The Cable Car

Bogota consisted of me just wanting to lounge and eat. There was really good and cheap food available in Candelaria, I was pretty happy just to put myself in the mix, talk to shop owners and locals and pass the days in the cooler weather under the clouds feeling like after the jungle I was back in familiar territory. I really liked this city.

We found a really cheap place for a great introduction to some local Colombian dishes. We paid next to nothing for the most deliciously and healthy menu. I had a veggie 'bandeja paisa,' a bean dish which normally comes with pork or beef, like a stew and can often include eggs and plantain although there seem to be some variations. I'm a fan, without the meat, it seems balanced filling and wholesome.

We decided to break free from the streets of Candelaria, our comfy hostel where we made our way through quite a few films. We visited a church perched on the top of Monserrate a mountain in the city to be able to get a look over Bogota. We wanted to go all the way up on foot but we were warned by some local policemen that it was not safe for us to do so. Perhaps, moreover that it was not unsafe but they were warning us that if there were any problems there were no police around and we'd be out of easy reach. An Australian guy who we were hanging out with from our hostel seemed to want to disregard this advice. In all honesty so did I, I got the impression that police in Colombia were slightly over cautious when it came to tourists, trying incredibly hard to change this country's reputation for being drug and crime ridden. It would have felt rewarding to go up all those stairs and know that we'd had some good exercise that day.

Instead we felt very much obliged to take the cable car, which was not a bad second option but we had planned to use it to get down, thus saving some pesos and spending some pounds.

The view onto the city was endless, Bogota is huge. It looked like a saharah of reddish and grey buildings sprawling out into the haze. It went on for as far as you could see before it was swallowed into a far-off mist.

As you can see the city is shrouded in grey cloud but appears as a sea of reddish grey. I wasn't much in the mood for taking another picture of another colonial church. There was a guy standing with a llama at the entrance to the cable car but I was almost certain he'd ask me for money if I got a photo of him so I left it. We perched ourselves below the church and watched a slow stream of visitors make their way up the steps and mused over the city. It is huge, in Candelaria we have barley scratched the surface, I what the rest of it is like - I certainly wont have enough time to find out.

I'm Lost in Art

Amazing and so long over due. One of the final afternoons spent in Bogota I went and had a look around a contemporary art museum nearby our hostel. We had actually tired to go a couple of days before and looked around a smaller exhibition. Failing to realise that we needed an entirely different building we gave up the search after going around in circles and asking for directions just too many times. We had a Juan Valdez coffee instead (coffee planter collective). I have missed art galleries. They had a good collection, notably there were paintings by Cezanne, Ernst and Bacon. We breezed through an exhibition about Colombian money and money printing, the detail and insignia on bank notes through History has been so detailed (header to fake that way, or simply because its money so it has to look expensive?) I didn't do much reading but its the kind of exhibition someone like my dad would have loved. We made our way on and up to the top of the building to look at some fantastically whimsical photography. I particularly loved the work by ... And finally some work on display by students at one of the Art Colleges in the city. The most memorable for me was an installation of stencilled dust on the floor, that spread out from one of the corners and dissipated. as well as some very high quality drawings.

Max Ernst - up close and in real life this painting was breath-taking.

 Bacon

 This was also amazing

 English money making machines - the mint Birmingham

I think this guy lived the life I aspire to have, a true explorer documenting with a true lyrical beauty what he came across on his travels.

This was the stencil floor installation, it looked better on the floor of the exhibition and in real life. The fragility of something that could be so easily damaged but looked so delicate and beautiful was powerful, I felt inspired to start creating again.

I left feeling like I had my soul massaged a bit, I needed that visual stimulation, it was long over-due.