Ciudad Perdida

Despite some last minute back-and-forth, Abra and I were committed to the 5-day Lost City Trek, and woke up Saturday morning full of anticipation.

We walked down to the Magic Tours Office, dropped off our bags, and loaded up into the clown-mobile jeep that would be taking us to the cut-off pueblito of El Mamey in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. From there, the trek began.

Our first order of business was lunch, and with food aplenty (and delicious) we were hopeful for future meals in the trek to come. Meanwhile, our mules were loaded up with sufficient food for 17 tourists, plus 2 guides and 2 cooks. Including all the snacks of pineapple and candy that would be handed out at our frequent- and necessary- breaks.

While we waited for the last few arrangements to be made, a Arhuacos (descendents of the Taino indians, of whom the Lost City belongs) girl (or boy, not really sure, they all have long hair) and a few adults (none more than 4.5 feet tall) wandered into the pueblito, apparently for beer. Just the adults, that is, they're not stupid. The girl was adorable, and happy to pose for pictures. She seemed to be used to the attention, and liked looking at her own image in the display. For about 5 minutes she got to feel like a true celebrity posing for the paparazzi. Not that she'd have any idea what either of those are.

Little Indigenous girl from the very first village, before we even started our hike. Abra asked her how old she was, but she said she didn't know.

Abra trying to understand this short Indigenous man... but not having much luck!

And before we knew it, we were off. We had brought just the essentials- toiletries, a single pair of paints, and two shirts we would be alternating between for the next 5 days. How naive. All was loaded into my (mostly empty) traveling bag, while Abra carried my small day pack with our water supply. A perfect idea that should have had me tied to her at the hip, but instead left me without water as I wandered ahead.

And, here we begin!

Our first day we were all still hopeful, and took the time to notice nature's intricacies, like the ant freeway that crossed the path, carrying cut up leaves from one side to their hill on the other. Apparently they didn't have trees and leaves on the other side.

Crazy ants! And their bites hurt!

Each day the horses and the cook would rush ahead to prepare the meal for our arrival. The guides do this trek about 15-20 days out of each month, and seemed annoyingly unfazed by the task ahead.

Our food, making it up the mountains

After a mere 30-minutes and we were already taking a break. After some coaxing everybody jumped in, and the guides showed off their much practiced, not-quite-Olympic-caliber, diving skills.

Our first rest stop, and swimming hole!

Our first day also offered us our first river crossing. This one was easy though, as we could hope from rock-to-rock, hopefully avoiding getting wet whatsoever. If we're lucky/smart that is.

The day was mostly uphill, and before we knew it, we were stopping again, this time for delicious pineapple at a mountain-man's house. The trail was pretty unforgiving, with really no breaks of flat ground to speak of.

Up and up and up.... didn't stop!

Rest stop #3

Fortunately, it was just a half-day of walking, and after about 5 hours we arrived at our first camp for dinner. We were all exhausted, our shirts dripping, so we welcomed the cold showers to clean off. We didn't welcome the hammocks-for-beds as much. But the mosquito nets were a definite plus! The bugs are incessant up there.

Camp #1

Before bed, we started to get cozy with an Aussie couple in the group, and spent the night away playing Hearts. We soon grew tired, and with a long day the next day (and the next, next, and next), we didn't go to bed that late.

The next morning, and I already felt it coming on. At breakfast, which was a terribly greasy arepa (thick fried corn tortilla-esque thing) that had an egg slapped on it, I was hardly hungry. My stomach was bloated, and I was visiting the bathroom quite often. But I had little choice, so I powered through and began the day's trek.

Breakfast before hitting the trail.

Just a few road blocks...

CHACOS!

I was lucky that the second day was much easier than the first. While still in a general uphill direction, it was at least interspersed with flat periods, and we even passed a small Arhuacos village.

An Indigenous village along our route.

Some Indigenous people.

The second camp was a welcomed site, and a skipped lunch to go straight to bed. After some consultation from Dr. Niall (one of our fellow trekkers), and concern from everyone, we had decided that I had drank some unclean water, and therefore my stomach was quite upset. The cure was a few diarrhea pills and rest.

Camp for our 2nd night.

Delicious soup lunch, which I missed out on.

Toilets and showers.

In my absence Hearts was impossible, so the game of choice was Yawn-If. This is a phonetic pronunciation of a Hebrew word (Yaniv). We were taught by the 3 Israelis in the group. Pretty fun game.

Day 3 offered more amazing views, and more river crossings. And my stomach was already feeling much better. Almost normal.

By this point, several of the girls had given up on carrying their bags, so our guide, Luis-Eduardo was carrying an extra one on his back (on top of his own), and one in the front.

We reached Camp #3 by lunch.

In the last 20 feet, Fadwa took a wrong step, and landed shoe deep in mud!

Abra just had to play in the mud before showering...

The biggest toad I've ever seen! Probably a good 8-9 inches long!

Lunch time!

Dan's a hungry boy!

 Our guides decided after lunch to continue on for a round trip visit to the Lost City. I knew this was a terrible idea as we headed out. It had been raining every evening starting at 5pm consistently, and it was getting dark by 6ish. At best we'd have 3 hours, and with an hour of travel time each way, there was no way we'd see more than a glimpse of the Ciudad Perdida.

 

As we crossed a river on the way to the Lost City, there was a rope across to hold on to. Instead, it was being used as a bridge for ants, who methodically brought leaves from one side to the other.

Night 3.

Where Abra chose to sleep... a whole tent to herself, and no mosquito net hovering over her face!

From our camp, it was supposedly just one more kilometer to the Ciudad Perdida. But when you're climbing straight up a mountain side, on an indigenous stone staircase, it can take an hour. We each did it in our own time, with each of the 1200 steps taking maximum energy.

As we reached the suburbs of the lost city, we took a rest. It was a relatively flat area, filled with a half dozen raised circles made from stone. Previously, each of these contained a wooden house, which is now long since gone.

Supposedly a prehistoric map of the area, pointing out the various indigenous villages.

More stairs! These ones connect the suburb to the city center.

We finally reached one of the highest points in the city, which overlooks the main center plaza/plateau. Abra was happy. As we started to take pictures, it started to rain, and our time in the city came to an abrupt end.

Our whole group.

We now had to descend- for an hour- across slippery rocks and lingering darkness, back to camp. We were less than happy.

When we got back, we no longer really needed a shower, so we ate and hung up our clothes to dry. Of course by morning, nothing was dry, because of the moisture in the air. But we descended anyway. Day 4 was a big hiking day, because we had to hike all the way back to the first camp. 8 hours of hiking. The night before Dan had come down the same symptoms I had had: bloated, vomiting and diarhea. Surely he had drank something that was unpure as well. I sympathized with him as we headed out on our more intensive day of hiking.

We got to the second camp by lunch, and by that point I was determined to finish strong, so Martin, Caroline and I ran ahead. We got from the second camp back to the first camp in less than 2 hours when it should have taken at least 3 (the guide said 4). We showered, washed our clothes, and waited for the rest of the group to arrive.

On day 5 we all headed out together to cover the last stretch back to El Mamey. By this time Dan had recovered from feeling ill, and it was Mathias's (sp?!) turn to take a turn for the worst. In El Mamey we had a huge lunch together before taking the jeep back to Santa Marta.

Homeward bound...

Our guide's shirt. Except in this case, he means it. Everyone does coke here. And not the delicious, refreshing beverage variety.

Back in Santa Marta we checked into the backpackers hostel Brisa Loca- full of twenty-something-year-olds more interested in drinking and going out than traveling. But it was a fun atmosphere.
For dinner we met up with Dan, Michelle, Olga, Niall, Charlie and Mathias from out trek. We had just spent the last 5 days with them and weren't sick of them yet. We had Mexican, and delicious blended mojitos. By this point Charlie wasn't feeling so well from the trip and joined Mathias in the "not eating" party.

La Brisa Loca Hostel in Santa Marta.

Just a few mojitos I'd say!

After dinner, I decided to take the trip to the nearby burough of Taganga to meet up with the rest of our trekkers for a night on the town. We started at their hostel, bought some rum to drink on the beach, then found ourselves at Club Sensation until they closed at 1am. After that we went back to their Jewish hostel for the after party. It was all fun, and the hangover would make the next day's bus trip to Cartagena that much more fun.

Posted by Hans. Photos by Abra