Bogota, buses, airports and transit stress

Conversing with the locals in Cartegena before heading to Bogota.

Cycling to the bus terminal in Cartegena in the early afternoon heat was easier than cycling into town a month earlier as we learnt for our errors and referenced a map before starting out, but still forward planning was a skill we weren't practised in which became obvious during a conversation over lunch with a cafe owner just before we left:

Cafe owner: "So how are you getting there?"
Us: "Bus"

Cafe owner: "What time does the bus leave?"
Us: "Don't know"

Cafe owner: "Where are you staying once you get there?"
Us: "Don't know"

Cafe owner: "How long does the bus take?"
Us: "Don't know"

Cafe owner: "How are you getting into the city?"
Us: "Don't know"

Cafe owner: "Oh." Followed by a long awkward silence before he walks away. We can sense that he feels we are disorganised.

Our route to the bus station fell apart almost immediately when our carefully planned direct route turned out to be a one way in the wrong direction coupled with large and very disorganised roadworks which forced us into several bocks of pushing through mud and construction rubble, followed by a long spontaneous detour in the wrong direction. Things eventually improved and with some assertive cycling in the middle of the fast lane holding up several buses we made it to the terminal, covered in sweat and road grime. And there's nothing better to do when you're covered in sweat and dirt than to sit on an overnight bus, so we did. According to the guidebook it was a 20 hour ride but things began to unravel immediately, when 5 hours into the trip we stopped at a city that we had already gone through and knew it was only 2 hours from where we started. It was tea time but we didn't get a food stop, instead got videoed by the military to record who had got on the bus, a concerning thought when we began to wonder why that was necessary. When we didn't stop for breakfast we began to get concerned, had we accidently hopped on some sort of diet bus? Eventually the bus pulled into some sort of rural self service food area at 11am, when we were meant to be in Bogota at 11:30. So we were running a little late, but how far late we had no idea. The food was terrible so we didn't eat much, think we'd be there soon enough, but a few hours later we saw a sign for a town that appeared to be going in the opposite direction to Bogota, which was concerning.

5 hours later the driver put in a dvd of 118 Colombian accordian songs.
4 hours after that night was falling and we still weren't in Bogota and the bus hadn't stopped since our 11am food stop and the accordian songs were still playing.

Eventually at 9pm, 29.5 hours after we left we arrived in Bogota, at a bus terminal on the opposite side of town from where all the hostels were located. Anna wanted to get a taxi but Ben thought the line was too long so we rode, and it wasn't as bad as we thought it would be, there was some homeless people but most of the way was on a bike lane which was a pleasant surprise. We found a great hostel run by Australians and had a great nights sleep in the dorms, despite our room mates partying until mid morning.

Bogota was much nicer than we thought it would be, we had 4 nights there to prepare for flying but ended up picking up a couple of bike boxes really easily on the first morning, as it turns out the city it huge on cycling. There is over 300kms of cycle lanes in the city and on Sunday all the major roads are closed to traffic and cyclist rule the roads. We took our bikes out on the Sunday and had a great time riding all over the city with locals from all walks of life. The roads were lined with vendors selling energy drinks, snacks, cycle clothes and bike mechanics offering their services. There was lots of kids out and roller bladers and people walking their dogs meaning that cycling wasn't exactly fast, but it was really fun. We spent the rest of our time in Bogota visiting a number of interesting museums, some on purpose like the gold museum; and some by accident like the money museum when we were looking for something else. We spent an afternoon at the Botero Museum which was really cool, both his work and other art from his personal collection including Picassos and Monets.

Due to the huge size of our luggage we had to get two taxis to the airport, which took way less time than we had expected and we had to wait around for ages to check in. When we did we got spat out of the line firstly for not having some sort of airport exit piece of paper that we had to get from a booth down the hall, then because we didn't have a printout of our USA visa waiver number that we had applied for a day earlier and it said we wouldn't need it. Thirdly because after Ben had ran through the airport looking for the internet to get out numbers only to find out there wasn't any and having to convince a travel agent to let him borrow her computer we then were asked for the expiration date of our number. We nearly throttled the check in person, but she saved herself by telling us we wouldn't need it after all. Then the bikes had to be completely pulled apart for a drug search, undoing all our careful packing of the day before and some, when we had to deflate the tyres so they could check there was no cocaine stashed in the inner tubes. They also checked all the additional stuff we had crammed into the boxes to reduce the weight of our other bags, like the tent, sleeping bags, towels, sleeping mats, bike tools, helmets and the like, all right behind the counter next to the baggage conveyor belt. We had to be careful not to accidently rest thing on the conveyor belt in case it got carried away to wherever luggage goes. Things were no repacked as well as they should have been, and the boxes weren't taped up as well as they were - something we would regret later.

After about 6 security checks we were about to board the flight when the attendant asked us for the expiration number we had been told we wouldn't need earlier, When we said we didn't have it he said we'd have to bring it up on the internet and get a staff member to view it in order to get on the flight. So again, we were spat out of a massive line to go and find the internet. Then our numbers wouldn't work and it kept coming up as we weren't authorised to enter the USA. Blood pressure rose exponentially before we realised we had written it down unclearly and the "I" was actually an "1". With tempers fraying we pushed to the front of the line offending everyone and showed the attendant the date on a piece of paper and were happily let on the plane.

Four hours later we landed in Fort Launderdale, which we think is in Florida. Customs was easy (clearly we were authorised after all) and even our luggage arrived without hassle...things were going too well and when we put the last piece of luggage on the trolley and turned to go we saw a line of well over 100 people when we has less than an hour to catch our connecting flight. We experienced our first encounter with American air rage after a woman pushed in front of us but actually it went quite fast and they didn't need to open our bike boxes again thank god. We brought our first ever American candy, some english magazines and some bottled water that upon closer investigation actually was tap water from the public supply just bottled. We also met our first homeland security officers who made us put our shoes through the x ray machine, they have a crap job. The flight to LA was uneventful but when we picked up the bike boxes one had completely fallen apart in transit. Fortunately nothing was lost, the baggage guys went back and found some pedals which had fallen off which was lucky. The airport was undergoing rennovation which made locating a phone to call a taxi a total mission, but eventually we made it to the hostel at midnight making for a pretty long and stressful day.

We left the boxes at the hostel where we will hopefully pick them up when we leave and got a taxi first thing the next morning to the greyhound bus terminal downtown. We ordered the taxi both too late for the bus that we were hoping to catch but also too early for us to get the bikes back together and out bags packed again. Rats. The moment we got to the terminal we were told the bikes can't go on the bus like that and we had to get boxes which we could buy at the terminal, so we spent 20 minutes undoing all the work we had rushed to do before we got a taxi that morning. Rats.

It turns out that alot of crazy people catch the bus in America, and alot of crazy people are interested in bikes.

But about 8 hours later we arrived in San Francisco, which after only one day we have decided is completely awesome. Our day has been spent marvelling at the cool bikes everyone seems to have here, and doing tourist activities such as Pier 39, Fishermans Wharf, Chinatown and North Beach. Our accommodation is really great and central and the food compared to South America is a-mazing. Today we even managed to fit in some engagement ring shopping at Tiffanys, Anna is now the happy owner of a diamond ring which she is collecting in Santa Monica. We have another day here being tourists before we start to head south along the Pacific Coast towards Los Angeles.