Exploring Bogota

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Awoke to beautiful Bogota morning.  Clouds with some sun trying to poke through.  Took some pix outside our window, showered, dressed, and headed down stairs for breakfast. Met a woman traveling alone who was revisiting her stay in Colombia when she worked in  the Peace Corps. A native New Yorker, I told her I was from Flushing and she replied "We call it Flu-Ching now".  Got a kick out of that because a good friend of mine said that Flushing is now known for its Chinese food.

Montserrate

Not quite sure what to do this morning, we decided on trying to make our way to the Funicular to go up to Monserrate since it looked like the sun was breaking through.  Along our walk we popped into the Emerald Trade Building and admired the gems.  Passed many parks and squares which are nice gathering spots.  One thing to keep in mind while travailing this city, is to watch your step -- some of the streets are horrendous.  We made up to the station and took our place in the queue.  After standing in line for about 20 minutes, I got bored on waiting on line, the clouds were overtaking the mountain, and we had a 2:00 date with the graffiti tour.  We decided to ditch the mountain, since we will be back tomorrow night for Valentine's dinner if the weather cooperates.  However, this might be the best pix we get because I fear it is only going to get cloudier.  Ce la Vie!

Heading back down. Spotted a man selling fried plaintains and couldn't resist. Very tasty. Continuing on, we wound up at the Gold Museum which happens to be free for us folks over 60!!  One of the highlights of this museum is the Musica Raft also called the Offering Raft.  We met up with this raft again on our graffiti tour.

The figure refers to the ceremony of the legend of El Dorado. It represents the ceremony of investiture of the Muisca chief, which used to take place at Lake Guatavita. During this ritual, the heir to the chieftainship  covered his body with gold dust and jumped into the lake along with gold offerings and emeralds to the gods. The piece has a base in the shape of a log boat with dimensions of 19.5 cm x 10.1 cm and various figures on the raft, the largest figure that stands in the middle apparently represents the chief, which is adorned with headdresses, nose rings and earrings, measuring 10.2 cm and is surrounded by his soldiers who carry banners.
The raft was found by three farmers in early 1969 in a cave in the village of Lázaro Fonte in the municipality of Pasca (Cundinamarca), Colombia in a ceramic pot, adorned with a human figure whose face has sharp teeth. The priest of the municipality protected the piece until it was acquired by Bogota's Gold Museum and where it has become one of its major exhibition pieces. It has never left Colombia.

Leaving the museum we ran into some folks selling big bottom ants. Yummy. Well, Geoff just couldn't resist. Just the appetizer for lunch. We slipped into this cafeteria style place for a small bite.  Had a nice chat with some young women.  We were in need of some help to get the local free wifi working -- no luck.  By the way, this city, like all large cities, is overrun with American fast food cuisine.  Although, I would never recommend eating in such establishments, the bathrooms are always available and extremely clean and free.  This is a very useful bit of information. 

After lunch we had some time to kill before the tour so we popped in to none other than Juan Valdez for an extremely wonderful cup of java.  After, we made our way to the Journalist's Park to meet up with the graffiti tour.  While waiting, we met a mom and her son, both from Brooklyn.  Her son is a big cyclist so there was a lot of talk about there.  We both found the tour to be very enlightening and the art is simply amazing.  Mostly done by stencils with both acrylics and spray paints.

As with many urban centres, Colombian capital Bogotá has always been home to graffiti and street art, with graffiti artists such as DJ Lu taking the well-known

route of creating art at night and avoiding the sometimes overzealous Colombian police force. All of this changed though in 2011 when a young graffiti artist, Diego Felipe Becerra, was shot dead by police when creating his signature image of Felix the Cat on the walls of an underpass in the Colombian capital. Police tried to portray Diego Felipe Becerra as a suspected armed robber, but outcry over the death, along with condemnation from the UN and a flurry of graffiti protests across the Colombian capital, sparked a wave of change for graffiti and street art and how it is viewed. A topic that may be of interest also is Urban Art Originating from Social Upheaval.

The tour ended about 4:30.  We backtracked to the book binders and then headed back. Got back to the hotel and went straight to the spa to book a massage for tomorrow afternoon after our city bike tour.  Rested up in our room for a bit and then went out in search of some bottled water. With the water secure, we made our way to dinner a few streets down from the hotel.  

Capital Concina y Cafe is a small cozy place which has maybe a dozen tables at best.  So with no reservations, we were fortunate to get a table.  We sat next to a British couple who were absolutely delightful!  World travelers like ourselves, we found we had a lot in common.  Both the food and conversation were excellent. 

Walking back to the hotel, we noticed, not for the first time today, that our hotel area is covered with military personnel On the main streets in downtown you see a lot of yellow jacketed police with dogs -- all muzzled. Our guys have camouflage suits and big guns. After inquiring at the reception desk, we learned that we are very near the President's residence, hence the security.  So for all the talk of crime, it feels like we are in a very safe area.

Getting ready to pack it in the for the night.  Had a terrific day. Lucked out with the weather.  It threatened to rain all day and we barely got a spry.  Looking forward to tomorrow.  Starts off with a city bike tour and ends with a Valentine dinner - somewhere!


Next time.... Happy St. Valentine's Day!