We ended up spending five nights in San Agustin,
and could have easily spent longer in the town if it wasn't for the
looming prospect of our visas expiring. There were many things to see
and do, and even at the height of Semana Santa festivities it was
still a really nice place to hang out. For some reason, we seemed to
arrive in San Agustin at the same time as many other travellers
that we had met along the way, making for a nice social element. We
even got a chance to hang out with Martin one more time!
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| San Agustín as seen from the Palo Alto finca |
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| La Chaquirá carved rocks |
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| Unfortunately, the former casa de ciclistas in San Agustín is now closed.... |
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| A bunch of travellers with a common interest in cooking can only lead to yummy dinners |
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| The mysterious tombs of the Alto de los Idolos |
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| One last chance to meet up with Martin, next Paris-Brest-Paris or Salzburg |
We never seem to be at our most efficient when we
leave a place we have been for a few days, so our first day out of
San Agustin was more of a half day. We retraced our tracks to
Pitalito and then continued South on route 45, much quieter now,
although the little traffic there was still in the form of big
tanker trucks. We had a quick lunch in Bruselas, coffee capital of
the Huila Department, before starting the gentle (for now) 1000m
climb that would take us a good portion of the next day as well.
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| The department of Huila is big on coffee growing, and this is a drying facility for coffee beans |
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| The road 45 becomes quieter and very scenic after Pitalito |
With rain starting to come down at about 3:30pm, we
started looking for places to camp, and eventually asked at the home
of the Trujillo family, about halfway up the climb. They started out
saying we could camp, then suggested we sleep inside on the living
room floor, and by the end of the night they offered us a bed
instead! They also insisted that we eat dinner and breakfast with
them. Sr and Sra Trujillo were just headed out to Pitalito for the
night but their adult children, especially Mary and Nancy, were
running the ship in their absence. Mary and Nancy, both young
mothers, were fascinated that we didn't have any children. The house
had 14 people living in it, of three generations, and had a warm and
bustling atmosphere that we really enjoyed being a part of for the
night.
Unfortunately, our plans to get an early start the
following morning were scuppered when we discovered that Lucy's GPS
unit had been stolen off the bike in the night (the bikes had been in
the living room). To make a long story short, it took about three
hours for one of the boys who lives with the Trujillos, although not
related to them, to fess up and tell us where he had it. In the end,
it was probably the most painless way possible to learn a lesson
about keeping our belongings safe, and it doesn't change the
wonderful experience we had with the Trujillos.
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| One more example of the great Colombian hospitality - the Trujillo family hosted us for one wet night 40 km out of Mocoa |
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| Putumayo welcomed us with lots of rain, until the border with Ecuador |
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| But Colombians don´t seem to mind the rain, and they protect against it in style |
So we set off into the late morning, now worried
about whether we'd make it to Mocoa or not. The terrain was more
rolling than we expected, but with great views to keep us occupied.
Near the end of the day it became clear that Mocoa was still too far
away, so we asked permission to sleep in a school near the roadside
in the tiny settlement of El Dorado. It was raining off and on, so we
were grateful for the covered area where we could cook a quick
dinner. We settled in to the tent at around 9 pm and soon drifted off
to sleep.
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At 3:30 in the morning we woke up to a heavy
rainstorm and the sound of male voices all around us. Before we had
time to figure out what to do, one was addressing us. “Who's in
there?” said the voice. Alberto poked his head out, in the pouring rain, and saw dozens
of men in uniform with guns and backpacks all over the schoolyard.
“We're two foreigners travelling by bicycle,” he said timidly.
“We asked permission to camp here for the night”. “Oh, okay, it is the national Colombian army”
said the voice. “You guys rest then”. It was a bit hard to rest
while we watched the shadows of guns move across the tent and
listened to the sounds of the group getting ready to sleep for a few
hours. We hoped they were the army and not the other side!
By
5:30am it was starting to get light and both us and the soldiers were
packing up and getting ready to get on with their day. By the light
of day it all felt much more comfortable, and we chatted with the
soldiers about our camping equipment and our trip. The soldiers were
all gone into the hills by 7am, and by 8am as we were packing away
the last of our things, the children arrived for school, none the
wiser about the excitement that had taken place overnight.
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| A quiet and comfortable school to spend the night in... |
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| ...that at 3:30 am became occupied with half of the Colombian army getting ready for a few days training in the selva |
After two days of more adventure than we bargained
for, we worried we were behind schedule to get out of Colombia before
our visas expired. We decided not to camp for the remaining nights
in Colombia to avoid any more unplanned delays! It rained all day,
but after experiencing the heat of Huila Department we had developed
an appreciation for the rain at low altitudes. It kept us cool, and
we put in a long day to Santana to get back on track with our visa.
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| One of many river crossings in Putumayo |
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| Out of Santana, the road isn´t unpaved for 25 km |
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| But once again, we were fascinated by the scenery of the road to the border |
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| The 45 road will, one day, be completely paved all the way to Ecuador |
We were unsure what to expect of the roads the
next day. We had been asking about the road conditions towards the
border since San Agustin, and had heard everything from it being 100%
paved to basically unpaved with a few paved sections. In reality
there was quite a bit of pavement, but the unpaved sections were in
terrible condition, making progress sometimes painfully slow. Later,
the road was mostly paved, but the steep up-and-down hills put us to
the test. Nevertheless, we made it to our target of La Hormiga, and
found a nice and cheap place to stay for our last night in Colombia.
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| The piranha soup (or one of its brothers!) Alberto had on the way out of Santana was delicious |
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| One of many random sections of paved-unpaved road on the 45 |
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| The final 25 km to the international border crossing with Ecuador had one of the finest pavement of our Colombian journey |
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| And also, some open air schools |
We lingered La Hormiga in the morning, reluctant
to leave Colombia after three wonderful months, but knowing it had to
be done. After a gentle morning's ride to the border, the formalities
were very quick as the border was virtually empty. Then it was
another quick shot on the perfectly paved roads of Ecuador to Lago
Agrio, the centre of the oil industry in Ecuador, where we spent the
night.
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| Unfortunately, oil companies rule in Putumayo, Sucumbíos and Napo regions |
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| The not-so-busy international bridge. We made it to Ecuador with 2-days left on our tourist visas! |
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| Our 3-month Colombian journey ends, but hopefully will be back for some more in the future |
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| Lago Agrio, a city built around the 60s by the oil company Texaco, had a modern but nice church |
Route notes:
- San Augustín to Mocoa: the road 45 is now paved pretty much all the way to Mocoa, carries less traffic than the upper sections closed to Neiva, and is really scenic. We noticed that the heaviest traffic, mostly oil trucks, is condensed in the early morning hours, at around 4 pm, or between 7-10 pm. There is not much in the terms of villages, but a few small shops will provide the basics, as well as options for camping.
- Mocoa to Santana: paved all the way, except some sections around villages. Traffic gets lighter in this section, and we did not encounter any other problems. Ask the locals for the latest security info - we felt it was a perfectly safe area, at least during daylight, with a fair amount of army settlements in between, and a constant flow of colectivos and small buses. There´s a fair amount of small villages along the way, as well as plenty of camping options in schools.
- Santana to the border with Ecuador at San Miguel: the first 25 km out of Santana, on the road 45, were unpaved and a bit rough, but perfectly rideable on tourers. After the town of Yarumo, the roads becomes unpaved for 5 km, then on and off paved to Valle del Guamez. From there to the international bridge, it was mostly paved. The passport check takes place 3 km past the bridge, in Ecuatorian soil, and was totally empty and much more relaxed than the bustling Tulcán-Ipiales crossing.
