After a couple of days in Cartagena I made it to Santa Marta!!!

Many people had said that Santa Marta had nothing, it was boring, and that it pretty much was a town just to pass by on the way to either Minca or Tayrona but I quite liked it.
I found a nice hostel and it was perfect to relax and sunsets were beautiful.

There really wasn't much to do but to be honest by the time I got to Cartagena I was done! Yes! DONE! I wanted to go home, it was hot, most of the time I had no energy to bother doing anything at all.

The last week in Colombia was probably the hardest because I just felt like I needed to be home with my mom, she needed me and I needed her. At one point I thought I should just forget about the trip and get the next flight home but financially it would have cost me more to change my flight than spend the extra week in Colombia so I just stuck to the original plan.

Main church!

Santa Marta was a small town  and had a nice path along the water perfect for watching the sunset!





The boardwalk was always full of people and sellers trying to make you buy all kinds of foods and souvenirs such as shells and what not!

It was a beautiful sunset, imagine those two guys are not there!

 From Santa Marta I headed to Tayrona! Well, not exactly Tayrona, but El Zaino.
Tayrona is the name of the national park that is supposed to be AMAZING! but I wasn't really sure I wanted to go.
1. I am NOT a fan of the beach
2. It was HOT!
3. I sweat like a pig!
4. It was a 5 hour hike in the heat and walking in sand while carrying a backpack and your water and food for 2 days!
5. One had to camp. One bathroom only for everybody!!!
6. NONE of the above sounded like fun!

I kept thinking and thinking: "should I? should I not?" I would tell myself that it is a must do in Colombia. It was like a typical angel in one shoulder, the devil on the other but instead one was saying what "I should do" and the other what I wanted to do.  I think many times as I travel I get sucked into the idea of what I should be doing as a tourist although is not really what I want. With this Tayrona thing even Shakira says "Que si a Pique algun dia le muestras Tayrona, Despues no querra irse pa' Barcelona" (If one day you show Piqué Tayrona, he won't want to go back to Barcelona!) what if I didn't go and it was this amazing place that even Piqué would like to stay?!?!?! I hate decisions!!!

That morning I took the local bus to Tayrona and got dropped off in the middle of the street and walked into my hostel! The place looked like a little bit like Paradise (for me Paradise is any place that has a hammock!)

I came prepared! I had water and food to last me through Tayrona so before I made up my mind I asked everybody I came to contact with about Tayrona and the hike. Most people said "It was ok" NO ONE... ABSOLUTELY NO ONE! said it was amazing!

I had been to the beaches in Indonesia, in the Philippines, and those were amazing so I thought: "Could Tayrona beat them?" Deep down I knew I didn't want to go plus it was overcast and rainy at times and the owner of the hostel even said it's not worth it! So... I did not go! I decided that I would spend 3 days lying on the hammock, reading, and making new friends!

"You are already here, Enjoy Being"

That's the hammock I spent most of my time at!

One night at the hostel we didn't have water so I couldn't take a shower; the next morning since I wasn't going to Tayrona I let everybody take a shower and get ready to go. By the time I was going to take a shower there wasn't any more water!!!! I was so annoyed!!

I talked to the owner, Eri,  and he said they were going to a friend's hostel at the beach front and that they would take me so I could take a shower while Eri taught his wife how to drive! I quickly went to the room and grabbed my stuff.

Here we are on route in Eri's jeep!

I went to check out the beach but it was nothing too exciting, it was overcast and the sea was super rough that they advised us not to go near the water!




My three nights in el Zaino were perfect to relax and then  I headed to Minca!


In a way I think I was looking forward to Minca but when I got there I was very disappointed. First of all my hostel sucked big time! The bathrooms were dirty all the time, the kitchen was disgusting, the beds were noisy and the room didn't have lockers or even a door!
The outdoor area was super nice but when I laid down and tried to read I kept being hit by seeds coming down at full speed from the trees! So annoying!

I am a big believer that when you have a positive mind set everything works out but by then I wanted to go home so everything was annoying and I was not happy with anything!
The heat was unbearable, the town was small and if I wanted to visit anything I needed to walk up the hill for hours under the heat so I decided to do NOTHING! Well... I counted the days 'til I could go home!




The one good thing about Minca was that I found an amazing bakery that sold pretty yummy bread with chocolate chips and amazing hummus and babaganoush! Literally those were the only things that made me happy!


From Minca I went back to Santa Marta and then to Baranquilla where I met my friend Shamia's cousin Fatima who had just moved there to teach English.


Now back home!!!!!!

Do I look excited?