UGANDA 2025: A TRIP WITH OUR GRANDDAUGHTER

 July 15-17, 2025

In 2023 we took our oldest granddaughter Savannah on a trip to Colombia. She didn't get to choose the destination. We were already planning a trip there, and when we learned she was interested in the country, we invited her to join us. She was 16 years old and made a great travel companion, so we decided to take her younger sister Ella on a trip when she was 16. Because of the advanced planning, she got more say in her destination. In 2024, a year before we intended to travel, we asked her where she would go if she could go anywhere in the world. Without hesitation, she said "Africa!"

It didn't take Bob long to start exploring where we could go in Africa where he and I had not been before, and he decided on Uganda. Uganda?? Really??? Well . . . okay. Like Colombia, it straddles the equator, and we all survived that trip. How much different can it be?

A lot, as it turns out. Here are just a few significant differences:

-  While their populations are almost identical, hovering around the 53 million mark, Colombia is about 4.74 times larger in total area than Uganda. 

- Colombia has a richer, more developed economy. ($7,914 GDP per capita vs. Uganda's $1,073 GDP per capita)

- Uganda has a much younger population, in fact, one of the world's youngest populations with 43.5% of people under age 15!

- Uganda is landlocked while Colombia has both Pacific and Caribbean coastlines.

Before our trip, I knew very little about Uganda, other than that it was ruled by the brutal dictator Idi Amin during my teen years. Of course, I also had known little about Colombia other than that it had been the home of the infamous drug lord Pablo Escobar who was particularly active during the 1980s and 1990s.

Gee, those both sound like great countries to take your granddaughters to, right?

COLOMBIA: THESE ARE A FEW OF OUR FAVORITE THINGS

 March 14-23, 2023

After many of our trips, starting with some of the trips we took with our kids, we have made a list of all of our favorite experiences and things we want to remember. We decided to do that for this trip. So, in no particular order other than this is the order we came up with them, here are our favorite experiences, places, people, and things from our trip to Colombia.

- Fruit EVERYWHERE! Mangosteen was our favorite, but we also enjoyed granadilla, dragonfruit, lulo, and guanábana.

- Fruit juice of all kinds, but especially the kind mixed with milk (probably sweetened condensed milk).

- And speaking of juice, the raspberry grape juice with dinner in Bogotá was Judy's favorite.

- Cartagena--everything about it. It was our favorite city, and Carolina was our favorite guide.

COLOMBIA: MEDELLIN, PART 2 - LUNCH, BOTERO PLAZA

 March 22, 2023

After walking around Comuna 13, we were hot, tired, and hungry. It was time for lunch. Our driver picked us up when we got down to the flatter part of town and took us to a restaurant Jakob thought we would enjoy.

There was plenty of street art to see on the way, even on the freeway underpasses.

La Familia Restaurante specializes in platos típicos, or local dishes. The most expensive thing on the menu was about $10.

COLOMBIA: MEDELLIN, PART I - COMUNA 13

 March 22, 2023

In Hotel 10 in Medellín, breakfast was included with our room, and it turned out to be a very nice buffet that included Colombian dishes, muffins, cheeses, lots of fruit, juices, an omelet station, and more. It was a feast.

Medellín (pronounced Med-uh-ZHEEN by the locals) is the second-largest city in Colombia, after Bogotá. Situated in the Andes Mountains at an elevation over 4,900 feet above sea level, it has a population of 2.5 in the city proper, with an additional 1.5 million people in the surrounding metro area.

Medellín was named for a small village in Spain that was the birthplace of Hernán Cortéz. Today, the city is made up of 16 comunas, or districts.

We were picked up by our guide, Jakob, at 9:00 a.m. and driven to Comuna 13, located on the opposite side of the city. We walked a few blocks, almost immediately starting uphill. We said hello to Che Guevara . . . 

COLOMBIA: TATAMA NATIONAL NATURAL PARK, PART 2

 Tuesday, March 21, 2023

I got up at 4:30 to shower to be ready for a 5:30 drive to the top of a nearby mountain. Savannah, as always, was ready on time and waiting for us outside her room. We stopped for a few minutes at the moth net to see what was left from the previous night's partiers, then got in a truck that was waiting to take us to the lodge, where we drank some hot chocolate and picked up food for a breakfast that we would eat at the end of our drive.

We only stopped a few times to look at birds on our way up a steep road. It took us two hours to drive about 8 miles, which gives you an idea about the condition of the road, which was built to service a military base at the top. The road would be impassable to most vehicles. It is rocky and uneven. Our driver, Jon, drove very slowly.

From the end of the road, we had a beautiful view of the rugged Tatamá Peak across the way, shimmering in the early morning light. Its summit is 13,500 feet above sea level, and there are several other peaks we could see in the same range that must also be close to that elevation.

The far-left guerrilla group FARC (Fuerzas Armadas Revolutionarias de Colombia, or Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) attacked this military outpost in 2000 during a long period of Colombian conflict. Apparently the outpost is there to protect some vital communications towers that link isolated parts of the country. According to an LA Times article, there were 600 FARC rebels who attacked 50 government soldiers at the complex. The government soldiers ultimately prevailed, although there were at least 20 fatalities. The family who runs the Tatamá Eco-lodge told us that they saw soldiers bringing all the bodies down from the mountain.

The road we took ended at a gate that said no photos were to be taken of the military facility, but I figured the tops of the communications towers that peaked out over the heavy vegetation were okay.

The forest service has built a large observation deck at the end of the road. 

COLOMBIA: TINAMU TO TATAMA NATIONAL PARK AND MONTEZUMA ECO-LODGE, PART I

 March 20, 2023    

Our driver arrived at 6:30 AM and we were ready to go, but our guide from the previous day offered to buy breakfast for us and our driver Mario, so we stayed for the overcooked fried eggs, another tough arepa, and a roll, and then we got on the road at 7:00 AM. 

We were in a much bigger vehicle than the one that brought us to Tinamú, a van with four rows of seats. Bob was in front, I was on the second row, and Sav sat on the elevated back row. The beginning of the drive leaving Tinamú on the one-lane dirt road was rough riding, but eventually we got to a divided highway, tough it had way too many hairpin turns. After we passed through the large city of Pereira (which we had flown into from Bogotá two days before), the road eventually became even rougher and narrower, but the scenery, at least was spectacular.

I slept for at least an hour, maybe two, of the 3.25 hour drive as my protection against motion sickness, but I woke up occasionally to look out the window. Bob said I missed a fabulous section of terraced farmland where coffee plants were growing. Savannah also drifted off to sleep occasionally.

By the way, our drive Mario looked just like Savannah's other grandfather (also named Bob). She and I made that connection independently. 

There were quite a few sections of the road where the right shoulder was partially or wholly washed away by mud and/or rock slides from the towering cliffs on our left. At least once there was a large boulder in the road that Mario could barely get around.

We eventually made it to the town of Pueblo Rico. Mario said the "Rico" part didn't refer to the town, which was very poor, but rather to the setting. I was surprised to discover when I was writing this post that it has a population of over 14,000, and many of the residents are indigenous people.

We got out of the car and bought a few Cokes before transferring our luggage to a 4x4 truck for the last part of the drive.

COLOMBIA: TINAMU DAY 2

 March 19, 2023

I was up and out by 6:30 AM to see the morning birds with Bob. It was definitely not as impressive as I expected, and the birds we saw were similar to the day before. However, it was nice to be out in the cool morning air appreciating the glorious scenery.

The reserve folks had sprinkled some bird seed along the driveway that attracted dozens of small birds.

Saffron finch

COLOMBIA: BOGOTA TO PEREIRA TO TINAMU, DAY 1

 March 18, 2023

During the night I began stressing about my stolen phone and couldn't sleep. I looked at my email on Bob's phone and saw an email from either Verizon or Apple (I can't remember which) that said that at 4:45 PM someone had tried to retrieve my password to unlock the phone. That made me nervous and didn't help my insomnia. I was also a little nauseous. I think I fell asleep around 2:00 AM and got two hours of sleep before being startled awake at 4:00 by the alarm.

We were picked up at 4:45 AM and transported to the airport. We were supposed to have been given boarding passes, but they hadn't come, so we had to figure out how to do that. We made it to our gate in time to get Savannah a "pink drink" at Starbuck's for breakfast. I had a Coke to settle my stomach, and I bought some chocolate for the first time on the trip. 

Somehow we got seated on Row 2 in business class, which was the best seat on the plane. (Row 1 had less leg room.) It wasn't especially luxurious, but they did put a little table where the middle seat should be. It was a small plane, and they did make us check our bags.

Our flight to Pereira was supposed to be a little over an hour, but as we were coming in for a landing, the plane suddenly jerked upward for a steep climb, and then we made a wide circle (or two) before making a successful landing.  I have no idea what that was about. Pilot in training?

You can see from the map below that Bogotá and Pereira are not that far apart relative to the distance between Cartagena (top left of map) and Bogotá. We could have had someone drive us to Pereira, a distance of about 200 miles, but it takes almost eight hours to make the drive, which indicates what the roads are like. No thanks.

We had never heard of Pereira and don't know anyone else who has, even those it has a population of over 700,000 people. It is located in the Andean foothills and is part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site known as the "Coffee Cultural Landscape of Colombia." The soil in this region is rich in minerals from volcanic eruptions.

We were picked up in the Pereira airport by a very friendly and talkative driver who took us to Tinamú Birding Reserve, abouat 1.5 hours away. We started on a very nice highway that eventually devolved into a narrow, bumpy dirt road with tight turns, and by the time we arrived, I was green. At the very end we cam nose-to-nose with a car coming out. Our driver had to back up quite a way before they could pass each other.

We got to the reserve at about 11:00 AM. We had a fairly large cabin not far from the main lodge. Here is the front entrance:

. . . and the side view:

I loved the tropical murals and bed throws in our room.

COLOMBIA: BOGOTA PART II (SHOPPING, PLAZA DE BOLIVAR, CITY STREETS, AND A SERENDIPITOUS MEET-UP)

 March 17, 2023

From the Botero Museum, we walked to an area where souvenir items are for sale on tables lining the street. This is the "Old Town," known in Bogotá as the Candelaria District, and it includes the foundation buildings of the city. Candelaria is Spanish for "Candlemas," a Christian holiday that commemorates the presentation of the baby Jesus at the temple.

On our way there, we passed this awesome three-wheeler that was selling, among other things, arroz con leche, or rice pudding.

The Nobel prize-winning novelist Gabriel García Márquez (1927-2014) is extremely popular in his home country of Colombia, as well he should be. There are many sites named for him, such as the cultural center in Bogotá that we walked by.

We also saw many artworks depicting "Gabo," as he is affectionately known in Colombia. He looks like someone I would want to know, at least in this painting!

There was a lot of art for sale, often copies of well-known works, such as Botero's Mona Lisa in the bottom right corner.

COLOMBIA: BOGOTA, PART I (WHEREIN WE VISIT MONSERRATE AND SIMON BOLIVAR'S HOUSE, MY PHONE IS STOLEN, AND WE GET UP-CLOSE WITH BOTERO)

 March 17, 2023

Our second destination after Cartagena was the capital city of Colombia, Bogotá.

I got up at 4:30 AM to take a shower and repack so that I'd be ready for our return trip to the Cartagena Airport. It is a very small facility--essentially one large room. We got there about an hour before our flight to Bogotá, and there wasn't much to do. Our flight was pretty short, maybe 1 hour 25 minutes, but it would have taken almost 20 hours to drive it because of the roads and the terrain between the two cities.

On our arrival in Bogotá, we were picked up by a non-English speaking man and a driver named, of all things, Judy. They took us to our hotel, the Hotel Casa Deco:

. . . but it was still pretty early in the morning and the room wasn't ready, so we left our luggage and headed out with our guide, a woman whose name we never really got. She turned out to be a good guide, although she spoke a bit too fast and was harder to understand than Carolina, our fantastic guide in Cartagena, and she often misinterpreted our questions. I think if she had just slowed down, communication would have been a lot better.

The first place we visited was Monserrate, the tallest mountain in the city and therefore, like yesterday's Mount la Popa in Cartagena, a great place to begin because it offers a 360° view of the city.  Unlike the lower elevation of Cartagena's viewpoint, however, Monserrate is 10,341 feet above sea level and a 2,000 foot elevation gain from bottom to top. 

Pilgrims make their way to the top of the mountain on foot, but we opted for a funicular ride. Our guide had purchased "fast  pass" tickets, so we didn't have to wait in what was a very long line, which saved a ton of time. The funicular had four sections with maybe 20 passengers in each, all standing.

You can get an idea of how steep it is from these photos Savannah took:

COLOMBIA: CARTAGENA PART II

 March 15, 2023

One of the things we quickly came to appreciate in Colombia in general was the street art.  I think they have more murals than anywhere we have ever been. Little did we know when we were ooh-ing and ah-ing over the murals in Cartagena that they were just a fraction of what we would see later in the trip.

COLOMBIA: CARTAGENA, PART I

 March 15, 2023

Bob had arranged in advance for a private city tour in Cartagena, and after we dropped off our luggage at our hotel, we were joined by what turned out to be our best guide of the trip, a young woman named Carolina. She was excellent in perceiving our likes and dislikes and adjusting the tour accordingly.

Cartagena, founded by Spain in 1533 and located on the Caribbean coast of northern Colombia, is a city of almost a million people. It is a major port (one of the largest in South America) and historically part of world exploration and trade. 

Our hotel was kitty-corner from the Castle San Felipe de Barajas, a fortress built in 1536 by African slave labor under Spanish rule. It is an imposing presence and defended the city from attacks many times in the past. Along with the historic city center, it was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1984. These days it is used for social and cultural events. 

Our first destination was the Convent of Santa Cruz de la Popa, a convent built by the Spaniards atop Mount la Popa, the highest hill in Cartagena (about 500 feet high). From that spot we pretty much had a 360° view of the city. 

We could see the downtown/business district skyscrapers, which are almost all white. The contrast to the poverty-stricken areas full of cardboard shacks on our way up the mountain was pretty stark.