We took a bus from Medellín to Salento, a town of about 7k residents in the Andes mountains. The ride was brutal! Though it’s not very far – 292km – it took about nine hours. The road had numerous areas of construction, at times reduced to a single lane that wasn’t paved. We had to wait a few times for more than 20 minutes for traffic in our direction to gain the right of way.
That said, Salento is lovely. We enjoyed a break from big cities (we’d most recently been in Bogatá, Cartagena, and Medellín) and took advantage by trekking every day.
(Note: I put our trek through the Valle de Cocora in its own post.)
First up was a trek to the Don Elias coffee plantation. We left town across the “big yellow” pedestrian bridge. (It’s not so big.)
We hiked for about an hour enjoying the beautiful vistas.
We took a tour of the Don Elias finca. It’s a small coffee plantation, and completely organic. Banana trees help soak up extra water. They also plant blackberry and bamboo plants on the elevated side of the property. These help filter water running into the finca from other fincas that use fertilizers.
Here’s a look down the hill of the finca.
We continued hiking past the plantation per a map provided by our hostel. We went down the hill and crossed a river.
We followed the river upstream to the town of Boquia. Buses run every 20 minutes up the hill back to Salento. We caught a bus for a 10-minute ride that cost just 1200 pesos each (a little less than $.40).
Back in Salento, we hiked steps up to a mirador (viewpoint) overlooking the Valle de Cocora.
Speaking of miradors, I have a song for them.
To the tune of Beck’s “Loser”:
Soy un mirador,
I’m a viewpoint baby,
Why don’t you come see me.
I’ve gotten to sing this plenty on our travels. It never gets old. Just ask Leena.
Our guide at Don Elias encouraged us to go play Tejo that evening after dinner. So we found a Tejo spot recommended by our hostel and gave it a try. In brief, it’s a thowing game perhaps a bit similar to horseshoes. The target is a metal ring embedded in clay. Triangles of gunpowder a laid on top of the ring. You throw a small disc-shaped stone. You get 1-point if you’re the closest to the target (but nobody hits it), 3 points if your throw explodes the gunpowder, 6 points if your stone embeds in the clay inside the ring (a bullseye), and 9 points if you both explode a target and hit a bullseye. The first player to 21 points wins.
The target.
Getting ready to throw.
Exploding the gunpowder is the best part, but you really need a direct hit on the white triangle that compresses it against the metal ring. We had a few with soft fizzing explosions (those still count for three points), but the really direct hits let out a bang like a gunshot. We also each managed a few bullseyes, though we never managed a 9-point throw. Hitting the target directly enough to set off the gunpowder always resulted in the stone disc bouncing away and not embedding anywhere in the clay. For us, at least. We enjoyed a couple of local beers (Aguila) and played for about an hour.
The following day started with showers, so we postponed our hike in the Valle de Cocora. The weather cleared by late morning, so we took the bus down to Boquia to chase a waterfall.
The trail passed through a 100-meter long cavern.
Sunset falls over Salento.
