Medellín - Parque Arví and Comfama

I believe that Parque Arví and Comfama are so far one of my favorite things about Medellin.

Parque Arví is a large nature reserve outside of Medellin. It is easiest to get there via Metro/Metro Cable. The ride on the Metro Cable itself is a worthwhile experience. Typically as with most nature reserves, a person can hike. There are mountain bike trails. There is a restaurant that sits atop with a view of Medellin. There are also exhibitions of indigineous peoples.

Within Parque Arví is an area called Aventura Confama. I have not seen all that is at Confama, because I have only done two things there: the tree obstacle courses and the zip line. I really enjoy Confama and highly recommend it; especially if you like outdoor sports. My body is sore right now from yesterday's outing.

If you are visiting Parque Arví and Comfama, I recommend you get a reasonably early start. Yesterday, all places were filled for the day for access to the tree obstacles at Confama by 1:00 PM as they limit the number of people starting courses. This was on a Sunday. They told me that there are fewer people during the week if that is on option for you. We left at 8:30 AM and ended up getting back around 5:30, so you can easily spend an entire day there.

Me getting a band-aid:

The long zip line (not sure but I think like 300 meters):

Medellín - Unidad Deportiva de Belén

I believe the choice of location helped in my liking Medellín. Instead of staying in the Parque Lleras or Poblado areas, which are more popular with the tourists, I am staying next to Unidad Deportiva de Belén. UDB is a recreation center. They have basketball courts, soccer fields, two pools, tennis courts, weights and an archery range. I can just walk across the street and play. The weather is almost always pleasant, so that means outdoor sports are good almost any time in Medellín.

I am taking archery classes at the UDB. $80 for 10 hours of personalized instruction. It is less if you take it with a group, but since I am not going to be here for a long period I chose the personal instruction. I am really enjoying it and can recommend it to others. If you are interested, check out http://www.worldarcherycolombia.com/ or just go to UDB.  They also have personal instructors in other sports as well.

Going around the city, I have noticed there are other similar recreational centers.

These were from about 20 meters, but still I am getting better:

Medellín - Cerro Nutibara

On one of my first days, I noticed in Trip Advisor recommendations for Cerro Nutibara, which just happened to be about 6 blocks from where I am staying. Nutibara is a small mountain/hill in the center of Medellín. Nutibara offers a pretty good 360 degree views of Medellín. It is central and easy to get to. It is free. On top they also have an “authentic” village where you can dine.

Given its cost and location, I can recommend this as a place to visit in Medellín.

Medellín - I really like Medellín

I thought I would take a few weeks break in Medellín. My plan was to do some mundane work/errands, which I am doing, but I am finding that I really like Medellín. There is a lot to do here. The weather is nice. The people are friendly. Medellín is quite pleasant in general. Here are some of the things that I have done while here. I put these into their own blog posts as I thought it would be too much to put in one post:

Cerro Nutibara

Unidad Deportiva de Belén

Parque Arví and Coopefama

I expect to add a few more things before I leave.

Also, I have been taking some salsa lessons. I have determined that I really do not know salsa as well as I thought I did, but it is very good exercise.

If you are a biker and you are reading this, I can recommend the bike store https://www.facebook.com/pages/Bicicletas-Raul-Mesa/137816116318264. They modified my rear gears to hopefully give me enough power to manage some of the mountains that have been causing me difficulty. It is located in Laurales not too far from where I am staying.

My Initial Conclusions From Cartagena to Medellín

1. From my goals perspective, I am meeting some, but not all of my goals:
   • From a physical fitness perspective, I am feeling a major improvement so far in how I personally feel. Since this is my primary goal of all goals, I have to consider this a success. For this reason alone, I will continue the journey on the bicycle.
   • I have done no personal work. One of my goals is to focus on some of my business ideas, so that when I complete this journey, I have a working business. I have made absolutely no progress on this front. I have simply been too exhausted to do any hard thinking after each day of biking. Hopefully, I can get something started in Medellín, so that I can do small chunks of work on the road that do not require major focus.
   • Bucket List items. I have not yet checked off any bucket list items (Machu Piccu, Galapagos, etc), but I am getting closer to these.
   • Cultural/Social interaction: I have not done so well here either. Again, I have been too tired after biking to spend much time meeting people. I have met plenty of very friendly people here, so there is clearly a lot of opportunity to meet people.
2. Cargo weight is a huge issue still: I am going to drop a few things. I will drop my spare tire. I will drop my spare pump. I will drop one more spare tube. I will drop some tools. I have to consider sending my binoculars and computer back to the United States (not going to do this yet). I have yet to camp, so I may drop my tent.
3. I will see about getting additional lower gearing, so that I can handle the inclines.
4. Colombia so far has proved itself safe for biking. I have only met friendly people. I have not encountered any threatening or uncomfortable situations for me. The traffic leaving Cartageña  and in Medellín were probably the most concerning situations so far.
5. I still need to be careful about pushing myself too hard. There were a couple of times that I went too hard either in the heat or the altitude. I need to give my body a little more time to adjust even if it means going really slow.
6. I feel like I have made a good choice to do this trip!

Sasn Carlos to Medellín - an amazing ride

The ride from Sasn Carlos to Medellín was amazing. The first few kilometers were mix of the scenery that I had previously seen; very nice. A few km in, however, and it changed to long downhill. It started above the clouds and eventually descended below the clouds. Today, I got a blister on my thumb from the downhill braking, but it was so worth it.

The ride into Medellín itself was not so nice. I thought I would be able to ride the regional highway all the way to my destination in Medellín. I looked at it on Google Street and it looked like there were either adequate shoulders or good sidewalks. This was not quite the case. There were lots of breaks in the sidewalks/shoulders which put me in traffic. I saw a girl on an off-street riding a bike in the same direction as I was going. I decided to follow her and ended up finding some bike paths that took me to my destination. They were slow because they ran into a lot of lights, but were much safer than the route I was taking. I should have listened to my own advice that I gave from Cartageña : take a taxi when I get to the city.

I arrived at my destination: an apartment next to International House Medellín and Unidad Deportiva de Belen (Belen Sports Center). I am pretty excited about the location as I can swim and I will take an archery class while I am here.

Also, I had my first encounter with another touring biker: Juan from Spain (http://www.bicicletaporlatinoamerica.blogspot.com). He has been biking from Honduras. He is now on his way to Bucaramanga and will return towards Bogota and then on to Ecuador. There is a good chance that our paths will cross again. I have also noticed that he is taking a lot more pictures than I have; I need to improve that.

Los Llanos to Sasn Carlos - Short Ride - Difficulties with Altitude

The feeling in my lungs stayed with me as I rode from Los Llanos to Sasn Carlos. Even though this ride was more downhill than uphill and it was not a long distance, I had to stop at Sasn Carlos. I stayed for a day there to rest and hopefully acclimate a little to the altitude (it was lower here than in Los Llanos). There was a lot of nice scenery on this ride.

Yarumal to Los Llanos - 29 km all uphill

Before leaving Yarumal, I got one more surprise. I had understood that Yarumal was almost all the way at the top in terms of altitude and there would just be one more section of climbing closer to Medellín. When getting my bike ready, I started talking with some locals. They informed me that once I left Yarumal that it would 29 km all uphill. They were correct. The grade was not steep; I was able to do it, but it was a lot of climbing and I was starting to have difficulty with the altitude.

By the time I got to Los Llanos, I was beat; but I did not realize just how beat. When I stopped at the hotel in Los Llanos, I felt like I had “burned” my lungs a bit. It seemed as if all of the heavy breathing of air that was dry and lacking oxygen dried out my lungs. I did not feel right.