Bogotá, 2,600 metros más cerca de las estrellas

The title of this post is the motto of Colombia's capital city - Bogotá, 2,600 meters closer to the stars. A motto with a far better ring to it than that of my hometown (Kitchener) which until Wikipedia informed me, I wasn't aware even had one. Turns out it's Prosperity through industry. It's a wonder the city isn't overrun by tourists more frequently than during our annual German festivities with a line like that. Bogotá, while not what I would call overrun by tourists given its only recent return as a safe destination, certainly has it's fill of attractions. Along with my typical travel partners, Katie and Don, I spent four days in the city last week. Something of a long weekend created by the fact that Colombia's 200th independence day fell on Tuesday July 20th, and our office deciding it might as well close for the 19th. We opted for short and fairly cheap flights instead of the 18 hour bus ride from Cartagena to Bogotá that would have taken up too much time when we only had a few days. We were incredibly lucky to have a friend from the hotel arrange for us to stay with his brother, saving us some money and putting us in a good location to check out different parts of the city.

As a play-byplay of our trip to Bogotá would take longer than I care to spend typing away, I'll hit on the highlights of our trip (and start saving stories to tell when I get back instead of giving it all away here). The first highlight to mention was a cable car trip up to the top of Cerro de Monserrate. The 1,500 steps to the top of the hill (which take at least an hour to climb) were closed off for repairs when we visited. At 3,152m above sea level a white church built in 1657 houses the statue Fallen Christ, which is said to have many miracles attributed to it. The view of the city is incredible, as well as the looming hills on the opposite side. It turned out we chose our timing wisely as Bogotá was fairly raining during our visit and we were treated to a bit of sunshine and the view of more dark clouds rolling in.

I couldn't pick out the place we were staying from this picture if my life depended on it.

Good thing I packed that one pair of pants and one sweater - Bogotá was a chilly 15 degrees!

La Candelaria is the colonial section of Bogotá, similar to El Centro in Cartagena, and an obvious tourist attraction. In addition to many impressive churches and the architecture of other old buildings, there are plazas with statues, museums, galleries and a mix of modern buildings and stores as well. Our "to do" list in this barrio (district) included Museo Botero (a museum filled with artwork by Fermamdo Botero of chubby people and objects, along with his personal collection) and Museo del Oro (a museum dedicated to gold in Colombia with over 55,000 pieces on display to make the idea of El Dorado understandable). Our unplanned timing put us walking by the Casa de Narino (presidential building) for the changing of the presidential guard, and we ended up seeing 6 historical churches on a list of about 10 of them around La Candelaria.

Iglesia Nuestra Señora del Carmen, a rather impressive church that took ten years to build and was finished in 1938

On July 20th, we set out to take part in some of the Independence Day celebrations in Parque Simon Bolivar, a 360 hector park that boasts being slightly larger than New York's Central Park. Arriving there by taxi it wasn't hard to figure out which direction to go in as people streamed towards the site of the parade. The police and military presence in Bogota had been obvious since we arrived, and increased on the day of the celebrations. Although I'm certain someone had told me before hand, it didn't sink in for me that we were going to a military parade. Which means that while there were marching bands, the rest of the parade consisted of historical and current outfits of the military marching by while fighter jets and helicopters flew overhead (much to the excitement of the large crowd jostling for position along the sides of the street). Leaving the parade slightly before it ended, we made our way to the afternoon concert where we donned our free paper hats and blew up our free noise makers. The crowed was enormous, and you could tell instantly when the musicians started playing a popular tune. It was the only day of real sunshine we had and after being out in it for several hours, I would once again return to Cartagena with more than a hint of pink.

Military helicopter that flew along the parade route just before it began.

Armed with my blow-up-noise-making-sticks and sweet paper hat, the green space around me would not last long as mass amounts of people filed into the concert.

Fingers crossed this video works, since it's my first attempt to add a clip to my blog. I wish I'd picked a more energetic song to film, but this give you an idea of the size of the crowd we were part of.