…and getting into town in time for breakfast.
The blockades start at an undetermined time in the morning and last all day as the protestors try to force the government to follow up on promises of financial help after last years ruinous slides and flooding caused by heavy rains.
My technique for handling the blockades is to get out my book and give a curt “Buenas tardes ” to the passing Jehovah’s Witnesses. Wither they went or whence they came I know not but I was as ever not in the mood for salvation. After Layne told some missionaries in Belize she was Jewish and they left her alone swarming me, I have taken to telling anyone who tries it on with me that I’m Jewish too. It works a treat.
After the blockade opened in the afternoon the traffic flow was not great and we burbled along at walking pace hour after hour. iOverlander had a truck stop listed about forty miles from Cali and there we stopped for the night like other overlanders before us.
No dishes to wash up if we bought dinner for $3:75 and we get the whole Colombian traveler cultural experience. Luckily we speak Spanish as there is no menu, just a recitation.
And so on our second attempt we arrived in Cali, a city whose name may be familiar to you as part of the Escobar-cocaine trafficking legends of thirty years ago, but which to me signifies hairy traffic.
Motorcycles swarm, lane control goes out the window and we both, Jew and Gentile set our navigation on our phones to try to figure out the routes through the city. Do we take the bridge over or does Google Maps mean for us to go under? We chatter a lot and Layne warns me constantly of ropes potholes motorcycles and cars busts and trucks veering into us.
There is so much to see in the city as we roll through. Amazon delivery is not how people shop here, there are stores everywhere selling everything.
We stopped at PriceSmart for Layne to pick up a few things, dog cookies, walnuts and stuff not sold normally in local markets. PriceSmart is an offshoot of Costco and looks just like that warehouse store inside but it operates only in Central America, some Caribbean islands and Colombia. South of here we lose the last US shopping influence. Our 8’6” van is too tall for the underground parking so I just did as the delivery trucks and cabs and parked on the street with four way flashers and walked Rusty while Layne shopped.
Back out in the real Colombia we made our way across town following the blue line. Below you see a southern Colombian typical bus (collectivo or Gua-gua) an older four wheel drive truck with a canvas roof and bench seats. Why not a van I don’t know:
I snap my photos using a small dedicated camera, a Panasonic GX85 using the much despised spray and pray technique pointing without aiming properly. I end up with a lot of discards but I can snatch a few to help tell the story of our travels. I’ve left these unedited so you can see the wobbly technique in action. I can only take them obviously when we are stopped or on an empty and clear stretch of roadway.
Sometimes photos are overexposed and I can edit them later…
The light and color balance here were better and you can see the pedestrian darting, the manhole cover now turned into a sharp pothole and all the sidewalk activity as the bus from above passes through. Layne is watching for her photo ops (which I sometimes use) while helping to avoid hazards.
Welcome to Cali.
A busy modern city of skyscrapers and industry and commerce. Oh and home to a company that helps foreigners with their immigration paperwork.
We had been having no luck getting a response from immigration when we tried to use their electronic forms (in Spanish and English) to get a ninety day extension to our original ninety day permission to stay in the country. As we were in Cali we tried to hire a company that helps foreigners get residence in the country. Our WhatsApp messages started promisingly but faded into silence so we decided to go to the office directly. In Latin America I find phone calls and WhatsApp messages are superseded every time by personal contact. We drive up into an upper class neighborhood. Until Google sent us to a gated community…”I’ll bet this is a home office,” I said as we were stopped by big black gates across a driveway into a neighborhood of luxurious sky rises in a hill high above the city. We pulled over in some grass to let Rusty out and contemplate our next move. Which was when a man exercising on a tennis court stepped up the fence fascinated by our presence.
“Where are you from?” devolved into “Why are you here?”and we explained and his face lit up. “Oh, you’re looking for my wife Jessica!” Can you believe we bumped into the exact person we were looking for? Neither could we but fortune favors the bold…Patrick is from Denmark and while riding a motorcycle through South America fifteen years ago met his Colombian wife and settled here as a building contractor. He is itching to travel as soon as his kids are grown and he was delighted to meet us; a very nice guy. Jessica was shocked to see actual clients on her door as hers is a virtual business but she took us in and after a couple of hours we had our extensions…just like that when you know what you are doing! We now have about 100 more days we can stay in Colombia though I don’t think it will be that long!
We also had our brakes checked by some French former travelers who have settled near our campground in the come rains and work on traveler vehicles. It turns out the rubber sleeves that protect the brake parts are wearing and we ordered some replacements which will be shipped to us via our friends Dan in Oregon (who volunteered for the duty! Thank you Dan). Locally the parts are not obtainable of decent quality and we have a long way to drive.
And Saturday is our date with a dermatologist to see if we need to worry about our skin in high altitude sunlight. The sort of housekeeping at home that is so easy in familiar places becomes a trek when everything is new, unfamiliar and possibly exciting on the road.
Which does mean we face more Cali traffic before we go to explore coffee country.
