Where to start for the next edition of our journey... Let's start with we absolutely loved everything Colombia served up - this country has it all and isn't afraid to share it with its tourists!

We spent 3 days in the port town of Cartagena, loosing our sea legs and recovering from our little sailing adventure. Cartagena was very beautiful, but pretty expensive - apparently if you can afford to park a yacht here, you can afford to pay crazy prices for everything else, and had our first $70 meal since leaving Australian shores.

We did however stumble across our first 'Aussie Cafe' - yep a bloke and his wife from Yokine in Perth which was a bit of a spin out, had opened an a Australian cuisine cafe and you could get everything from vegemite and cheese on toast, to a meat pie and sauce - we did what every good Aussie would do, we ate, we shared stories about what has happened in Perth since they left (not much really...) and we ate their vegemite!

We took the overnight bus from Cartagena to Medellin, which took about 13 hours and was pretty easy in the scheme of things - the scenery as we went over the top of the mountain range and in to Medellin was amazing, a little scary but we are starting to become experts at this crazy bus ride stuff, so I didn't even hold on too tightly this time.

We arrived into Medellin and caught a taxi to our paradise in the mountains, as far as we could possibly get from the ocean...

As we drove from one side of the city to the other, we both shot each other nervous glances and wondered if the driver a) had a licence and b) had any clue where he was going... We soon learnt everyone in Medellin has a license, they also dreamt of being a Formula One driver as a kid, and if you brake it is a sign of weakness and you will be banished from the roads - or so they must think!

Arriving at the Secret Buddha Medellin was like being welcomed home! As soon as we were out of the taxi one of the owners, Mariano met us, took our bags and immediately told us how much he loves Australians! We would come to realise he was also one of the most amazing people we would meet in our trip so far!

After we were shown around the hostel, which actually was a home not a hostel, our room had a king size bed but was the same price as a room in a normal backpackers - Mariano made us both breakfast and we got acquainted. He also then made us a 3 course lunch and later that day a 4 course dinner, needless to say we fell in love with the Secret Buddha and the owners Mariano and Martin almost instantly!

Both Mariano and Martin could not do enough to ensure our stay in Medellin was one to remember - we drank and shared stories til 4am in the morning most nights, we leart how to salsa, we learnt that no matter how many times someone plays Kanye West it never gets any better, we learnt that despite language barriers travelling allows you to be blessed with new and wonderful life long friends!

We ended up staying in Medellin for 10 days (the first time round...), we had our flights booked to Cali and we were off on day 8, but after an email from our little Aussie Brothers who were on their way to Medellin and being convinced by Mariano we were going to miss the best salsa club in all of Colombia, Matt and I had our rubber arms twisted and stayed on for a couple more days of what can only be described as debauchery!

Pat and Damo arrived and it was like our little family was back together for one last hurrah!!

I could write so much about Medellin, we saw and experienced so much - good food, good company, interesting history in a city that is trying to regain confidence from the world that is as safe as anywhere else, a museum dedicated to fat statues - ha ha yep fat things - and so much more...

What I will never forget about Medellin though is the people - the people were the highlight! Nothing was ever to much trouble, they were crazier and partied harder than anyone I have ever had the pleasure of meeting, and they are proud - and such pride should be admired in any culture.

We moved onto Cali finally as planned - taking our first flight since leaving Australia, we both felt like royalty - no 13 hour bus for us!! This time a nice quick 50 minute cheap flight instead - perfect!!

We only stayed in Cali for 2 nights and neither of us were overly impressed - it was another city, and had big shoes to fill to beat our time in Medellin!

From Cali we headed in the direction of Popayan, a small town that boasts it is the gastranomical centre of Colombia. In short Popayan was a little disappointing and this was where Matt would try his first tatse of what we think could have been horse, donkey or alpaca - it was definitely a moment to remember and I will never forget Matt's face when he took the first bite!! He thought he was getting beef and my oh my it wasn't beef - he claimed later that night he might just open a horse orphanage cause he felt so guilty for eating what ever the hell it was!!

We only stayed in Popayan for two nights and then kept heading South on what tops all bus rides to date as the most hardcore, and did 14 hours off road - meaning rocky, muddy mountainous highlands to the hippie town of San Agustin.

San Agustin was delightful and Matt and I came to agree that we both prefer to be out of the cities and in the middle of no where, where the streets are quiet and everyone you walk past says "Ola", where you can waste your day staring at the never ending green mountains they call the Andes, sharing a drink with the love of your life and laughing together about what our future holds - San Agustin much like Lake Attitlan suited us both, it was our little escape, our little piece of heaven!

We got up bright and early and walked to the famous archelogical site, Parque Archelogical - we spent hours wandering around the site, staring in disbelief at the rock carvings found in this area.

Our time in San Agustin was cut short pretty quickly, when after our day at the archelogical site I recieved an email from my sister asking me to call my Dad as soon as possible. My heart dropped a little and I knew my Mum must not be well again - we waited a good 5 hours before we could call home and walked to the nearest internet cafe to call Dad at 5:30am Perth time. We had a really bad connection and just as Dad got the words out "we think we might loose her" the electricty in the town cut out and Dad was gone. I sat in the cafe and openly sobbed, sobbed so hard there was no noise just tears. Poor Matt paced around the streets trying to find help and eventually 20 minutes later the power was back on and we spoke to Dad again. Mum had had a turn for the worse and it was time to head home - we were on a bus to Bogota at 5am the very next morning.

We arrived in Bogota and on Mariano's very high recommendation we stayed at his friends hostel, Casa Violeta.

Being back in a big city meant constant internet access and constant access to home. I found out Mum's lung collapsed again, and she had in turn had a heart attack, she was in a pretty bad way and the nervousness in everyones voices when we spoke frightened me like I had never felt before. We learnt that Mum was scheduled for an operation on Friday morning, which was risky but extremely necessary for her health and her future. Next came the hardest decision I have ever had to make - there was no way I could get home in time to see Mum before the operation started, in fact I would be 10 hours in to a 14 hour flight and would not even get to speak to her, tell her I loved her, or find out how it went so instead of making the journey Matt and I stayed put - praying that our decision had been the right one!

Although our time in Bogota was mared by how sick my Mum was, we also did our best to keep our spirits high and try and enjoy our time in the city.

As Mariano had promised Casa Violeta was a brilliant Hostel, and the staff were perfect over this pretty rough period. We will never forget hearing "Alex" called around the Hostel constantly at all hours of the day or night, we will never forget escaping out of the rain to a cute little cafe to play the craziest game of jenga in history (see the photos...), we will never forget the perfectly timed and more than needed party held in the basement of Casa Violeta with best techno we had heard in almost 3 months - I drank and danced for hours which for me was just what the Dr ordered! We will most certainly never forget partying with the owner, Hyon and his friends and him jumping on a plane with us to Medellin the next morning because apparently us Aussies are that much fun - he wanted to come along for the ride!!

We decided that although Bogota was great, we felt at home with Mariano and Martin at the Secret Buddha in Medellin and when I called Mariano to tell him about Mum and that tomorrow she had major surgery, he stopped me there and invited Matt and his "Aussie Kangaroo Princess" back home!

The day of Mum's surgery Matt, Mariano and Martin were fantastic and I am not sure I will be able to thank them enough for not asking questions, not judging when I cried all day, letting me drink wine and sit on my bed by myself, cooking us an amazing dinner and really just being there when I needed them!

The surgery was postponed and the tears were for nothing on the Friday, and thats when Matt and I knew it was time to come home - we needed to be in Perth, we needed to see my family and I needed to give my Mum a hug.

So we booked our flights, packed our bags, went out for one last night at the salsa club with Mariano and Martin and started the 3 day journey back to our real home...