Colombia

in one massive photo explosion.

I am warning you now that this is long.

Bare with.

It is my journal of my trip.

3 weeks ago, Weston said, "Hey, let's go to Colombia next week."  Right, sure, as easy as that.  He had been watching tickets, and found some for $200 cheaper a piece.  Plus, the "slow time" at the ranch was quickly passing (calving season is now upon us).  It took a little while for him to convince me.  My biggest deal: babysitters.  I don't like asking people to watch my children for an hour, let alone a whole week.  But when my mother-in-law called and said that she was excited for us to come, it was a sealed deal; we were going.  And I was really excited.

We left a week later, on MONDAY February 4th.  It was good that we already had our passports (mine with one stamp in it: Aruba from 2007.)  We flew half that day and then all that night, and upon sunrise on TUESDAY found ourselves in 

SOUTH AMERICA!!

I had never been there before, neither had Weston.  

Bogota, Colombia!!

population: 7.3 million (huge! esp. for this boonie life girl)

Weston's parents were there to greet us.  It was so good to see them!  We had seen his mom in December at his brother's wedding, but we hadn't seen his dad since last June.  Since we used to be neighbors and see them pretty much everyday, it felt like forever. 

My first impression:

THE AIR FEELS AND SMELLS AMAZING!! AND THE VEGETATION!!! MMMM!!

I pulled my camera out as we got in the car, and my f-i-l said, "I haven't seen a camera like that since my camera got stolen in Venezuela (or was it Peru?)."  He told me that I might not want to take it to some places.  The next 4 days after that I was very conservative about where I pulled it out.  (After that I didn't care as much).  

second impression:

THESE PEOPLE DRIVE LIKE CRAZY!  I HOPE WE DON'T DIE!

(there were cars, taxis, buses, forklifts, horse and carts, street vendors, jaywalkers, motorcycles, everything trying to use the same space of road at the same time)

They first took us to this amazing produce store (of which I have zero pictures because I locked the camera in the car. tucked under the seat. with a jacket over it).  There were crazy tons of fruits and veggies there.  My in-laws bought a bunch of yummy fruity goodness.

(There were seriously like 200 pictures that I wish that I could've taken, but was either too scared to pull my camera out, or we were zooming too fast down the road, or I didn't have my camera with me.  Oh well.)

After the produce store,  we went to the Leather District (blocks of stores that only sell leather)...

Weston got a leather messenger bag that he uses for his scriptures.

cool colored winders.

see horse and cart

street vendors varied from selling cell phone chargers, to roses, to calendars, to spinning balls.  anything to make a little money.

We went to Weston's parents' home.  The top floor (8th) of an apartment building (not the building above).  

This is a little board thing so Dad can keep track of all of his 180 missionaries and where they are:

Just in case you forgot, Weston's parents (a.k.a. Grandma and Grandpa) are the Mission President and wife :) in Bogota.  Remember this?  It is a very busy (non-paid) job.

After we dropped our stuff off at their home, we packed an overnight bag and headed out, to drive 3 hours north to deliver some supplies to some missionaries up there.  Traveling around like this is a normal weekly thing for them.  Sometimes they have to fly to areas.

As we drove north, the big city got smaller...

and little towns popped up here and there (and uniformed school kids were everywhere - big city and countryside.  are we the only country that doesn't have uniforms as the norm?)...

we stopped in for lunch at a quaint cafe.

colombian soda for the men, chicken, potatoes, and fried smooshed plaintain. mmm.

the little towns got to be farther and farther between and the countryside was all in between.

and gorgeous!  And this is their winter brown months.  It was amazing how they used every bit of those steep hills.  We passed lots of farmers in their ruanas. 

We drove Paipa, to the hacienda where we stayed that night.  It was pouring down and rain, and so romantic/movie-ish.  This hacienda was built in 1536 and had a huge 400 year old eucalyptus tree in the courtyard.  It felt like I might imagine Italy to be like.  Anyway, it was really cool.

the 400 year old tree.  The white hammock on the 2nd floor was right outside Mom and Dad's room.  Weston and I fell asleep in it; we were so tired!

gorgeous porch

My cute in-laws.

the super old stair well.

Mom and Dad's room was on the top (3rd floor) and it looked like a king's room, and ours was in the "dungeon".  Hahaha.  It was still really nice.  The coolest hotel room I've ever stayed in.

Gorgeous rainy view.

Tuesday felt like a forever long and eventful day.

WEDNESDAY 

morning the rain had stopped.

Kind of funny how I was thousands of miles away from the ranch, in a foreign country on a different continent and I was drawn to the cows and the guy fixin' fence.  What can I say?

Outside the hacienda wall (which is the thing in the bottom of the picture) were some shacks.  I could hear a t.v. or radio or something.  I think that some of the workers lived there.

We left there and went to deliver supplies first to some sister missionaries...

They wash their clothes here:

and then to some elders...

One missionary was so happy to have an ironing board that he hugged it.

We went souvenir shopping in Nobsa, a little village and got some cool stuff before going back to Bogota that evening.  Some missionaries came in from smaller towns like 8 or 10 hours away for a training meeting they were having the next day.  They stayed at the mission home (my in-law's home).

On
THURSDAY
we started off taking a taxi to a chapel for the training meeting (we woke up every morning at 6:30, which was 4:30 our time.  But it was light so it was no big deal).  It was a day that no cars could be on the road; only public transportation was allowed.  Mom took breakfast and I sort of helped her serve it to the 26 missionaries.  We hung out there for a bit, and then Weston and Mom and I walked the 3 blocks to the temple.  It is a beautiful temple!

Dad and the missionaries all met us there for lunch.  After that they all went back to finish their training and Weston and I were on our own.  I am so glad that Weston speaks Spanish.  Sheesh!  We caught a taxi to the Museum of Gold, which is in a really busy and sort of sketchy part of Bogota.

FRIDAY

we went along with Mom and Dad as they did some missionary work in the northern part of the city.  I sat in on some English lessons that mom was teaching; I sat at the other end of the table and worked on Spanish, conjugating regular verbs, and what not.  I quite enjoyed it.  

That afternoon when we went back to the misison home, we met Nidia.  Nidia comes in 3 x per week to the mission home to clean, cook, do laundry, etc.  (She gets the whites super white.) She is so super nice and cute (and little).  

She made us a yummy, yummy traditional lunch of ahiaco, which is like a potato-ish and herb soup that you add shredded chicken and avocado and cream and rice to.  It was muy delicioso. 

  

and fried platanos.

She sat and ate with us, and she and Weston and Mom and Dad talked in Spanish and laughed.  I tried to follow along and laugh in the right places. 

We went souvenir shopping after that.  I left my camera at their home and captured via instagram via my tablet.

catching a miniscule taxi.

my tablet takes pix reversed.

in the taxi

elevation of bogota.

my favorite of the colombian paintings.

should i get this hat?

or this one?

look, there's a peso inside!  too bad i didn't realize that when i took the picture.  i don't like that gum anyway.

parking in the parking garage is a bit tight!

(are you still there?)

SATURDAY 

We were in an earthquake.

We were sitting at the breakfast table that morning and we started to shake.  The chandelier was going back and forth and the milk was sloshing around in the pitcher.  We all just sat there and looked at each other.  We wondered if it was construction going on somewhere in the building below.  Later we found out that there was a 6.9 earthquake somewhere in Colombia.  That was my first time feeling one.

After breakfast we went up to Monserrate.  The cable car wasn't running yet, so we took the funicular, a tram car that is hooked on a cable thing that goes straight up the steep mountain!

Just came out of that tunnel.

Off the funicular, we walked to the top.

It wasn't a clear day, but it was still quite the sight overlooking Bogota.

This is the only picture of the 4 of us.  And my eyes were closed.  While we were there I was telling my m-i-l how we have so many pictures of Weston closing his eyes.  And then when we got home and I was looking at the pictures, there were a bunch of me with my eyes closed.

Shopping at 10,341 feet.

Back down in Bogota...

I thought these were cool:

change purses out of tapes and other random things, and a bag out of bottle tops.

Mom and Dad spoke at a stake conference that night.  It was all in Spanish.

SUNDAY
(most of my Sunday is here)
(our last day) I made the orange juice while my m-i-l worked on her talk.

Super fresh. 

Took a cab to church.

Mom and Dad spoke again.  This time Mom spoke a little in English.  It was a good talk.  And even though Dad was speaking Spanish, I followed a lot of his talk.

Back to the mission home to eat, pack, 

a view from our room

play Dominos, get schooled by Mom.

It was a great trip!

The best thing about it: being with Weston's parents and seeing a new country!

The hardest thing about it:  knowing that my sister hardly slept because she was babysitting my 2 littlest (and Zoe wouldn't let her put her down for the first 5 days).

and more power to you if you made it all the way through.  :)