Last Days

As you can imagine, it is has been pretty hectic since we returned from Colombia. I will try to give a quick blog entry for our last two days in Bogota.

Last Tuesday, our last full day, we woke to some more typical Bogota weather. However, as the day progressed, the rains became more frequent and stronger – even by Bogota standards.

After breakfast, we spoke with Carmen about the possibility of going to Monseratte. As she did each time we asked about Monseratte, she took us outside, pointed in the cloudy direction of the mountain and explained that this would not be a good day to go. So, we opted for plan B, a trip to the Botero Museum, instead. Our cab driver drove us around the narrow, hilly streets of downtown Bogota for a while. Some were closed and we couldn’t tell if he was lost or just having difficulty being routed in different directions. Finally, he stopped and talked to one of the security people watching a closed street and we learned that the Botero Museum is closed on Tuesdays. At that point, although it was cloudy and sprinkling a little in places, we told him to take us to Monseratte.

We arrived at a fairly nondescript looking building and purchased tickets for the “train” to the top. This train basically consists of one car with staggered compartments for people to stand on the 2-3 minute ride to the top of the mountain.

It was kind of misty and overcast at the top of the mountain, but we could still see most of the city below. However, the real beauty of Monseratte isn’t the only in the surrounding views, but also in the church and structures at the top of the mountain. Here is the ride up.

The house where we "landed."

A few views from the mountain.



Of course there were more stations of the cross as we walked up the path to the church. However, I found these a little more interesting than the “salt crosses” of the Cathedral of Salt (the extremely subtle symbolism was kind of lost on me at that place).


A few more views from the mountain top.



The church at the top of the mountain.


I am assuming this was a Catholic church, but I have never been in a Catholic church where Christ was not on the cross and was on the ground like here. I will have to ask around about this (like my family Catholicism expert Aunt Carole) and would welcome answers from anyone.

Luke asking for, and needing, a prayer.


I liked this Jesus statue but it kind of reminded me of "Buddy Jesus from the movie "Dogma."

Looking back out the doors of the church, you can see another mountain peak where they have a big Jesus statue - like the one in Rio De Janeiro except smaller. It was kind of cool.


Los ninos outside of the church.

Although we had to take a "train" up the mountain, we had to take the cable car back down. Here are some views.





After the tour of Monseratte, we arrived back too late for lunch at the compound. So we went to a little restaurant near the compound that had always looked interesting, “Sopas y Postres.” Traci and Luke tried the empanadas (our first in Colombia), but we decided we like the ones from the Colombian restaurant in KC a little better. That really isn’t too fair of a comparison since this place isn’t really known for empanadas.

After naps, we ran out to the kids hair styling salon to get Maria’s hair done again before we returned home. Of course, once we arrived another serious downpour started. On the way home, we put Maria in the stroller usually used by Andres because it could be covered by a big plastic sheet (I wasn’t about to blow $12 on a hairdo only to have it get rained on). Traci tried to keep Andres and herself covered under an umbrella, but the rest of us pretty much arrived back at the compound drenched.

As I recall, dinner was rice and meat balls. Afterwards, I ran out to one of the local coffee shops to get some souvenir Colombian coffee. Nothing like waiting until the last minute to get all of your shopping done. When I arrived back, Oscar, our attorney, and “the dress lady” stopped by the compound. They both needed money for the services they provided during out stay. We were very happy that the dress lady could complete our order before we left. She said she employed 4 additional ladies to help her get things done. I know that the boys got matching sweaters and I think Maria got 2 dresses (I wasn’t too interested at this point. I just knew we were going home the next day).

Night time brought few surprises. I still hadn’t started packing and Traci was pretty much done getting herself and the kids’ stuff put away. We didn’t have any internet access that night, so I had only clothes packing to do that night. I don’t know if it was all of the activity going on in the room or what, but Maria couldn’t sleep. We tried hanging my “ruana” over the bunk beds to sort of shield her from the light. A few minutes later, though, she began to sob and cry. Maybe she was just overtired or maybe it was kind of hitting her that she was leaving – we don’t know. Traci and I sat with her for a while and talked about all of the fun things that the next day had in store (she loves to fly on airplanes and we talked about that for a while). We showed her some videos of the house and her room which got her to calm down to the point where she could finally go to sleep.

The next morning, Traci got up a little before 5 and I got up a little after that. Andres, our escort, was supposed to arrive at 6:00 a.m. to take us to the airport. We got all of the bags arranged in plenty of time for me to have a cup of coffee before we had to leave. Andres went with us into the airport. We were ushered into a line and then he asked for all of our passports and took off somewhere. We didn’t see where he went and pretty soon we would be reaching the end of the line where we needed our passports. We were starting to get a little nervous and let a few people go past us before Andres finally showed back up He wasn’t gone long but we were on guard for that minor catastrophe that would keep us from getting home. I think he must have gone to pay the “exit tax” or whatever it is called. I remember reading that we were supposed to pay one, but I don’t recall doing that ourselves. We got our tickets and into the boarding area without too much of a problem and in plenty of time for our flight. In fact, we even got to have a little breakfast before settling into to the waiting area.
Here are Maria and Andres waiving goodbye to Colombia.


Just a bunch of photos from the plane.




Andres figured out how to mess with the headphones jacks between the seats. The poor lady sitting next to him did not have a good 4+ hour flight to Atlanta. Eventually, Andres fell asleep, but he woke up and pretty much cried and whined the last hour of the flight. Consequently, he sat with me on the second leg from Atlanta to KC.


The trip to Atlanta and, later, through customs were pretty uneventful. In fact, customs went a lot faster than we expected. We did get stuck on the runway in Atlanta and were about an hour late getting off the ground. However, we were able to give plenty of heads up to our families who would be waiting for us at the airport.

We arrived home at 7:15 on Wednesday night. Luke, Andres and I had to sit in the second to the last row of the airplane – so anyone who thinks we were trying to be last off the plane for dramatic effect is wrong. It was great to see our families and friends again. Luke’s buddy, Behr, came to the airport and surprised him. I know he was missing his friend, and I think Behr was a little bored without Luke around too.

That night the kids didn’t get into their beds until around midnight. We had food, people stopping by the house a lot of great stories from both continents. It was kind of like a small party.
There were some gifts.




Apparently, people had been reading our blog and had heard about Andres' diapers.

Maria got a new pair of earrings. . .

and they got lost in the shaggy carpet about as quickly as the box was opened. We never did find it, but Nana Sharon fixed it the next day and got new ones.

And, of course, we had the Maria dance. Papa Denny sang while Papa Bill and Papa Ron took turns dancing with Maria. She loved it.


That is pretty much it from our last couple days in Bogota. I will try to update again in another blog entry about how the kids have been doing in our first week back – and, not to spoil it, but they have been doing great.