We are sitting in Medellin, in the Black Sheep hostel, exhausted and hardly capable of moving. We left Cartagena at 9 to arrive to Santa Marta at 2 in the afternoon, overdosed on some Chinese food and some policemen kindly escorted us to the collectivo stop towards the bus station. Unfortunately, the collectivo buses were so small that there was no way we could have fit on it with all our bags, so we took a taxi.

Bought our tickets to Medellin for the next evening, and when, referring to the fact of leaving my credit card behind the counter for 20 minutes until the transaction is confirmed, I remarked 'I don't feel comfortable.', a Colombian guy took it a bit to the heart. When I explained that I love his country and what I really meant, he became instantly friendly and supplied us with heaps of advices, including that Parque Tayrona closes at 5 and it costs about 50.000 pesos to get there and also that he is a taxi driver happy to take us there. Not to be taken as a fool, I wondered outside to check this information from other drivers. It was true, and thankfully a Colombian couple overheard the conversation and suggested that we share a taxi. We packed in, stopped at a supermarket to stock up on some fruits and water, as Tayrona is infamously expensive. We had a military check on the way, and almost ran down a pack of lazy big black birds having their siesta on the middle of the road, but despite this, we reached the entrance as they were about to close. We reached the drop off area in, what it seems was 5 minutes, but the next day walking back was about an hour hard trekking. We strapped our bags on a donkey and set out for a 45 minute hard walk through the jungle, struggling to get to Arrecifes beach before the last rays of the sun disappeared.

We rented two hammocks, consumed a part of our fruit supply and soaked ourselves in mosquito repellant. This of course didn't halt the 5 million little buggers to attack and slowly consume us throughout the night. It was the least restful night I've ever spent in a hammock and prayed for the sunrise as my various body parts were itching out of control.

After fruit breakfast, we proceeded down to the beach where a mule was having his last minutes of the night's sleep. Actually, on the photos, he looks like he is dead and partly decomposing. The sunrise was gorgeous and as at Arrecifes already 200 people died since it was opened, we opted for a 20 walk through different beaches and some jungle to La Piscina, where we spent a wonderfully solitary morning. Literally not a soul was around, until about half nine, when people started lingering about. Got back to Arrecifes, had some more fruit, although we had to throw some of it out, because it started to smell like fermented alcohol, and we thought before a 15 hour bus ride we probably shouldn't risk it.

So after the above mentioned 1 hour and 45 minute track we managed to get on a bus to the station and started our freezing cold journey (apparently the more the bus resembles a refrigerator the more luxurious it is). Took the metro from the station dragged all our crap here to the hostel and now here we are sort of unable to move. But we are determined travelers. There is a display of Chrismas lights on the banks of the river and great bar and restaurant areas to discover tonight. Tomorrow we are taking on a more cultural side of the city and at half 10 at night taking a 10 hour bus journey to Bogota. I am aware that this blog entry is not the most entertaining one of all, but I have actually misspelled 'shouldn't' just above. I am not at capacity to write, let alone to entertain. Nevertheless, I hope you enjoyed it.