Our second day in Medellin we took a day trip to Guatape, a colorful town next to a reservoir created by the government in the 70's. To the side of the lake is a 200 meter high rock called Piedra del Peñol. Energetic tourists can climb to the top to overlook the reservoir and tiny islands.
We took a tour so we wouldn't have to arrange the logistics of getting there and around. There are always pros and cons to that, but the ease and cost of it outweighed the bad food and slow people. Our first stop, to Hyrum's delight, was the training fields for Atletico Nacional (his favorite soccer team) in Guarne, a town outside of Medellin.
We took a boat ride around the reservoir. When the reservoir was built, it displaced a city, which I can't think of the name of. They moved everyone to an area of higher elevation, but you can still see where the cemetery used to be, and the steeple of the church. We also saw one of Pablo Escobar's mansions (top right, below) which is now in ruins but offers tours, and Colombian soccer player James Rodriguez's mansion (bottom right, below), not in ruins, obviously.
Here, Hyrum is pointing to the tall rock (Piedra del Penol) off in the distance.
They created a smaller-scale replica of the displaced town. It's pretty touristy.
The rest of our day was spent in the actual town of Guatape. After lunch we decided to try out the zipline. It was only around $8, so we figured, why not? We may have had second guesses once we started. We sat on little benches and they chained 3 of us up to the cable in a cluster, then they started hauling us up to the beginning platform. Going up is so much worse than going down. Once at the top, they released Hyrum almost immediately, and he went flying. I went down right after him. As I approached the starting platform, all I saw in front of me was a big black mat. I had half a second to contemplate how the 'landing' would work before I just crashed right into the mat. It had some give, but still, they could've warned us beforehand!
(Last time I zip-lined, we were in harnesses, and clipped into all the different lines. When you feel secure it's easy to relax and feel like you're flying. That was not our experience in Guatape-- we definitely wanted to hang on and not risk falling out!) But overall, not terrible. ha
Once the reservoir was built, and the area became touristy, they created higher standards for the buildings in Guatape. It's well known for it's 'zocolos'--which are 3d murals created on the lower half of the buildings. They started making these over a century ago when the construction materials they used attracted chickens. Instead of having their houses pecked like crazy, they put these designs on top to help keep chickens away. Each house put up a design that held meaning to it. Bus drivers had buses, farmers had crops, sailors had boats, banks had money, etc. While they've existed for a long time in Guatape, many weren't in great shape, and the paint wasn't so vibrant. The town got a face lift to make it what it is today. We took this picture below for Tiago, since he likes all forms of transportation.
Below, you can see the evolution of "silleteros"-- they started out carrying Spaniards on their backs, and evolved to carrying plants and then flowers. (Carrying flowers on your back on these wooden boards is famous in the Medellin region.) You can also see the school building painted on the bottom of the town's school.
Our last adventure for the day was climbing to the top of the rock, which was really our whole reason for wanting to visit Guatape. In the picture below you can see a poster of what the rock looks like. (We never got a good shot of it at a distance.)
This land was owned by a family, and one of the sons was obsessed with this rock. His father left it to him in his inheritance. In 1950, Luis Eduardo Villegas was the first man to climb the rock, and it took 5 days. Eventually, they started charging admission for people to climb it. A stone staircase with 740 steps was built into the side of the rock. (Before our trip, I saw pictures and worried the stairs would feel rickety, but they fortunately were quite solid.)
Towards the beginning I was still smiling.
But very quickly, it got hard! I kept stopping to drink, and catch my breath, while Hyrum was practically running to the top. It took about 20 minutes to get to the top.
Hot and sweaty, but worth it!
Going down was a lot easier than going up!
Back in Medellin, we hit up Crepes and Waffles, a delicious and affordable chain restaurant in Colombia that serves beautiful dishes. (We ate there 3 times on our last visit!) We saw this Colombian Chiva in the street, which is unfortunately the only picture we took of them during our trip. The buses in Medellin are all colorful and well cared for. But we opted to walk--it was beautiful weather.
Overall, we were glad to have survived the day.
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