Museo de Oro

After a late night we eventually dragged ourselves out of bed at half 10 or so. We waited around the hostel for an hour or so to see if anyone else would join us and when they didn't we left. The gold museum in Bogota is a must see according to the guide books and although we generally ignore their advice we decided to check it out. Not least because it's free on sundays. On the way we picked up 3 empanadas each and a couple of coffees which we devoured while trying all the 7 sauces that were available. We have discovered that if not for the sauces most of the food here would be quite bland and also that most of the sauces are HOT which Mae discovered when she had a large dollop of guacamole that burned her mouth and made her eyes water! The gold museum contains over 3500 pieces in display over 3 floors as well as many very impressive vault doors which are almost as interesting to look at. The museum is fascinating, the detail on the pieces is incredible and the sheer amount of gold makes it obvious why the Spanish were so keen to colonise the continent. As usual the famous pieces were far less impressive than we expected but there were several unknown pieces which took our breath away instead. It took us a good 2 hours to look round and by the time we were finished we decided it was about lunch time. We walked along to the cafe where we had dinner the previous evening because we knew that we would be able to try a Tamale which we have seen in several places we have been. It turns out to be chicken stuffed cornmeal wrapped in banana leaves, tasty but quite greasy, we also had a sausage which came wrapped in ham and potato before being battered. In the afternoon we looked round the Casa de la Moneda (the mint) which we contains a lot of coin printing machinery (mostly made in Birmingham however!) and a huge coin collection (with pieces of 8 but no spanish dobloons) It was quite interesting, and free, but after the gold museum that morning we were soon all museumed out! We also had a look into the garden of the military museum next door which houses a tank, two jet fighters, a small helicopter and a long range missile. These were quite cool and we took some photo surreptitiously before walking to plaza Bolivar where we expected there to be a changing of the guard ceremony. Evidently however it was not going to happen today and after waiting for half an hour or so we gave up and went back to the hostel. We hung around doing a couple of internet bits before going out to get some dinner of skewer (Nom) and pizza (NOM) which we tried with honey on top (NOM NOM NOM!!!!!!). After dinner we went back to the hostel and spent the rest of the evening chatting to the other guests until bedtime. At least it wasnt quite as cold tonight in the dorm, the staff had moved in with their brats as there wasnt enough room in the hostel for other guests who had booked private rooms and they had lit the fire to keep warm. The issue now was the amount of smoke made your eyes water and the kids are horrible keeping everyone awake all night and morning too grrrrrr!! We're starting to think we should be paid to stay here instead of the other way round!!