In which Roz and Layla cycle like Bogota locals, climb a hill, and fly a kite

By Roz

Having checked out of the hotel at an unreasonably early hour, we went in search of breakfast (having decided to shun the hotel's odd yoghurt item of the day before). Having walked past a fair number of closed establishments (this being a holiday Monday) we were both immensely relieved to find a lovely cafe attached to the city's main (only?) English language bookshop, Authors. We both had an arepa, and then settled down for a brief read and a vague discussion of our plans. Conscious that a lot of the day would be taken up with a long bus journey, we were eager to ensure we made the most of our morning. Having seen so many cheery people passing on bikes on the closed roads, we decided to head back to our hotel, take advantage of it being a holiday and thus the roads closed again, and hire bikes for a couple of hours. This we did successfully and we then hopped on to join the rest of Bogota on a bike ride, down into Candelaria and back.

It turns out that Colombians combine an enthusiasm for biking with a really remarkable lack of expertise. Let us be clear: I am not and have never been a good or fast biker. But that morning I felt a master, passing Bogota natives and dodging their dubious moves. What was also really lovely was that we seemed to be the only non-Colombians out. We passed some things familiar from the day before (including the police leading slow aerobics in the park) but really enjoyed getting to see more of the area. Heading into the center of town, we made a vague attempt to find a cafe made out of an old train carriage which I had read about. We did find it (and were smug) but it was closed. So we headed straight on to Place Bolivar, the main square in a Bogota which bizarrely we hadn't seen the day before and admired while drinking orange juice from a random stall.

We headed back, still feeling we were doing something very local, and deposited our bikes back at the hotel. Not wishing to miss lunch (as we so nearly had the day before) we headed back to the bookshop and cafe for an early lunch, preceded by a browse around the bookshop. It was a lovely bookshop, and there were loads of things I wanted to buy. But I am ashamed to admit that I couldn't bring myself to pay $25 for paperbacks I knew I could get for half the price in DC. Recognizing that this made me a bad person (independent bookshops are a good thing) I consoled myself with a giant cheese and tomato sandwich whilst we discussed what we should do when gay marriage comes into force in the UK (which continent for ceremony and celebration).  Having come to no conclusion at all (we never do on this subject) we headed back to the hotel and got a cab to the bus station. 

The journey to Villa de Leyva was fairly long (4 hours) and not especially beautiful until the last 30 minutes or so, at which point it was lovely). I nevertheless had a reasonably jolly time listening to things ( my book Americanah and, somewhat oddly, two economics lectures to break things up a bit). We arrived into the town just ask dusk was falling. To my surprise it turned out to be just as pretty as the guidebooks had said - apparently it in one of the prettiest towns in Colombia (if not the prettiest). It's all cobblestones (not great for dragging a suitcase along, admittedly) and old (well 19th century) buildings that lean. There's a huge square in the middle of the city (the largest in Colombia which seems odd - why make it so big?) which is also attractive (in a slightly desolate sort of way). 

We checked into our hotel, which is one of the oldest buildings in the city, with sloping walls and so forth. And our own balcony overlooking a smaller square. Having dumped our stuff we headed out for dinner. We found this cute courtyard with 6 or so different restaurants, and happily ensconced ourselves in an Italian place where Layla looked smug and virtuous whilst she ate a salad (and I looked neither whilst I ate pasta). We then headed off to a similar courtyard which had live music and drank wine and felt jolly before returning to the glamour of our private balcony and a night time beer. 

Alas we were both awake early again (this is starting to be dull in its repetition) but we lay in bed reading till it was a respectable time for breakfast, which we had downstairs in the hotel. From there, after some pfaffing, we headed off to a hotel / hostel that's a bit out of town to try and book a couple of tours and to go for a hike. Booking the tours took longer then one would have expected, though mainly because we were so indecisive about whether booking rappelling would be a good thing (particularly since the torn tendon in my arm still hasn't entirely healed). We came to no firm conclusion, but we did book horse riding for tomorrow and something for the day after before we went off on what we anticipated would be a super easy and straight-forward hike.  Alas it didn't quite turn out like this,with us deciding that we had gone the wrong way at least ten times during the course of our walk (mainly when going uphill, which both of us hoped was a error we could halt). It was a nice route, though, by the side of a canyon to a waterfall (which sadly had no water!) and to a couple of lookout spots. I fell en route which was surprisingly sore but had the benefit of meaning that I was able to lumber Layla with carrying the rucksack for the rest of the hike. Having read our Kindles for a while at the top of the hill / canyon, we identified it might rain any second, and headed back with some speed. Or was it the fact that we wanted lunch that had us moving with such comparative speed?! 

Back in town, we had a late lunch in a cafe on the town square, whilst Layla looked longingly at the small children who were flying kites. I was persuaded, and we then spent a very happy hour flying a swiftly purchased kite alongside the Colombian children. They were definitely better than us, and it was fun getting tips from them on how we could improve.  By the end, I'd managed two short but respectable kite flights and felt very pleased with myself. Kites are a huge thing in this town! 

We popped back to the hotel to change out of our hiking gear and then settled ourselves down for a coffee and cake in a cafe. This was delightful until we noticed it was getting on the chilly side. We eventually ended up in a nice place called Antique, where I had a gin and tonic, Layla had wine and we had some "molten cheese" which is what it sounds like but was much bigger than anticipated. We stayed there for a good while, reading, before heading off for dinner (no, molten cheese does not constitute dinner!). We ended up eating a Spanish tortilla and patatas braves (having sworn no cheese would pass our lips again) in the same courtyard as the night before, as a guy played a guitar and sang. Our night was mainly spent arguing over what name we would call a daughter (for no reason at all) and whether 'to gull' was a verb version of gullible (it is!). As the names and verb usage got sillier, we fell apart laughing much to the bemusement of the nearby waiters and diners and had a very jolly time. And now, to bed...