Taganga and Bogota

May 13, 2011
Right now we are hunkered down in Bogota and waiting patiently for Sunday to come so we can begin the journey home!  We have been away for almost 5 months and are definitely ready to be among the familiar again.
Last week we spent 5 days in Taganga.  Tangana is a teeny tiny little town near Santa Marta.  It is famous for diving and the starting point for the Lost City Trek.  We were interested in the diving for sure but being that everyday was an average 36degrees we opted out of the trekking tours.  We took a bus from Cartagena and 5 hours later they dropped us off at our hotel.  Now that we were a mere week from heading home we shelled out a whopping $35 a night for a private room with bathroom at one of the nicer hotels...this one was even called a B&B!  It had a pool too which was a life saver in that heat.  I have never been that hot in my life.  During the day a bathing suit and sarong was the standard uniform.  The streets were mostly just dirt and rock and I don't blame them...who the hell would want to pave a street when you can barely breathe when you just walk for 5 minutes. 
Chad signed up to do his advanced course in scuba diving.  He really wanted to do it in Utila but having infected ears prevented that.  It is just as cheap if not cheaper in Colombia to do your dive courses.  I did two fun dives on his first day and was amazed by the number of fish I was seeing!  The water is not as clear and is quite a bit colder but the angel fish were bigger than I have ever seen and the barracuda were as long as I was.  At one point I saw 3 eels, two angel fish and a barracuda and I couldn't decide where to look.  We also came across an octopus having a snack on some type of crustacean.  I didn't even know it was an octopus because he hid his body inside this tube corral.  The divemasters in Colombia are not as hesitant to interact with the wildlife as they are in Utila.  My divemaster was grabbing scorpion fish by the tail and picking up porcupine fish in his bare hands and scaring the crap out of lizard fish just to make them move.  Entertaining for me yet probably no so great for the fish. 
Chad's first two dives were the deep dive at 30m and navigation.  He got to see what its like to feel the effects of narcosis that happens at those depths.  His instructor asked him to do a few simple math problems and he said his brain felt like mush and couldn't even add 4 plus 4.  His next two dives were the drift dive and buoyency perfection.  For the drift dive he had to swim against a current and make their way back to the boat using currents.  That day they were super strong and they tried to swim against it but were getting nowhere.  When they started to head back some how Chad's bouyency got messed up and he ended up floating to the surface.  When he tried to submerge again he couldn't find his instructor.  Oops.  So he just had a little relax at the surface and waited for him to come up.  He still passed!  Our last day in Taganga we signed up for the night dive.  It was amazing!  We each are given a flash light and told to follow the leader.  It wasn't nearly as scary as I thought it would be.  Not at all actually.  We saw lobsters that were going about their business, this weird prehistoric looking flat bug thing and all the fish we saw during the day that were busy swimming around sleeping peacefully on the corral.  At the end of the dive we all turned off out lights and swirled our hands around so we could see the bioluminesence of the plankton!  When we came to the surface we noted that two of our group members were not the same group members we came down with.  They also noted this and asked us "who are you?" in which we replied "we are us, who the hell are you?".  Unbeknownst to us two of our group had to surface because one was low on air and two divers from another boat some how ended up with us.  Very odd indeed.  They were just as confused as we were.
Many of our sailing trip friends came to Tanganga as well so we had lots of fun eating and drinking and complaining about the heat!  We actually had the best steak dinner we have had on this trip at a restaurant there.  But alas time to say goodbye.  We decided to fly to Bogota instead of taking the bus because of bad road reports and an aversion to 20 hour bus rides.  It was the exact same price and took 19 hours less!
So here we are.  I am wearing a sweater and my scarf and socks! I hadn't even looked at my sweater since Mexico.  Bogota is at 2400m and is cold and rainy.  We actually have blankets on the bed...crazy I know!  We arrived yesterday and after a quick nap we went out in search of food! We found a nice place and sat down.  I thought I orderd chicken but a big honking steak came out slathered in mushrooms!  It was the best mistake ever.  Our hostel here is shit but for some reason all the good ones require reservations, who knew.  Today we went out for a bit but it started to pour so we had to retreat to a bar for beers.  A bar called Public Beer House that has three of its own brew.  I even drank a dark ale!  I was so impressed with myself.  We did a little shopping too and after rewarded our good haggling skills with a chorrizo and a potato on a stick and a chicken empanada.  Back at the hostel we are too cold to leave our sleeping bags so I think we will call it a night.