San Cipriano

So I know im a little behind on my blogging, so here goes to back tracking.

Dec. 14th 2009- Best day ever!

I had heard about this little village called San Cipriano from a few other backpackers. It is a day trip from Cali, Colombia, where you ride some sort of cart on the train tracks and go tubing down the crystal clear river. I was all for it and I had told a few people about it in the hostel I was staying at, Pelican Larrys. I ended up getting a group of 8 or 9 people. We had to start out by taking two taxis to the bus station, barter with a bus company for a reduced price, and took off on this dangerously scary 2 hour bus ride up the mountain. The driver was swerving in and out of traffic, driving on the left side of the road around corners, and passing everthing possible even when you couldnt see if there was oncoming traffic. I felt sorry for the australian couple that sat in the front seat. Sitting in the van, i could tell people were wondering what they were getting themselve into, and I was just trusting from the stories I had heard, that this trip was going to be amazing. So finally the driver pulled over on the side of the road, where there were huts set up and people all around. We didnt know if we were to get out or wait for him to get back to the van. Finally he called us all out, and it looked so shady. There was a giant swing bridge that crossed over a river to the other side of the mountain, and we were instructed to go across. Looking down there were tons of people down in this river and there were machines digging into the ground. We found out that it was a gold mine and people from all over were coming to find gold!

Our new tour guide, took up to the top of a hill where we found this 'cart' that we were supposed to ride. It turns out, it was a wooden platform with benches nailed down to it, sitting on 4 metal handmade wheels to ride on the train tracks. The best part was, it was motorized, with the back wheel of a 125 motorcycle, the front wheel sat on top of the wooden platform. It was just redicously cool. As soon as the group saw that this is what were had to ride on for about 15-20 minutes to get to the actual village of San Cipriano, they were all excited. Who knows what else would come from this day! The 9 of us piled on, with a few other locals and took off on the tracks. The things was if there was something coming the other way, like another cart, or an actual train (we didnt see a train) the driver of the motorbike lifted the platform off the tracks into the ditch. Just crazy!

We finally got to the village and had instructions to walk all the way through the town until you find Hotel David, where we could have lunch, rent tubes, and store our stuff. This was such a poverty village, but for some reason, there were a few hotels, restaurants, and when looking into houses that had nothing, they managed to have a tv and wifi internet. Children were still playing with tires and a stick! These two woman freshly prepared our lunch, then pulled out tubes, filled them up, and gave us a key to one of the rooms to store our stuff. The men of the village were probably down at the gold mine. We had to walk up the gravel road for about 30 minutes before launching out tubes into the most beautiful clear river I have ever seen. I hadnt realized that most of the people I brought with, had never gone 'tubing'. So the concept of sitting on a tube and floating down the river, was amazing to them! There was one point where we could stop and jump off a cliff into the water. Then continue on down a few rapids. Towards the end of our trip, it started to sprinkle, then rain. We headed back to Hotel David, grabbed our stuff. We had no idea if we would have a ride back to the other village or not. We just walked back to the tracks and waited. At this point, there was such a magical energy about this day, that everyone had such a good time, and no one would have cared if we had to stay the night.

We thought we were lucky as a motobike pulled up just as we got to the tracks, but then he pulled the bike off, turned it around, filled it with a few people, and went the opposite direction we needed to go. About 15-20 minutes later, a guy came up to us and asked if we needed a ride. We said Yes! and he just turned around and ran away. We didn{t know what to do. Watching him, he pulled a motobike from out of the forest and came back and picked us up! This time we had to fit, 9 people on one single platform with 2 benches. 7 people strateling one bench and me and an Irish guy in the front catching all the rain and bugs, even a bat that flew infront of us. Ok so we made it back, now we had to find a bus back to Cali. Standing on the side of the road, in the rain, we waited for about 30 minutes for a bus. They pilled the 9 of us in an already crowded bus and we were home free. Such a crazy day, but it turned out all right in the end, and everyone was happy about going!