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This will be my last blog from Colombia. It saddens me that I will be saying goodbye to this country in a matter of days. It has been a wonderful experience (and adventure) and I hope to return here again one day.In my last blog I was having dental work done. Well it all ended quite pear shaped. The implant didn't happen as it was a two month process, root canal was apparently not required (although now that I have had my metal fillings replaced I think that it will be and for a totally different tooth) and the whitening, well after the dentist tried to charge me twice as much for my fillings than I was initially told I opted to go no further and I look forward to a visit to the dentist upon my return to Australia.After a week in Popayan (which was a delightful colonial town that was easy to do practically nothing except drink coffee and relax), I headed up to the Zona Cafetaria to drink me some more coffee. I stayed in a gorgeous village called Salento and spent two days there visiting coffee farms and hiking through the nearby CacoraValley.The coffee farms were great to see and the first coffee farm that I went for a tour on was a small family run farm and we had the grandfather take us around. Luckily the guy I was on the tour with spoke a bit of Spanish as the tour was all in Spanish as the old guy obviously didn't speak English. The next farm was a lot bigger and had a great array of flowers on it and the guy even took us to a pig farm which was very smelly but the pigs were very cute. It was interesting to see how coffee is made from beginning to end and yes there was a nice cuppa waiting for us at the end of each tour. The coffee in this region is quite mild, definitely not for serious coffee drinkers like myself, but was very nice. Apparently Colombians don't get to drink really good coffee as it the 'good stuff' gets exported.On my second day I went hiking up through the CacoraValley. The valley was just a 40 minute jeep ride away and once there you could spend as many hours as you wanted hiking through the valley and up the mountains. I spent nearly six hours here which included a visit to the trout farm. The CacoraValley is known for its wax palms. These palms are used to make candle wax and are extremely tall. I saw plenty as I hiked around and at times the scenery around me seemed quite surreal. The hike also included a walk up to a place called Acaime where you could see humming birds. I crossed many bridges to arrive at Acaime where a crazy lady lived and sold drinks and food to the tourists that ventured up here daily. She was quite sweet but talked to herself a lot (which is quite expected when you live in the middle of no where on your own). She was keen to have a chat with me but it was very hard with my limited Spanish and I also found her hard to understand. I enjoyed a cup of hot chocolate and a bowl of veggie soup here before continuing on with my hike up to La Montana and back to Cacora through the wax palms.At the end of my hike I had an hour to spare until the jeep would take me back to Salento so I went a visited the trout farm for the second time that day (I also went when I first arrived). The farm was really cool with literally thousands of trout in various pools. They ranged from the very small to the extremely big and when I say big I'm talking about 15-20 kilos at least. I was keen to get me one of these BIG fish to take back to the hostel and pop on the barbie but it wasn't to be as the BIG ones were for looking at only and I had to settle for 2 little measly things that I would throw back, back home. They were very cheap though and cost me less than $2 and with a bit of garlic, butter and lemon they cooked up a treat and the other hostellers were very jealous of my trout dinner.After 2 days of drinking coffee and hiking I was on my way to Medellin. Medellin would have to be the 2nd largest city in Colombia and was a really cool place to visit. I was quite adventurous here and went paragliding for the first time ever, had my hair dyed a sort of red colour and got my nose pierced. I really shouldn't be let loose in a country where visiting the beauty parlour is soo bloody cheap. My hair cost $25 and my nose piercing $15. I am pleased with both outcomes but the nose piercing hurt A LOT!!!!!! and I had tears streaming down my right eye which was the side I got my piercing. Getting my hair coloured was hysterical as the lady who did it spoke no English and so it was a matter of looking at hair magazines to try and explain what I wanted. What I wanted was quite simple and obvious. I just wanted to have my regrowth done with foils and then a red stripe put through just a small section. Quite easy yes, but no that's not what happened. First she dyed my whole head and it was sort of blonde/brown, then she put a handful of foils through the top of it which when finished looked quite good but she wasn't finished as I then had a red colour through it. I was assured by the lady that the red would be one stripe even though she was putting it on my whole head of hair. So of course the blonde foils were now red as the dye took to them. I suppose you could say it is strawberry blonde. She also blow dried my hair straight which gave me an opportunity to see how my haircut with the razorblade looked and loll and behold it looked pretty good.Paragliding was thrilling and scary at the same time. I was up in the air for about 38 minutes in which time we ascended and descended a lot. We were descending more than ascending and I was a bit nervous with all of the trees and power lines around us but the guy who was controlling the parachute had 18 years experience doing it so I was confident that if we had to go down that he would land us safely. Luckily enough we caught a thermal that was strong enough to take us up to a great height and get us back to our landing spot. I am really glad that I did it and would probably give it another go sometime but maybe somewhere where there weren't so many obstacles to crash into.On a day trip from Medellin I went to a place called the 'Rock of Penol' and a town called 'Guatape'. The 'Rock of Penol' was a huge rock that when at the top of it had the most amazing view of many lakes. It would nearly have to be one of the best views I have ever witnessed. After climbing the 700 odd steps to get to the top of the rock I made my way back down and caught a bus to Guatape which was just 4kms away. It was very beautiful and the houses where just gorgeous. I also had a very yummy trout lunch here.Now I am back in Bogotá (its currently 5pm on Friday). Arrived on Wednesday night and have done very little except get a bit of a hangover. I fly out first thing Monday morning to San Francisco so will be busy doing some last minute shopping and visiting a town just 50km north of Bogotá which is famous for its salt cathedral. Might get a couple of more hangovers before I leave as well as I have not been out in Colombia until now so have to make up for my poor efforts.Fi xxxPS - Hotel Labassa is no more. I have been advised that it has been dismantled brick by brick. RIP
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