Villa de Leyva

October 12th to 14th

Ask the locals in Tunja about 'Villa de Leyva' and they all go misty eyed and talk of a hidden paradise in rapturous tones. It's a 700 metre climb back the way we came, but that's never stopped us before.... so another diversion....

Luckily we've got our newly enlarged visas in our back pockets!

The ride is another doozy as we climb sharply out of Tunja through massive agrarian landscapes backed by ever rising emerald hills....

Higher still the land tends to brown as the peaks are too steeply angled to delay rainwater long enough to sprout vegetation. From this vantage we can see the road slicing along the ridge as it drops into the next valley....

And drop it does! We are getting a bit confused after expecting a full day of climbing as we continue to fall and there is no longer much road between us and our destination. Our descent is confirmed as we stop to admire the scenery and I am instantly swarmed by blood sucking black-fly. Above 2500m we have been free from such attention as mosquito and other nasties cannot scale such heights.

We continue to zoom down a thin line of tarmac carved along a rock wall...

Racing past agave plants flowering massively and dwarfing nearby telegraph poles....

Suddenly we hit town and decide our guide book must have got it wrong. The dramatically rising air temperature confirms our descent, and we conclude that Villa de Leyva is 700m lower, not higher than Tunja. Oh well - an easy day today and we can worry about regaining all that lost altitude later.

Villa de Leyva; a Paradise....

Hmmm....

Well I guess it all depends on what you are looking for. The scenery of the ride is far more interesting than the barren scrubby hills surrounding the town and we are definitely not impressed by the authentically ancient cobble-stone streets that threaten to destroy our bikes and rattle our fillings free from our teeth.

We attempt to find cheap digs and start to understand the town's appeal to the city slickers of Tunja and nearby Bogota. Most accommodation is strictly not cycle tourist friendly. It's more your spa retreat, room service, full manicure and facial type of crowd with prices to match. We take a deep breath as we leave the first couple of places but eventually find a family run business that has an outhouse with spare beds behind their lovely (and way beyond our price range) hotel. It's a third of the price at 30,000 pesos.

OK that sounds a lot, but it's about $US17 and pretty good value!

We don hiking boots for the uneven stone streets and explore a bit more.

Villa de Leyva is a throwback. Established in 1572, it was declared a national monument (like the whole town is the monument) in 1954 and nothing modern is allowed to exist. It's all rather jolly quaint!

Whitewashed colonial houses and the Parish Church surround what is reputedly the largest plaza in all of Colombia....

All the streets around the town centre are painfully cobbled and extremely lighty-brighty in their immaculate, eye melting whiteness.

Window shutters are traditionally wood carved and uniformly brown or green....

Roof tiles are ordered ranks of inoffensive pale salmon, neatly laid and not-a-one broken.

As a town it's all incredibly well behaved, and surprisingly, as a graffiti virgin I feel just a slight itch to run amok with a brush and some colour. It's not in my nature, but all those pristine expanses of immaculate whiteness is acting like a bland rag to a bull with a spray can.

Somebody stop me!

We race past all the twee souvenir shops in a rush to get away before something goes wrong and hike out into the hills.

The town is a lovely museum and I can see the appeal for rich city folk on a pampering weekend, but for us the hills above the town provide an escape from a theme park into some fine hiking country. Trails skirt along rock crags....

and are lined by weird combinations of agave cactus and pine....

The air is warm and loamy, with the scent of resin heavy and sweet on the breeze. Spanish moss drapes the trees and giant bromeliads sprout short legs and wild sprays of green - like a huge pineapple - wildly enthusiastic....

Those obsessively correct tiles make for a fine view back over the town's rooftops to the patchwork hills behind....

Maybe I'm being a little unfair. Villa de Leyva is undeniably pretty - maybe even a little dainty, but we do find a fairly hard hitting museum to the martyrs of the Colombian fight for independence. Antonio Ricaurte, a Captain in Simon Bolivar's army was born here and there is stunning original artwork of brutal scenes endured by the freedom fighters....

There is a (surprisingly) interesting Palaeontology museum just outside of town with models and exhibits from when this whole region was a giant pre-historic inland sea. Even more incredible when you consider the whole area has now been elevated to over 2000m (6,600ft) by the rising Andes.

Villa de Leyva also has tons of nice bars and restaurants hidden away in old colonial court yards behind those bland white facades....

Changed my mind...

I kind of like the place really.

And I'm sure your mother would too....

A Change Of Plans

April 23 to...

Ometepe Island resembles a dumbbell in that it is two giant volcanic cones joined together by a narrow strip of land. We leave Moyagalpa on Conception Volcano heading to Merida on the other cone of Maderas Volcano.

The road around Conception is paved and it's an easy 20 kilometers to the turn off, whereupon the tarmac ends and it's a rough ride across the isthmus. Rocks in the road are big enough to stand the bike up for a photo op....

Where the lands sweeps down to meet the sea there are some great beaches of soft golden sand. Fronted by palm topped palapas with the impressive 1400 metre cone in the background it's a memorable setting for a lunch stop...

Behind us there is a midden pile where all the local hotels throw away their food waste and white faced capuchin monkeys squabble noisily over scraps. I can almost hear the "Mission Impossible" theme tune playing as this one runs the tightrope back to the trees....

It's hard to believe that after another road juncton at Santa Cruz, the road gets even worse....

It's one of the worst surfaces I've ever picked my way through. Always terrible - it varies between nasty rock to tyre sucking sand which stops the bikes dead. Riders don't always stop so fast and we are often thrown overboard. Fortunately it's a soft landing, but slick with sweat we become covered in grit and sand and it's slow going. Even the buses struggle on this route, often taking 4 hours to cover just 40 kms (25 miles)....

It takes us 5 tough hours.

Next day we head out to hike up to the San Ramon waterfalls. It's about a four hour trek that takes us roughly half way up the Maderas Volcano, so it's a good dry run to take on the full thing. Midday temperatures are as ever in the billions, so we set off at dawn to hopefully get most of the climb out of the way in the cool part of the day. It's a good decision as the path is really steep in places as if passes through an ecological research centre and up the mountain side.

Unfortunately views are limited through thick vegetation, but the glimpses you do get of the lake and mainland are spectacular.

Then, just as the heat is getting seriously oppressive the tree cover opens up as we reach the 40m cascade...

Actually "cascade" is a little generous; this being the end of the dry season. However, despite 6 months with no rain, there is still some water. More importantly there is a small pool at the foot of the falls that is crystal clear and fabulously cool for swimming in.

After the descent and whilst picking up some emails, we get some bad news about Sue's father. A frantic phone call home reveals the worst and we are suddenly making arrangements to leave the island and book return flights. It's a Sunday afternoon and the last ferry leaves the other side of the island in just 90 minutes. We dash back to our hotel and hastily make arrangements to dump the bikes and kit with the the owner, pack a bag and get to the boat jetty in less than an hour. Fortunately there is a speed boat there and we manage to get a ride to the ferry port.

Arriving just as the ferry is finishing loading and preparing to leave, we pull up alongside and climb from the roof of the speed boat through a hatch on the side of the ferry.

We just made it!

It takes us a couple of days to get a flight after the problems with volcanic ash from an eruption in Iceland and we arrive home on Wednesday morning. It's a devastating blow to hear her father passed away in the night and that we were just too late to see him. He was 83.

Ivor had been ill off and off for a long time and we were always travelling with the spectre of this news in the background. In the end he was taken to hospital with what was thought to be a 'routine urine infection' but he was found to have internal bleeding that couldn't be stopped. He passed peacefully in the night.

Ivor was a man you would describe as a 'True Gentleman'. In a world where that term is bandied about with little regard, it is good to have known the man for whom the expression was truly meant. Ivor was a gentleman and a man I am proud to have known - he is sadly missed.

It was hard for us both to have arrived home just too late to say goodbye, but Sue and I can look back on the four months we spent over Christmas with her dad when he was in better health and on good form....

This is a better way to remember him.

We have spent the last 2 months back in Britain with family and friends especially with Sue's mother Sal who is slowly coming to terms with her loss.

We are now heading back to Nicaragua to pick up the bikes and resume our tour into South America. It's always tough to leave family behind and that is especially true now. It is a tough decision, but then starting the trip in the first place was a tough decision as well. There are always reasons to delay, to put off and not to do what part of you needs to do, and there is never a 'right time'. Sometimes you just have to go - and then be flexible enough to about-face and head home when needed.

As ever - life goes on.....

Ometepe Island

April 21st to 22nd

Another ridiculously early start sees us leaving Granada and heading past the cloud obscured cone of Vulcan Mombacho. It's a trivial climb made tricky by the oppressive heat as we head to the volcanic island of Ometepe.

At Nandaimo, we rejoin the Pan American Highway and battle the traffic, the manic rush of cars like a stream of blood cells gushing along a main artery. It's a pretty short, dull ride until Rivas where there is a turn off to the boat dock at Saint George. After debating boat times with captains that conflict with timetables, we book passage for bikes and riders on the next ferry - all for less than $5.

With an hour to kill we rest up on the sandy lake shore with the mile high cone of Vulcan Conception rising dramatically from the lake surface forming the island in the background....

The 10 mile crossing is by a tiny, chugging boat that carries all manner of cargo to the islanders. Our bikes share space with chickens, copper pipe, a diesel generator, food, water tanks and electrical supplies.

Ometepe Island is actually 2 volcanoes joined together by a thin strip of land forming a rounded dumbbell shape roughly 20 miles long and 10 wide. The second volcano is 'Maderas' - greener and lower than it's conjoined twin at 1394 metres (4500 feet).

The barren drama of the steep sided Conception Volcano is clear as the boat docks at 'Moyogalpa'....

Moyogalpa is pretty much a dock and a single street lined with guest houses with a church at the end. After a long day it's as much as we want to explore and we crash in the cheapest room we can find.

The island is served by roads that circumnavigate both volcanoes and connect together at the isthmus between them. Some bits are even paved using cinder blocks - the rest is a nasty patchwork of rock and stone. We head past banana and corn fields to 'Reserva Chaco Verde' to hike along the lake amongst primary forest. The air hums with the screams of insect, bird and animal as troops of monkeys cavort in the tree canopy. Some are newly born and cling to mother for dear life as she hunts for food....

Adolescents are bolder and more inquisitive staring right back as we watch them....

Father just broods....

There are huge butterflies, chameleonic lizards, coatis (a kind of giant rodent the size of a small dog) white herons, and blue tailed magpies called 'Urracas' which follow us screeching out warnings to all who listen....

It's an incredible place and we see no-one all day. Views back to the volcano are stunning....

The lake dominates life here. Soils are fertile, but rainfall is absent during the 6 month dry season so it's water provides life to valuable crops and people alike. It is a meeting place for socialising, to cool and water cattle and also for bathing and washing clothes....

Wooden washing platforms are dotted along the shore.

Mother washes....

Whilst dad fishes....

And son relaxes....

Caribbean Cayes

September 1st to 5th

A quick 25 miles back in land from Dangriga brings you to a 7 mile track disappearing off into the jungle. It leads on a steadily worsening surface into 'Cockscomb National Park' which is unique in being the only Jaguar reserve in the world....

Belize, despite huge fruit and logging businesses and also having a tourist industry where annual numbers of cruise ship passengers outnumber the entire population 5 to 1 still manages to run massive debts. The governments response has been to issue squillions of dollars of bonds to prop up the ailing country's finances, and to hike taxes and prices massively. Belize is not a cheap country to tour and it's all a bit of a shock after Mexico and Guatemala.

We are asked to pay $60 Bz ($30 US) to enter and camp in the park. Considering we were paying $6 US to camp in National Parks in the states, that seems a little high. For the same price we take a 'rustic cabin' which is an 8x6 foot room in a shack with bunk beds.

On the plus side, it's incredibly beautiful and we have the place - the entire place, like the whole national park to ourselves....

Being an ex-British colony, hikes and trails are well marked and there are accurate maps. Normally this is not noteworthy, however after over a year in Latin countries, this is the first place where we can just hike without having to hire a guide or book on to a tour....

We take an easy hike up river where and you can hire oversize inner tubes and float languidly down river. Well it starts fairly languid, and then we hit a series of rapids and have to paddle for dear life to avoid rocks and submerged branches. It's great fun and a beautiful way to see the jungle. At one point the river divides, and so does our group as I get caught up in the current and cannot prevent myself getting washed along this new course. There are just a few moments of mounting worry as I speculate on my new heading; visions of raging waterfalls or spear throwing tribesmen on the river bank passing through my mind, before the 2 flows finally join up again about a mile or so down stream....

Another short hike takes you to the place where Dr Allan Rabinowtiz's plane came down shortly after taking off in a thunderstorm. Previously the plane was used to track Jaguars for Dr. Allan's research into their numbers and movement. Fortunately no-one was killed, except for the aeroplane which is now, slowly becoming part of the jungle....

In all there are 100,000 acres to explore with trails leading to hidden waterfalls, and the park derives it's name from the range of mountains that have a serrated ridge reminiscent of a cock's comb. We see no jaguars however, except in the visitors centre where they have a rogues gallery of these incredible cats caught on hidden cameras. Beautiful place though.....

We leave heading south towards Placencia, a narrow spit of sandy land that splits from the mainland and extends some 20 miles out into the Caribbean Sea. On the way we cross a number of river bridges, mainly supplied by the UK and the European Union. Frequent storms have damaged several of them and in some cases they have been completely washed away. This is hurricane territory after all and we pass by a couple of solid looking storm shelters. We also cross a couple of not so solid looking temporary bridges....

When we reach the sand spit, the land narrows to under 200m in places - just wide enough it seems for a narrow road and an American retirement community to either side. There are new builds going up everywhere and even more for sale in this little strip of paradise with the Caribbean on one side and the tranquil Placencia Lagoon to the other. Half way in the road is under construction and a year of Spanish has taken a toll on my English skills. We completely fail to comprehend the sign and ride through the 10 mile building site; sending the girls first - just in case....

It all gets too beautiful and we have to stop at Maya Beach for a cold one....

Placencia is a Creole town, the descendants of British loggers and black African slaves. They have their own language (Kriol), a mixture of English, Native American 'Miskito' and various West African Languages; it has some similarities to Jamaican Patois and sounds to-tally tropicaaal. The buildings are wood and stand on high stilts above the high tide levels....

It's also a seafood town and local hero Oscar runs the finest restaurant in town perveying fine snapper fish and lobster that he personally caught that morning. Lobster in a creole sauce with rice and beans. Sue finds a new kind of food heaven....

On a beautiful white sanded Caribbean beach we find 'The Coconut Man', errr - selling coconuts (what else?) under the coconut tree. He offers lessons in 'Slack Rope' walking - 'Dis is not de tite eRrope, dis be de slack eRrope' he drawls by way of explanation. Slung between 2 coconut trees it's weirdly addictive and after a couple of hours of flailing arms and frustratingly lame attempts, it all starts to come together and we take a couple of stuttering steps....

Placencia is just another of those simply magical place we have visited on this trip....

Mount Doom

Aug 1st to 7th

To leave San Pedro de Atitlan we had planned to ride around the lake past it’s triumvirate of monster volcanoes and on to Antigua, the former capital of Guatemala. Unfortunately there have been a number of attacks on tourists recently on the very road we need to take and we are warned against riding. Yeah, yeah we think everyone gets a bit twitchy after minor incidents, but on asking around the response is surprisingly firm and constant. Do Not Go That Way! When a US army veteran recently retired to this area explains that even he takes a bus, we decide maybe the rumours are not exaggerated and we reluctantly agree to take the bus.

Apparently there is a group of bandits who make a living preying on tourists, robbing them at machete point before melting back into mountain terrain that makes them impossible to find. Every few months a group of vigilantes forms a posse and tries to hunt them down, with the result that they go to ground before reappearing in a new location somewhere else round the lake. It’s proper wild west stuff!

We just have to rationalise the bus ride is not cheating as the lake is a side trip and we will ride the route back from Antigua to the lake junction - all the miles will get ridden….

We have a few days to kill as Anna and Ali are set to return after Anna’s father’s funeral and we’re going to ride together again so we extend our stay in Antigua. Being the nation’s capital for 233 years until a massive quake levelled the city in 1773, Antigua has some fine old relics of buildings, many sadly now ruined. Others have been restored to former glory such as Iglesia de la Merced….



The city itself is spectacularly located and surrounded by 3 more giant volcanoes - Vulcan de Aqua, Fuego and Pacaya. At 3759m (12400 feet) Vulcan de Aqua provides a stunning backdrop to Antigua’s signature building - Los Arcos….

Close proximity to Guatemala’s new capital - the imaginatively named ‘Guatemala City’ ensures a regular flow of well healed weekenders and Antigua has more than it’s fair share of fine restaurants, swanky hotels and boutique shopping, sadly all beyond our modest budget. There are however enough cheap Chinese restaurants and back street bars to keep us interested.

And one of the volcanoes is still massively active - so we have to climb it!

Vulcan Pacaya erupts constantly and there are several flows of fiery hot lava coursing down it’s steep flanks. We’d be fools not to try and get as close as possible to something as dangerous as that!

It’s an organised tour, unfortunately as this is again rumoured to be bandit country and apparently it’s better to herd together under such circumstances. On the downside it does concentrate the wallets and cameras into profitably small spaces, but to counter that is the safety in numbers argument and the theory that you don’t have to outrun the bandit - just the slower tourists behind you. We’re pretty fit after all the cycling so we decide it’s good odds as we hike off across black ash fields into the gloom....

To the West are clear skies and the impressive sight of Vulcan de Fuego, another active cone coughing and spluttering into life….

It’s a moderate 2 and a half hour hike up slippery pumice and ash before we reach the tortured summit of sharp, twisted rock. Hot sulphurous blasts of fetid air rise from the bowels of hidden underground vents….



Like the final scenes from ‘The Lord of the Rings’ we finally approach conveyor belts of super heated rock flowing from a fault in the blasted land. Note Sue’s walking stick ‘a la hobbit’ as she flees the intense heat of molten magma, selfishly spoiling an otherwise rather nice photograph…..



To be fair to her though, standing within 4 feet of lava is a tad on the warm side and I lose all the hairs on my legs in a swirling wind that raises the local air temperature to inferno levels. Wearing hiking shorts was not a wise decision with hind sight.

THIS IS LAVA…..



And this how close you get to it as it flows off the side of the mountain towards the distant valley below…. 

In less enlightened countries there would possibly be a barrier in place to stop accidental immolation, or maybe just a sign explaining that; like McDonalds coffee, lava can be hot and pouring it in your lap is not recommended….

To be fair to the safety nit pickers, the swirling gale force wind that blasts furnace like air in random directions and the crush of camera wielding tourists staggering and wheeling about on uncertain footing does cause one or two alarmed cries of ‘I say, could you possibly desist from nudging me towards certain death’....

Or somthing similar.

We retreat to a sensible distance and roast marshmallows….



Mmmmmm marshmallow…..

In Antigua we reside with Edwin - proprietor of ‘Guate Linda Language Centre and Hotel’ and all round fine fellow, whose excellent establishment can be viewed here. He’s a fantastic host and shows us the ropes around his town. What he doesn’t know is that we can hear the Spanish lessons taking place outside our bedroom window and we’ve spent the entire week getting free Spanish lessons….