but I think they were a bit over the top with their warnings. Things are quite cheap in Colombia, not Asia cheap but more cheaper than North America.

Keeneone I didn’t have any issues with the altitude. I did try the coco leaves and they don’t taste good. I did know how to spell Colombia properly. As far as the tours I wouldn’t be able to recreate the info that he gave, my memory sucks lol.

Ollie is a good friend. We’ve been friends for about 5-6 years and I’ve taken poker trips with him before. Ollie fell into addiction in a bad way right around when I met him. He had a quarter million dollar score and that money is all gone now. He had a really bad coke addiction when he went travelling to Colombia. I honestly thought we might not see him again. He went, he partied, he met Yinna who was also travelling. They became friends and then when Ollie went home they talked every day. They wanted to be together but that meant Ollie had to be clean. He amazingly got clean and they have been married over a year now. They live in her hometown of Medellin. I always joke with him about how he went to Colombia and somehow lost his coke addiction.

Ollie has been trying to get us to come visit him and Yinna in Medellin for a couple years now. He was so happy that we came and loved that he and Yinna could show off their city.

Quote: PokerGrinder

Evenbob why do you bother when everything you post is negative?

So you think dropping an iPhone in
a S American Uber is the same as
dropping it in a US Uber?

Wow, you're the kind of tourist
that those countries love.. lol

Quote: EvenBob

So you think dropping an iPhone in
a S American Uber is the same as
dropping it in a US Uber?

Wow, you're the kind of tourist
that those countries love.. lol

Shush.

Quote: EvenBob

So you think dropping an iPhone in
a S American Uber is the same as
dropping it in a US Uber?

Wow, you're the kind of tourist
that those countries love.. lol

I think there is a good chance it’s not getting returned in any country. There are however good people out there like this driver who go out of there way to return things.

Quote: PokerGrinder

I think there is a good chance it’s not getting returned in any country. There are however good people out there like this driver who go out of there way to return things.

You should test it. Drop it in an Uber again
and see what happens.