After enjoying Bogotá much more than we expected, we moved on to see a couple of small colonial towns. First up was Villa de Leyva. It is a town of about 17 thousand people, and it is about 3.5 hours from Bogotá (even though it is only 161 kms). Luckily, we found a direct bus there and we didn't have to figure out any bus transfers.

Villa de Leyva is a somewhat preserved colonial town, complete with cobblestone streets. It at...

The final days we spent in Colombia were split between 2 towns in the coffee region, Jardin and Salento. Both were extremely stunning.

Jardin supposedly has the prettiest central plaza in Colombia, and we would have to agree. Big, clean, and adorned with many rose bushes, it was an easy place to spend hours just hanging out drinking coffee and people watching. The ornate cathedral stood on one side, and with the backdrop of the...

Medellin, the "City of Eternal Spring", truly had the most perfect weather..not too hot, not cold, and especially not humid. What a relief after the heat of Cartegena. The city sat along a long valley and spread up onto the slopes of the surrounding green mountains. While there were many highrise apartment buildings in certain neighbourhoods, there were also many tall trees and lots of vegetation, making it a very attractive m...

After enjoying the quaint villages of Villa de Leyva and Barichara, we headed north to Cartagena, a city on the Caribbean coast of Colombia. Cartagena is famed for its beautiful old colonial town surrounded by 13 kms of intact century-old stone walls. It was founded in the 1500's as the main Spanish port and northern gateway to South America. It was from here that many of the treasures taken from the indigenous people were shi...

We continue to have some great experiences in Bogota and here are two that are at the top of the list.

We took a graffiti tour through the Candelaria neighbourhood and without doubt this was one of the best tours I have ever done. Graffiti and street art are pervasive throughout the city but they are especially concentrated in Candelaria. The art is simply magnificent! Not only did we see amazing displays of artwork and learned...

After months of planning, we finally arrived at the first stop of our RTW trip in Bogota, Colombia! Although not hot, it is a pleasant temperature and a welcome relief from the -30degrees we had at home.

The last few days leading up to our departure was a mad dash to try to pack up the entire house and organize our affairs. The actual packing of our bags didn’t happen until the night before. The intention was for each of us to...