Popayan

Popayan, La Ciudad Blanca (the white city). And white it is! The old city here consists of an el centro district lined with old colonial buildings uniformly whitewashed with chalk-white facades. Second only to Cartagena (well, officially anyway) as Columbia’s most impressive colonial city, Popayan might just be a nicer place to visit due to the mild climate and more “off the beaten track” location. While there are a few gringos at our hostel, we are the lone representatives on the streets. It just doesn’t have that touristy vibe that Cartagena has. And, at 1760 m, the climate is near perfect. Nice warm days, followed by cool nights – 365 days a year. We’re still getting our heads around the lack of seasons here.

The two-day ride (150 kms) from Cali went smoothly, with a bit of a grind on the second day due to undulating ups and downs. We’re still learning the subtleties of what an elevation profile looks like and how it translates to the actual ride. My tendency had been to look only at the net elevation gain between the low and the high for the day, but that changed on this ride. Day two totalled a net gain of about 500 m – which has now become a daily goal post on the larger climbs – but also included half a dozen rollers of 100 m or so. Those rollers kill you. They definitely add to the total climb for the day, and turn a 500 m climb into a 1000 m climb. Lesson learned.

We’ve been remarkably lucky with rain. As mentioned in previous posts, it rains every day (i.e., every 24 hrs). But thus far, we have escaped riding in the rain except for one 10-minute sprinkling the other day. Yesterday, we watched from the luxury of our lovely colonial-style room adjacent to the cathedral and overlooking the main square (could be the best room yet), as a massive storm swept through the city. Gail-force winds and torrential downpour for about an hour. We both looked at each other and didn’t have to say it “what if we were riding right now?”  Yikes! But from the security of our bay window it was a great show.

 An interesting, if not disgusting, event occurred on our overnight in between Cali and Popayan. As mentioned, one of the pros of cycle touring is that we are forced to overnight in the middle of nowhere in the “real” Columbia. One of the cons however, is that we are forced to overnight in the middle of nowhere in the “real” Columbia. On said night, we reluctantly accepted accommodation at a less-than-sterile location. Not realizing the full severity of our decision until the next day, we were fully informed as I discovered multiple cockroaches crawling out of my handlebar bag and up my hands as we rode out of town. The final count after going through all of our things to shake out the lovely little critters, was dozens. Amy, who now has a near-fatal case of the heebeegeebees has chronicled the event for those interested in the gory details: http://wheelnspoke.blogspot.ca/.  Suffice it to say, not a pleasant experience, but no harm done either. As they say, what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. All part of the fun!

 Another interesting event, actually more of a realization, was our need to switch accommodation here in Popayan due to a group of young partying Colombians sharing our space. From what we have gathered thus far, Colombians (perhaps all Latin Americans) seem to have an infinite tolerance for noise, or I should say, an infinite ability to create it. No matter where, or when, or in what situation, there doesn’t seem to be any inter-personal boundaries to noise. Walking into a hotel or hostel at 3 am and turning on all electronic devices in a room and engaging in a spirited conversation about the night’s events seems entirely acceptable regardless of the proximity to other people. Similarly, any amount of shouting, yelling, music, vehicle horns, and/or any other kinds of loud noise at any time of day or night, appears to be entirely normal to everyone involved regardless of the situation. Needless to say, getting a reasonably peaceful sleep has become a top priority and challenge for us – it’s never entirely quiet, but sometimes it’s at least reasonable. Interesting facet of life here.

 Taking a couple of days off to walk the lovely streets of Popayan has been our recent agenda. The good food, including a local specialty of peanut-sauce empendas, has been a nice treat. Tomorrow we hit the road again with our sights on Pasto, the last of the big towns in Columbia. There is, of course, the ubiquitous large descent followed by the large climb to deal with. By our calculations it should take 4 days to cover the 250 kms. Hopefully cockroach free! With Pasto under our belts, we will be within striking distance of Ecuador, and onto the next phase of the adventure. I believe Ecuador is quite flat...no? J