City of Yarumal

Yarumal is a very cool little town built on the side of a steep mountain. As such, it is almost as vertical as it is horizontal. Check out this tricycle race they have through their town: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCDzYgGyDhs.

The temperature dropped significantly. I needed to wear pants and a jacket in the evening.

It looked like a bit of a party town too, but I was too tired to venture out past 8pm on Saturday night.

It had a very nice little center. This was a good town to rest my legs for a day.

The day I was leaving I had an early morning. At about 5:00 AM, I hear what I think are gun shots. Then I keep hearing them every few minutes. Then I hear a car pass with loud speakers playing what sounds line evangelical music and a speaker saying something religious. After a couple more “shots”, I look out my window and see they are shooting off some kind of bottle rockets. There are a number of people by the church. Apparently, it is some kind of religious holiday. As a non-Catholic, I am not sure what it is, but do they really need to start it at 5:00 AM????

Taraza to Puerto Valdivia – and a Taxi Ride to Yarumal

I got a good start out of Taraza. Again, I continued to handle the hills well. I was feeling pretty good when I reached Puerto Valdivia. There is some confusion here, since there is a Puerto Valdivia and a Valdivia. Google Maps calls Puerto Valdivia as Valdivia and does not actually have Valdivia on the map. Since, I was feeling good, I decided to proceed from Puerto Valdivia onto Valdivia. This is where I learned that I would not be able to get through this stretch on pedal power.

The incline out of Puerto Valdivia was much steeper. I found that I could go, but would quickly wear down. I would walk while catching my breath, then restart pedaling. There were some areas that I simply could not pedal and some that I had a hard time walking up due to the steepness. I made it about 6 or 8 km. I stopped at a roadside store and rested. Talking with a local, I learned that I had another 20km of similar terrain to go. I simply could not do this. Possibly, I could do it with either a lower gear or less cargo, but as it was, I was not going to be able to get through this.

I also learned another important lesson here: locals will often give you information that is not correct. This is not because they want to mislead you, but because they may not understand. When asking how far it was to Valdivia in kilometers, the local told me he thought it was about 3. This did not seem possible. So I rephrased the question: how long does it take to get to Valdivia by car? The answer: about 30 minutes. So the lesson is that when asking a question, make sure to phrase it in a manner that the person will know how to answer it with some accuracy.

Given the distance, I decided to return to Puerto Valdivia and get a taxi from there to Yarumal. The ride back down was difficult. I actually had to stop several times to rest my hands from the braking. This was a pretty serious incline.

The taxi from Puerto Valdivia to Yarumal had some spectacular scenery. I am a little disappointed that I could not do this via bike. It is amazing how you rise up to a pass where the area becomes dense with clouds and then you reach the other side of the pass and it is clear skies.

Caucasia to Taraza

There were a lot more hills on this ride. I was approaching the Andes. I was able to handle this ride and was feeling pretty good about my prospects for being able to make it over the inclines towards Medellín. Again, I was feeling like it was just slightly higher and as such a bit cooler (still pretty warm). I stopped, not because I needed to, but because I did not want to burn too much on any one day.

I stopped at a roadside restaurant to eat breakfast and while there I met some cyclists on their way to a competition in Cartageña . We talked about the ride ahead. I am concerned as they tell me there are inclines of 18% on the road to Yarumal

Planeta Rica to Caucasia

I expected this one might be as difficult as the ride to Planeta Rica. The terrain seemed similar. This ride went real well. It was not as hot. My modified cleats held. It had similar hills, but the roads were all good. There were no washed out/poorly constructed/under construction bottoms; meaning I was able to ride without incident all the way to Caucasia. I stopped for a late breakfast outside Caucasia at nice little hotel: El Meson del Gitano. I considered staying here, but decided I wanted to get to the far side of Caucasia so that I did not have to start the next morning going through traffic, especially because I was anticipating starting to hit some of the more difficult terrain. I found a cheap hotel on the far side of Caucasia and stayed for the night.

I feel like it may be slightly higher here than in the coastal areas. I also think the trees seem to be a little more deciduous versus wide palm leaf style trees.

Montería to Planeta Rica - a brutal ride

This was supposed to be a short day, but it was brutal.

The positive: stomach issues are gone.

I started by forgetting sunscreen and the sun was hot. Tons of clouds in the sky; just not between the sun and me. I tried applying sunscreen, but it was pretty late and I was sweating so it did not adhere real well.

The ride was mostly hills. To make it extremely difficult, there was most often very poor road at the bottom; either the road was washed out, poorly constructed or currently under construction.  This occurred probably 90 percent of the hills. This meant I had to slow down from 30mph to about 2mph right before the incline. I lost all momentum for the uphill ride and had to pedal the whole way up. It was extremely frustrating. My only positive was to assume that this would help for some of the mountains that I knew were coming.

Finally, I broke a cleat. I was able to replace it, but I did not know how to adjust the pedal. So I had to ride the rest of the way without locking in. It turns out after looking at the cleats that they were not the correct replacements for my pedal.

Given the difficulty of the ride, I decided to rest for a day in Planeta Rica. This also gave me some time to work with a shop to modify my cleats so that I could lock them into the pedals. I went to a motorcycle shop and we used a grinder to modify my replacements as well as we could. The modifications worked, but the cleats were pretty weak afterwards. I ended up making it to Medellin with just one cleat in reasonable shape.

Lorica to Montería

Again, this was a short ride. My stomach was not feeling so well still, so I did not want to try to continue beyond Montería. I wanted to avoid antibiotics to allow for my body build its own defenses; but since my stomach was not getting better, I decided to return to a pharmacy and get them. The antibiotics worked almost immediately.

On the ride in I stopped at a café and the owner told me the same thing as the owner of the hotel in San Onofre (that many cyclists passed through there). She in fact thought I might be with a group that had just passed through about a half hour earlier. I have yet to actually see any other touring cyclists.

Montería turned out to be the nicest town that I have seen since leaving Cartagena . It is a college town. It has a mix of new construction and historic architecture. I stayed in a new hotel that was pretty nice. I went to visit their cathedral (Catedral San Jeronimo) and arrived just in time for a very nice rendition of Ave Maria.

Since I was feeling better, I decided to leave town the next morning to continue on the journey. I am not sure if this was the right decision. I kind of liked the town and may should have stayed an extra day to get to know it a little better. Right now though, I am focused more on the biking than anything else, so I continued.

Tolú to Lorica

I got a little late start out of Tolú. I passed through Coveñas and proceeded on to Lorica. I got there at about 11. It seemed like a nice little town and my stomach was hurting, so I decided to get a hotel and stay there for the night. I stayed through the next day as my stomach continued to hurt. I went to the pharmacy and got activated charcoal, which I have used for this successfully before. It seemed to help, but did not resolve the situation. Since I was feeling a little better, I decided to continue on to Monteria the next town on my route.