Day 18 - Uy, uy, uyyyyyy!

Today, Friday, June 26th, we left at 9am to head over the Gualtapé, where there is a giant rock with 740 stair

s to climb it to see a beautiful view of the surrounding lakes. The countryside was filled with all different kinds of crops: corn, cilantro, bananas, tomatoes from tree (since apparently there are more types of tomatoes here in Colombia than there are in the U.S.). On the way over, it looked like a tree had fallen which had caused a metal power line pole to fall into the road, blocking one of the lanes. Our bus was having a hard time getting through because first off, there was no one directing traffic and so the oncoming traffic was going into our lane to go around the pole and therefore inhibiting us from being able to pass. Then I noticed that the power lines were probably dangling to low for us to pass by without dragging them with us. Another tall vehicle made an attempt at it and caused the lines to sway a lot. Then, finally after, a lot of time being stuck because our bus was too tall, some guys got some rope, tied it to the cables, and then climbed up a tree to lift them high enough for the taller vehicles to pass.

After we got through, we first stopped at a little city before we got to the rock to get some drinks since it would be a lot cheaper there. There was also a Catholic Church there that was designed to look like a rock in recognition of the rock of Gualtapé.

Then we headed over to the rock. I knew that I would need to go up the rock very slowly due to my anemia and being at a high altitude. Luckily, one of the students on the trip, Dolly, who is actually an adult student, was in need of going slow as well. It definitely took us a lot longer than it took everyone else since we kept stopping. The both of us were at exactly the same level. We were both winded the same amount and needed to stop at the same times. However, I knew that the view would be worth it. I was really embarrassed that it was such as struggle and took me as long as it did. People my age are supposed to be fit and have lots of energy and normally, I would not have had a problem with it but since I'm currently borderline dangerously anemic (since I checked my levels about five days before leaving for the trip). I keep wanting to make sure that the other students understand what was going one because one, if I overexert myself especially at high altitudes (Medellín is at about 5,000 feet), I could faint and get badly injured and two, so that people don't judge me. My muscles were fine, I just had a really hard time breathing. Dolly kept wanting to back out, but I kept encouraging her to go on with me. Later when I asked her if she would have continued if I hadn't been there to encourage her, she said that she wouldn't have. ..then she commented on how pale I was looking. I had told her about my situation and how I'm currently anemic, but I told her in English the first time and so she didn't completely understand. Once I told her in Spanish, it made sense to her. She was really worried about me and feared I had anemia due to how pale I was looking but she was glad when she figured out that I had known all along and was making a constant effort to remain safe and not overexert myself. I'm glad we were there for each other cause that would not have been fun going up alone and everyone else would not have wanted to go as slow as we needed to go. When we got to the top of the rock, we realized that there were only about 630 steps to get to the top of the rock, but there was a tower on top of that which makes it 740 steps total. After a brief break, I decided to continue on to the very top where the rest of the students were and what a view there was up there!

Since we needed to be back down at the bus at 12:00 and since it was 11:40, the few of us remaining realized we needed to start going down. It was surprisingly hard to go down since there were so many uneven steps, some areas that were very steep, and pretty much no railing the entire time.

Once we got to the bottom, I noticed that when standing normally, my legs were shaking furiously - more than I have ever seen on any person before. However, many of the others had the same things happen to them as well. After we got to the bottom, Dr. Steffanell gave us bags of gifts inside. In the girls' bag, there was a cute little leather coin purse with our names burned into it as an engraving. On one side, it depicts "El Puñol de Guatapé" with the rock and on the other side is a scene from Medellín. Along with that was a small brown suede-like leather purse, the kind that crosses over your chest that says Colombia on it. I'm not sure if they're real leather or not, but it's definitely possible since Colombia exports leather and it's supposed to be cheaper hear. Regardless (since I really don't care if it's real or not), it was very sweet of our professor. Then, we had some lunch and afterwards walked around a nearby quaint little city. In that city, every building, whether it's a house or a store, has what is called a zóncala, this is a base board border on the edge of the building that measure up about 3 feet. Each zóncala for each part of the attached buildings had different decorations. Some were just pretty designs others were pictures of thugs such as flowers or animals. The more elaborate ones depict historic scenes that have relevance to the family that own that house.

Then, we went on a boat tour that took us through the lakes that we saw in the view from Guatapé. Once that was done, we all went over to go zip lining across a portion of the lake.

All of us (except for Dr. Steffanell) ended up going although some were very very scared. I decided to take my camera up with me since I have a strap and didn't think I'd have any issues. I'm very glad that I did that since the business did not get any pictures of me like they did for the other students. (Which is odd since because I wasn't very heavy, I didn't make it all the way the the landing spot and was stuck a little way out for a while until they send a wire over for me to grab onto so they could pull me. I was hanging there for a solid 10 minutes and there should have been time to get a photo of me then, but perhaps they got all the white girls confused! :P )

Afterwards, we started heading home. It took forever to get through Medellín and to our hotel because there was tons of traffic due to the Colombia vs. Argentina soccer game. We left at 8:15 to go to a fancy dinner, right during overtime of the game. Everyone was super interested in the game and didn't want to miss it. The shuttle that we took had a tv in it that we could watch the game on. The majority of the time, the signal was lost, but we got to see some parts of the overtime. Unfortunately, Colombia ended up losing and is now out of the running. We were all really really hungry, but the shuttle driver seemed to have a hard time figuring out where the restaurant was and so we went in circles several times before we finally got there 30 minutes later. I ended up getting steak with 3 different types of cheese all over it. It was really good. At the restaurant, there were a guy and girl singer which was kinda cool but the music was just way too loud and we could barely hear each other. Later on we started noticing people on horses walking through the restaurant while the singing was still going on. For a period of time, the ceasing ceased and the horse act was the main attraction. There were several horses inside the restaurant, all doing different types of gallops and what looked like dancing in place. Afterwards, a different woman singer came out. She was fairly old, like 55ish, yet she had a skin tight dress that fell just below her giant butt and a very revealing top part and she just kept dancing provocatively wi

th customers and it was just gross. We were brought a dessert that was supposed to be like a cream but it had these weird chunks of almost translucent material and it was just weird. The male singer kept chanting "uyy, uyy, uyyyyyyyy!" about every five minutes and it was just annoying. I (along nicely with many others) was tired, the music was loud, and I was just disgusted by the provocatively dressed singing woman came over to our table and was trying to get Dr. Steffanell to dance with her. He kept saying no, but then at the last minute, he got up. It was the weirdest thing ever cause he was such an amazing dancer! Like he was really really good. We were just all in amazement of how good he was and of the fact that he, of all people, could dance...and could dance really well at that. He was probably the best guest that she had danced with. Shortly afterward, everyone started to drift to the courtyard as we were all tired and done with all the noise. We saw the different horses in their stables and went up to let them. One in particular looked very very mad. He was just restless, kept neighing and snorting, and tried snapping at me. One of the students knows horses well and judging by what the horse was doing and how tight the harness was, she felt the horses were not being treated as they should. It was sad cause several of them just looked really miserable. (For the rest of the trip, "uy, uy, uyyyyyy" was a joke that kept resurfacing.)