Be it the trauma involved in taking new possession of the Bestia Verde, the psychological effect of a new continent, the distance remaining, and/or the need for more long-term travel planning, when I broke free of Cartagena, the road once again mine, I could smell blood in the water.  And it was coming from the bottom of the continent.  

    For the first time since I had fled from a winter nine months earlier, the seasons came into play.  It was early Spring down south, and nine months from now would find me within another winter, one I imagined wanting nothing to do with.  It was either shoot the gap or take 13 months to be safe.

    I would find myself at the end of the road in less than 5 ½ months, straying only 67% from the most direct route, from which I had strayed 143% to get here.  The farther I traveled, the more this whole thing became about the mission.

    Colombia was a warm, kind, and beautiful welcome to a new continent.

    There was the walk along the rocky spine of a 6000’ ridge, near where I camped for three nights above Chicamocha Canyon.  A tiny woman in a long, blue dress approached me.  She asked me where I was staying and where I was going, but not where I had been.  There was something about her, up here, out here, in this high, remote place.  She wished me safe travels after a bit and headed off in the opposite direction, down onto an outcropping of rocks that had some structures on it.  I watched her as she walked away slowly in her sandals, until I couldn’t see her anymore.

    Two older gentlemen helped me as my brakes went bad coming down from those mountains, one of whom jumped in the back of the van and guided me to a good mechanic.  La Bestia would stay, and the mechanic walked me to a hotel nearby.

    There was a glorious drive along another spine of mountains, stopping in Versalles, to ask a woman if I could take a few pictures from her balcony, then a tinto (coffee) with a few locals.  One fella had lived in that tiny town for 40 years and was amazed at my roadtrip.  I continued to revel in my journey through Filadelfia and Felisa on my way to Medellín.

    I did well to avoid the Pope’s visit on September 9 and spent three peaceful nights in the driveway of the Art City Hostel – one of a few houses in a residential neighborhood that had been turned into a hostel.  I developed a nice little crush on Medellín, getting acquainted with the bandeja paisa (massive plate of Colombian food); taking subways and aerial trams in and out of the lovely hills and their neighborhoods; and walking around downtown, Parque Berrío, Plaza Botero, and the Jardín Botánico.  It was part shabby and part gorgeous – some parts wealthy, some parts poor.  Pablo Escobar is much more a hero outside of the country than he is inside it.  He may have done right by a few, but did wrong by many more.  Most would rather forget him.

    There were three days of camping and catching up on writing outside of Santa Rosa de Cabal, where I met some college-age kids on motorbikes.  They invited me to a tinto and introduced me to aguapanela con queso (sugar cane water with cheese). We chatted for half an hour about the world, travel, and languages.  I gave them my Instagram account (@davidalsur) and soon some of them began following me on my journey.

    A father and son helped me when I rear-ended a car with some sort of cage welded to its bumper in Pereira.  The son jumped in the back of the van, which apparently became a theme in Colombia.  They helped me find parts, body work, a mechanic for bad brakes, and provided almost too much help/general psychological counseling for a weary traveler over the next three days.

    I then found a group of fellow overlanders at Steel Horse Colombia.  Four dogs and five humans walked the few kilometers into Filandia on a Saturday night.  We bought groceries, had some pizza, and chatted.  Hours later, all nine of us piled into a Jeep taxi for a ride back in the rain.

    There was Salento, where I reunited with even more overlanders parked on the hill above the Serrana Hostel.  Some dude from Philadelphia welcomed me, and said that he and the wife had been there for a month.  I spent my days nursing my wounds, breathing deeply, and writing.

    Cali was warm and lovely.  I wandered around the Plaza de Cayzedo, Iglesia (church) La Ermita, and Iglesia La Merced - a beautiful church from the 1500s, which was mostly empty that day. I sat down in the back, took off my pack, camera, and shoes, and rested.

    A member of the church spoke with a nun in the third or fourth pew, then exited, leaving the nun and the traveler alone in a quiet place.  She paused for a few moments, then rose, extended her arms, and offered herself to God.

    There were two people in the chapel just then: one was a woman of religious faith, the other was a man on a pilgrimage, of sorts.  He wondered what she had prayed for and added some of his own.  Unlikely as it may have been, their paths crossed for a brief moment.  He was far away from home.  Perhaps he dabbled in blasphemy, but he chose to capture her there with the holy spirit, and in so doing, hopefully placed himself somewhere in the mix.

    Colombia was the biggest, most pleasant surprise of the journey.  It is recovering from a past a few had chosen and most had been victims of.  They have done well to distance themselves from the madness of the 80s and 90s.  I felt welcome and safe and glad and fortunate to be there.