At around 5.30, I had woken up, and found that I was still on the bus and we were driving along the streets in a built up area. We watched out the window as the sun rose up into the sky, and we started to drive into the heart of Bogota. At around 7.30am, we finally arrived at the bus terminal.
We unfolded ourselves from our seats, grabbed our cabin luggage and stretched our legs as we disembarked from the bus.
We waited as the bus driver took his sweet time unloading our bags from the buses under carriage. We then walked our way through the terminal, and made our way directly to the taxi rank.
Here there was a pre-pay counter (unlike the airport), so Andrés lined up and pre-payed for taxis to take us back to our Bogota hotel.
As we waited for Andrés to organise the taxis, it didn't take us long to realise the damage to Dim's legs. He had so many bites all over his legs, it looked like he had chicken pox. It must have been so itchy as well, as we stood back and observed him scratch one leg with the other. Poor guy, that's not going to be fun.
We didn't have too many issues with catching a cab, in fact today they were offering their services to us, big bags and all.
We piled into our cab, and were driven the 15mins to the hotel. It was a welcome site seeing the doors before us. All I was hoping for, was that our rooms were ready for us. Normally you can't check in until after lunch, but I was just hoping that the travel gods were on my side today.
We walked up to the door, and we were buzzed in by the receptionist. Andrés sorted out our rooms, and no sweeter words were spoken than when he told us that our room was ready. Thank goodness.
I collected my bag that I had left in storage at the hotel for the last week, and made my way up to our room. This time it was a twin room, just Donna and I were rooming tonight, as Lisa was off to Venezuela.
I set about completing my first task.... Getting out my washing. The receptionist had said that if I had put my washing in this morning, that it would be ready either tonight or tomorrow morning. Perfect. At least I will be able to start the next part of my journey with fresh clothes.
Donna and I quickly freshened up, and then we met up with the rest of the group in the foyer, ready for our orientation walk.
Dim was missing. I asked Andrés where he was, and Andres advised us that Dim was going to sleep today as he didn't get much sleep on the bus last night. Hmmmm, I beg to differ. Unless he was snoring awake, he slept the entire 12 hour bus trip!!
I dropped my washing off at the counter. There was no happier sight either, as I was down to wearing my bikini bottoms as underwear today, so hopefully it comes back tonight.
We started our walk, and headed up one of the roads in the Candeleria district of Bogota. This road was a bright and colourful one, with all of the buildings painted in bright colours, and some of the most amazing graffiti art work gracing the walls.
It was such an artistic area, with many shops and restaurants lining the streets. High above on the roof tops were more art work, crafted out of metal.
As we wound our way through the streets, Andrés colourfully told us about the area we were walking through and about the sad and unfortunate political history of Colombia. He also demonstrated so much passion about the bright future he sees for Colombia.
We made our way into a small cafe, and ordered some brunch. For me it was a cheese and ham roll, and I couldn't believe it when I saw hot milo on the menu..... it didn't take much for me to order one!!
We sat and listened to Andrés talk about the political parties in Colombia, whilst we waited for our food. Eventually it arrived, and everyone hungrily ate their food. I was more impressed with my hot milo, I just savoured every mouthful. It reminded me of home!!
After brunch, we continued on our walk around Bogota. The sun came out, and started to warm our cold bones. We soon found ourselves in the main square, we walked past the presidents palace, and then looped back and headed towards the hotel.
We were glad to get back to the hotel, where it was shower time. It was so nice to have a shower, and to wash my hair, especially after sitting on that bus all night.
After we were all fresh, Donna and I decided to go to an art gallery. This gallery houses some amazing art work, including a Picasso. However the main reason why we wanted to go, was to see the work produced by a very famous Colombian artist by the name of Fernando Botero. He has made a name out of painting everything larger. So essentially the people are larger, the animals are larger, even the fruit bowl paintings are larger. The best painting was a larger version of the Mona Lisa.
As Donna and I walked around, we looked at each of his paintings... pointing out the ones that tickled our fancy. That was until Donna pointed a little too close to one of the paintings and set the security alarm off. The security guard was staring at us, shaking his head. We felt his eyes following us as we continued around the remainder of the room.
We finished at the museum, and then made our way out on to the street. What to do now?
We decided to go and get a drink. As Donna sipped away on her coke, I burnt the hell out of my mouth on one of the hottest coffees I've ever had. We had quite a while to think about what to do this afternoon, as I waited for my coffee to hit a drinkable temperature.
We soon decided that we would head to the police museum. So once I had finally finished my coffee we made our way towards the general direction of the police museum.
We walked through the square again, and found a sign that pointed us in the direction of the museum. So down the road we went. Then the signs stopped... and we didn't know where to head now. So we asked a local police officer where we could find the Museo de Policia. He explained that it was a couple of streets up and one street across. So we followed his directions, and could not find it anywhere. So we ended up asking a military guard at the palace, in Spanish if he knew where the police museum was. He turned to us and said that he doesn't speak English.... which we found hilarious as we were actually asking him in Spanish. Obviously our Spanish isn't going as well as we thought!!
We asked quite a few other people, everyone pointed us in different directions. You would think that that the local police officers would know where their own museum was located.
We started to walk back to the square, and soon found ourselves been spoken to by an older man walking on the opposite side of the street. Not understanding a word that he was saying it us, I started telling Donna what I thought he was saying. It went a little like this 'who are these two crazy tourist b****es walking around the streets like this, I'm going to kidnap you, and you will run drugs for me, after I take your kidneys of course'. As I was saying this, he started to cross the street..... here we go, we have a live one. Speaking to us in Spanish, I asked Donna if maybe I should ask him if he knew where the police museum was. By this stage we had written it down in Spanish, so I flashed him my piece of paper. He was so happy to help. He waved his arm, motioning at us to follow him. Under the watchful eyes of many police officers patrolling the streets, he initially went one way, asked a shop keeper, and then lead us the other way until we arrived at the museum. We thanked him, and then made our way into the museum.
Much to our surprise, we were greeted by a police lady, who asked if we spoke English. When we confirmed English, she went off and retuned with a young man, introducing him as our guide.
We started our guided tour around the museum. It was actually quite interesting, especially when it came to Escobar, the history of the Colombian drug cartels, and how the police caught them. The tour went for an hour, and finished up in a room filled with guns that had been used by the Colombian police over the years. Not bad for a free museum guided tour.
We then went to the gold museum. I had no intention of going to the museum, especially after hearing Donna's report on how boring it was, however we were going to hit the artisan market that was located next door. Here we walked around and checked out all of the gorgeous handicrafts that they had for sale.
After making a few purchases, we now felt like we had seen pretty much all of what Bogota had to offer, so we ended up heading back to the hotel and relaxing.
When we arrived, I notice that my laundry was still sitting on the floor where I had left it in reception. I mentioned to the receptionist that I was leaving tomorrow and wondered if it would be done in time. She said that it would definitely be done first thing in the morning!! I hope so!!
We headed down to the computers, and we tried to check in for our flights tomorrow. Donna had some luck, however it was still a little to early for me to checkin. As I was surfing the net, I saw Lisa arrive at reception. She was asking for Andrés, who had actually headed out for the afternoon. It turns out, as Lisa was packing for her flight this evening, she was checking all of her stuff, and realised that the money envelope in her passport wallet was actually empty. The thieves got away with $400. So sneaky. As the receptionist attempted to call the police station Andrés walked through the door, and then took Lisa to the police station to get the required documentation to claim the money back on insurance. It was just so disappointing to end our Colombian trip like this!!
We said goodbye to Lisa, and then continued to just hang around the hotel. We then met the rest of the tour group members later on that evening for dinner. It was our farewell dinner, as Donna and I were leaving the tour as of tomorrow. The rest were continuing on with some new group members for another two weeks of touring Colombia. So we actually got to meet the new guys at dinner which was good. It looks like they have a good bunch of guys joining them, so that's nice to see.
Dinner was ok, not the best meal I've had whilst in Colombia. We were all so tired from our night bus the evening before, that once dinner was finished, we were all quite keen to catch taxis back to the hotel. This is where I flaked it! I was asleep before my head even hit the pillow!!