The most popular Colombia Travel Blog 2010 Entries.

Hello all!

It’s been more than a month since I last posted an entry in my Colombia Travel Blog, sorry about that! Just as it happened last December when I wrote about Christmas in Bogota,  many many things have converged during the last weeks of this year taking me momentarily away from my blogging activities… all very good things though!

One of them is that I just came back from a wonderful trip to the Galapagos Islands in Ecuador that was really breathtaking and that I’ll tell you about in more detail in a coming post. I’m also in the final stages of planning yet another round trip through Colombia during January, this time focusing in the Colombian Caribbean coast, so expect a lot of new entries about those destinations during 2011.  Also, and related to that trip, I am very happy to tell you that l will  very soon be able to  announce the Colombia project I have been so hardly working on during the last months …. And all of it thanks to this blog!

And because this Colombia Travel blog has given me that much during 2010, I wanted to list the most visited entries during the last 12 months according to Google Analytics:

5. Christmas in Bogota

Although it was published a few days after Christmas 2009 many people have googled about Colombian Christmas traditions, specially about the very Colombian Noche de las Velitas.

4. Bomba Estereo, my favorite new Colombian band.

I discovered this band thru a Belgian friend in Buenos Aires at the beginning of the year…. Now it seems that a LOT of people consider Bomba Estereo  as their new favorite Band, they even won the 2010 MTV award in that category, and I  had the chance to see Bomba Estero in Argentina live too a couple of months ago .

3. Party in Colombia

Unsurprisingly, many of you reached this blog by looking after the best joints to party at in Colombia, this posts talks about my top 5 rumba places in Bogota, my home city.

2. Safety in Colombia

My personal favorite, this little post created some buzz around travel websites and was republished in many sites and blogs alike even generating some controversy in a number of travel  forums.  Two main things to highlight about this entry:  1) Only listen to people that have actually traveled to Colombia when looking for advise on coming here and 2) Use your common sense as in any other place in the world: Colombia is not more dangerous than any other country in Latin-American.  

1. Top 5 Hidden Destinations in Colombia

Cartagena, Bogota or Santa Marta are amazing destinations, but it seems that people are also looking for more off the beaten path places to discover, here you can find my top 5 alternative Colombian Destinations 

               

Abrazos,

Marcela

Promoting Ecotourism in Colombia: Santiago Salazar and Ecoturismo Colombia.

Here’s another entry about people that go the extra online mile to promote Colombia as a Travel Destination, this time focusing on the bio diversity of Colombia. Some months ago while looking for Colombia pictures online I ran into www.ecoturismo-colombia.com  and got very curious about it, it seemed like a Colombia Travel Agency page but there were not tours to be sold, there was a lot of detailed information about Colombia Destinations (in Spanish) but it didn’t quite seem like an online Colombia Travel Guide, there was a online shop , but not really big enough to sustain a business model and it had tons and tons of pictures (specially about bird watching in Colombia) but wasn’t presented as a Colombia pictures database. Intrigued by all these, I decided to contact them.

Eco Turismo Colombia is a one man project; his name is Santiago Salazar, a Colombian entrepreneur and owner of the online company  www.imagine.com.co . Salazar started Eco Turismo Colombia two years ago with the main objective of spreading the word about Colombia’s eco diversity online and to create awareness about how global warming is affecting our fauna and flora. He defines it not as a “touristic project”, but as an independent environmental initiative that tries to reach as much people as possible within his means. Being an expert in online marketing he chose two relevant words to name his site (ecoturismo & Colombia) in order to attract visitors.

Santiago laments not to be a professional photographer, “That’s unfortunate” he says, “I’d love to be able to publish magazine-quality pictures…. my methodology is really simple and loads of fun too, what I basically do is to plan short trips, ride my motorbike and take photos of anything that catches my attention regarding nature and rural landscapes, then I publish them with a description of the area and some travel notes”

Ecoturismo Colombia’s very useful information (available in Spanish only for now)  is divided into geographical regions  and includes tips, distances between destinations,  a list  of hotels in each area and some very good pictures, their newsletter reaches around 5000 subscribers who are periodically informed about Eco news in Colombia.

Since he started the website, Ecoturismo Colombia has been steadily increasing its traffic which gives Santiago a pretty good idea of how the interest in Colombia is growing worldwide, “I’m sure that Colombia can turn into a Eco Tourism leading country , we have nothing to envy to any other country in the world, and there are so many unexplored places yet to be discovered around our country”.

You can find Ecoturismo here and  thanks so much Santiago for taking the time to answer my questions.

Abrazos

Marcela

My top five things to do in Bogota

As you know, Bogota – the capital city of Colombia - is my hometown and the place where I spent most of my childhood and teens, but it was only after I returned from my 10 years living in England that I rediscovered it and learnt to enjoy this cosmopolitan yet traditional city. Here are Marcela’s Colombia Travel Blog top 5 things to do in Bogota by day, a mixture of very well know places and some little secrets from a native Bogotan with a traveler’s view:


5. Gold museum
This is a must, even if you don’t like museums. The Gold Museum of Bogota is not just “another” museum. I don’t know if it is just me but I truly enjoy it because is not just exhibition after exhibition and artifacts after more artifacts, it explains in a very enjoyable and interactive way the importance of the metal for pre-Hispanic societies. The museum shows you how the pre-Hispanic societies extracted the metal, transformed it, used it, made it an astronomic and religious symbol and finally returned it to mother earth as an offering.  The Offerings exhibit is my favorite one, a really well done multimedia room that you have to experience yourserlf… a place where earth meets the sky!


How to get there.
You’ll find the museum at the Santander Park on Carrera 5 and Calle 16 close to La Candelaria area.  You can get there by taxi or public transport using Transmilenio. 
You need to take the bus going to Las Aguas and get off at Museo de Oro station, located on Avenida Jimenez and Carrera 7 just a few steps away from the museum

It’s open Tuesday to Saturday from 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. Sunday and Bank holidays from 10:00 a.m. to 04:00 p.m. The entrance is COL$3.000 (U$1.50) and free on Sunday … can get any better than that!

Colombia to the Everest: a dream of one, a dream of all

 I know this is suppposed to be a Colombia travel blog and I swear that when I wrote my last post about the Festival Iberoamericano de Teatro de Bogota, I promised myself that the next one would be the first in a series about traveling around Colombia in a month.  But then I received an email from a friend in Katmandu reminding me of some of the amazing things that are currently happening among Colombians and being as in love with my country as I am I couldnt help the urge to tell you about them.

As  I'm writing this words, there is a team of Colombian hikers on their way to Mount Everest, among them my very good friend Marcelo Arbelaez y Carolina Ahumada who sent me the e-mail I'm talking about. 
Some of them have already been at the top of the Everest three times, but what is very special about this one is that they will be attempting to take the first handicapped man with no oxygen to the 8.848 m.a.s.l. of Mount Everest, his name is Nelson Cardona, one of the nicest and bravest man I've ever met. 

Guest Entry: Medellin, The heart of Colombia

 

Hi all

First of all, thanks, thanks, thanks ! My blog has received quite a lot of visits  from people all over the world in its first month, so  it seems that my Colombia Travel Blog has been noticed in blog land. As you know blogging is a new experience to me and it has been an amazing  so far, I've had the chance to meet a few other travel bloggers that have been sending me tips about how to do this a little better every day as well as expressing their interest in coming to Colombia and telling me about their experiences here. 

What does Shakira and the Biggest Carnival in Colombia have in common? Barranquilla, land of music

Colombia is a land of music and musicians.... hurmm....wait a second... while I was writing that phrase I was at the same time wondering why do we Colombians consider ourselves to be so categorically more "musical" than other countries.  Do I really have the right to say that? I don’t think I'm exaggerating but still, I  can’t put my finger on what is exactly what make us such a  music loving country... maybe is the mixture of cultures that helped  building Colombia, the Afro influence in both coasts, the fact that we even divide the country in four musical zones or maybe is just the caribbean weather that makes us like this, but the fact is that we live and breathe music and I'm not only talking about the famous Salsa or the Vallenato, music and dancing seems to be part of our everyday life here. Anyway, ramblings aside, this time I want to tell you about aspecific area of our country that vibrates with music all year long and specially during February: Barranquilla and its Carnival. 

Top 5 Hidden Destinations in Colombia

From the caribbean to the Andes, Colombia is an unseen treasure. Cartagena, San Andres, Bogota, Medellin  are all more or less well known Colombia destinations, they are unique and you should definitely put them in your Colombia "places to visit" list, but this time I want to use my Colombia Travel Blog to share a few words about what I consider to be the top 5 hidden destinations in Colombia, fantastic and almost unseen places perfect for those that have a little more time and are willing to explore beyond regular travel agencies' Colombia Tours.

1. Cano Cristales.
To the south west of the country, in the National Natural Park of Serrania de la Macarena you will find the "7 Colour River". One of the most spectacular and untouched rivers in South America. Its coulors, endemic species together with the joyfulness and kindness of the locals, makes this place an unreal experience.