But first Guatape

I decided to start my first full day in Medellin on a day trip outside the city. I had heard so many great things about a small town called Guatape and the tour offered by the hostel seemed cool and it was!

We started with a very hearty breakfast at a house in the jungle and had the best papaya in my life. I was never really liked papaya but I never knew it could taste so intense. After some coffee and hot chocolate we continued and passed by some lakes, which were created after building a hydroelectric dam in the area. We also saw the new town, where the people were relocated before the lakes flooded their old town. It must be so cool to dive in this lake though and see the old town under water, but I don’t think anyone does that. We did however go for a swim in one of the lakes, which was really refreshing. There was even a bridge to jump from for those who wanted a little adrenaline kick. Anyways, another BIG highlight on the way to Guatape is THE ROCK, which is this huge boulder that you can climb (200 m or 700 steps) up and get some fantastic views of the lakes. Our guide Rafa was a very cool guy who had an even cooler van for the days trips he offers. While we climbed the rock, he and his buddy took out the back seats and the van was turned in to their kitchen. They prepared about 3 or 4 different hot dishes along with rice with sesame (very tasty) and when we came back they had set everything out for a picnic. We had a really great meal together and the guys put everything back in the van before we hit the road again. At this point, I thought the ROCK was the highlight of the day trip until we drove in to the town of Guatape. Almost all the houses of this town are colored in vivid colors and feature little drawings on the front, which makes for a beautiful atmosphere while walking through town. We had about 2 hours to walk around before the rain started coming down forcing us to head back to Medellin.