Tayrona Park
Tayrona Park was most definitely one of the highlights of my trip to Colombia. It is a nature reserve east from Santa Marta with beautiful beaches, a nice small jungle and a few sights. Surprisingly, I was by myself on most of my trails and barely met anyone. Even at the beach, I was almost alone only sighting another tourist every now and then. I kept walking along the beach until I arrived at another small beautiful bay. Unlike the other parts of the park, this area was completely crowded. I was quite surprised! It was full of teenage tourists drinking beer and smoking in the sun. It didn’t feel like the right place to stay, so I decided to keep walking to a more remote beach.
The hike to that beach was labeled as hard, but I figured I would manage. I was quickly surprised by its level of difficulty… It was very steep and some rocks that I had to climb were so large that I first had to push my backpack up and then somehow figure out a way to pull myself up. At some point, I even had to stop. One of the rocks would have been impossible for me to climb if it hadn’t been for some people coming down and helping me. After 4 hours, I got to the peak of the mountain where there were some ruins. But this wasn’t the end of the journey. I had to descend that mountain on the other side to go to the beach I wanted to stay at. I gave my best to find the trail and had to go back a few times to see if I didn’t go the wrong way. It was incredibly hard to see where I was supposed to go and hadn’t it been for two Spanish tourists that I eventually met on the way, I would have probably turned around.
After 7 hours of walking, I finally reached Playa Brava! It was beautiful! There was only me and a Spanish couple, and eventual some German/Dutch arrived there as well. Coconuts were lying on the ground, and all we had to do was pick them up and open them to enjoy a nice afternoon snack. But mostly Playa Brava was about the people, or the tourists that gathered there. I immediately connected with the Spanish people who lived in Central America for several years and we spent a long night talking about the Spanish economy, their experience in South America etc. It was interesting in some ways. It took a 7 hour hard trek through the jungle to gather like-minded people in a remote corner of the park and filter those people out among the more common drunk, party and drug-addicted tourists of Colombia.
The family that ran the hotel was also adorable. They were incredibly kind and always tried to help even when we couldn’t understand each other. They prepared a wonderful meal for us in the evening. Finally, we ended the day by sleeping in hammocks on the beach.
The way back from Playa Brava (I took another path) was just as intense. It was long and exhausting and I even saw a small snake on my way. I had to go through several villages and it was fun watching the farmers that were working in the fields along the path. Their lives seemed so remote as they were plugging the fields without any machinery at all, but with some wooden tools. Several farmers attempted to talk to me, but without Spanish that conversation didn’t go very far. I also met some traditional jungle people, that kindly showed me the right way to the street. I finally was able to reach the street and catch a bus back to Santa Marta.
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Panorama Image 1
Panorama Image 2
