Anne-Sophie follows the sun

Time to make some funny generalizations! Considering the size of this country is 37 times the size of Belgium, let's assume that everything I write applies to the coast region.

The weirdest thing I ate so far: a chicken leg! (in San Alberto)

^Food is very important, which makes me feel home even more! Breakfast can be very different but mostly heavy. I tried arepa (corn pancake) with cheese and scrumbled eggs; fried arepa with an egg in it, hallaca (cornmeal dough with beef, pork,...), caldo de pescado (a broth),... You can imagine that the few times I tried to make my breakfast (oats with dried and fresh fruits) people looked weird at me. Lunch is even better and bigger and forces you to take a siesta afterwards (in combination with the 40 degrees climate). Moreover if people know you didn't have lunch yet, they will offer you, it is very sacred. For dinner you don't eat that much, depends on the family. To conclude, luckily I'm a very flexible person and I eat everything.

^When I don't understand something because of the language barrier, they will repeat every word but just louder! It occured me once that some stranger thought I was deaf as my friends were shouting and talking in very short sentences to me.

^ They speak and eat fast! By the time I finished my soup, they already ate their whole lunch. People from the coast are known to speak very fast, the more south the slower they speak. Lucky me!

Regular street in Taganga

^ According to them, garbage belongs on the street either in a bags either you just throw it there, as long as it is not on their front porch. This way they can put their rocking chair on the porch and observe everyone going by.
Streets don't have sidewalks. You either walk on the street with the risk of stepping onto garbage or on the front porches with the risk of falling as every private porch is different in height.

Me and Gladys saying hi to everyone passing by - Pailitas

I've learned how to manage a motorbike!

^ An average household has a television, a pair of speakers and a motorcycle (to transport those objects). The bigger the television screen and speakers, the better. The speakers are daily used to make sure that everyone can enjoy your music taste and in case it isn't loud enough (because you might get deaf) you just put them outside on your porch. Motorbikes can transport anything, in fact you would be surprised how many people would fit on 1 motorbike!
Btw don't expect a warm shower in the coast households, very shocking fact in the beginning!

Maybe a 4th person?

^ Parents love to introduce me to their children, especially when they are my age and when they speak English. As if they are selling one of their sons to me. Or even better, when the sons are not around, they just call them and pass the phone to me. I had already several awkward phone calls!

Travelling by bike allows me to stop in the little towns, which is the most interesting part. I always end up talking with locals who are trying to convince me to stay a little bit longer. Well, after biking almost 400km I finally made a longer stop in Pailitas. This little town has a surface of 512,5 km2 with only 20.000 inhabitants. Comparable to a little town in Belgium, Zele, with similar amount of inhabitants, only significant smaller!
Don't expect any culture or history, just mingle with the local people and you'll have fun. Ask for Gladys and Lalo, they are the most hospitable people and very proud of their little town!

Enjoy.

Everyone tries to sit in the shadow

River fun

On our way to more river fun

Preparing lunch...

...with fresh chicken

Not for sensitive viewers

.... with a live band!

Catch of the day

Children are too cute

Geo. His first selfie

Meat market

Streetview

Biking around Pailitas

Lalo and I

My bike fan!

Lesley getting ready for a party

Me and the crazy Colombians.

Chicharron. The most greasy thing I ate so far.

More meat!

A typical Sunday in a river

minced meat with quail eggs and beans which you
roll up, wrap in aluminium and boil

Birthday party!

This kid could dance incredibly!

Troya and his beer, Aguila Light, which they drink like water

Again, too cute...

Gladys trying my bike. First time in 20 years she told me

One thing is sure: Colombians are familiar with bikers, but not with a solo-white-female-touring biker.

Sometimes I wished I could hide my identity for several reasons: men wouldn't ask me after 5 minutes whether they can marry me and people wouldn't assume that I have a lot of money (but according to their standards it is true). Nevertheless it gives opportunities to talk - depending whether I'm able to understand their Spanish. After staying 5 weeks at the Carribean coast I felt confident enough with my basic Spanish to travel.

From Cienaga to Aracata - early in the morning.

Some statistics:
Day 1 to Cienaga - 41,8 km (avg speed 15,8 km/h)
Day 2 to Aracataca - 59,6 km (avg speed 16,3km/h)
Day 3 to Bosconia - 80,2 km (avg speed 15,4 km/h)
Day 4 to San Luis de Chiriguana - 80,8 km (avg speed 15,9 km/h)
Day 5 to Pailitas - 64,5 km (avg speed 16,6 km/h)

Biking in Colombia is a great challenge! For now it was fairly flat and good shape of roads, but mountains and windy roads are waiting for me. We'll see how it goes!

I wasn't even biking for 5 minutes and I already got a thumbs up from a woman. These positive gestures I received continuously along my way, and although it seems unrelevant, to me it is encouraging! Every morning I try to leave between 5.30 and 6.30 am to escape the heat , although around 9am it starts getting warm, certainly when there are no trees for some shade.

Every 20 km you can find little towns (pueblitos) where they sell fruits and drinks. Lunch is the best moment of the day, for 2 to 4 euros you get a big bowl of soup, a plate of rice (always rice!) with meat/fish, jucas/platanos, and a little salad.

Owner of a restaurant was interested in my bike - Chiriguana.

People are very friendly and curious. Depending on the size of the town, they know very little about Europe. So every time I stop I get a lot of questions about my origin.

Several times I got food offered or even accommodation! The hospitability is huge. Making friends has never been so easy!

In Pailitas I stopped for more then 1 night. Initially because I had a food poisoning again (First, I thought it was because of a lulo juice, but probably I need to pay more attention which water I buy..). Next, before I know I ended up staying 10 days in Pailitas, thanks to all my new friends who wanted to introduce me to their daily lifes!