an idea of travel: santa marta & parque tayrona, colombia

They say Cartagena is sweltering but that it has a breeze. I never found that breeze.

Santa Marta is also hot, but it's a notch down.

Turtles at my hostel.

I saw these hats and wondered if they're also for sale in North America.

The hostel is huge and there's a pool in the middle of it.

When I got back from Ciudad Perdida I thought that my invitation would have arrived, but it hadn't so I decided to do an overnight trip to Parque Tayrona.

I packed my knapsack, bought food, and the next day caught a bus to the entrance of the park. From there I caught a shared van a little deeper into the park which brought me to the first beach. If you want to go any further, you need to walk as there are only trails.

There were countless lizards - I must have seen 6-7 varieties. They aren't the most graceful of creatures, and when they realize that you're close, the run away with frantic limbs across the leaves or earth.

I passed by a few larger beaches as well as a few without any people. Not all beaches have a camp site and swimming can be deadly at many of the beaches.

I stopped to ask about hammock prices at one camp and when the owner found out I was Canadian he brought me to meet a Quebecois guy living at the camp for several months. He was working as a mechanic in Quebec but needed a break, so he moved into a tent near the beach.

This is the camp I chose to stay at. It's the furthest out and more popular since it's beautiful, has amenities like a restaurant, lockers, camping, and perhaps most importantly - the waters are safe for swimming. True, it also tends to be more crowded, but when I was there it wasn't crazy.

There are two beaches separated by this rocky point with the structure atop.

The sand is grainy and it looks like there are little shimmering mirrors on your feet after you've been walking along the beach.

I rented a hammock with "an ocean view" from the hut atop the rocky point, and that's where I slept at night.

My hammock was of the Colombian flag.

Sometimes I don't get why this style of hammock is popular because they stink badly as they don't dry out well.

A baby bird fell out of its nest but a man was quick to put it back.

You can't really see from this picture, but it looks like the bird in the middle is having a bad hair day.

World Cup fanatics

The sun was going down and I kept hearing people say "This is Paradise," but all I could think of was - no, this isn't. Paradise is never on a beach and it isn't in one place.

The walk there seemed so much longer under the hot sun and that was probably made worse by all the water I was carrying. The next morning I work up at 5:30 when almost everyone else was still asleep and I started to make my way back to Santa Marta. I'd spent the night holding in pee (even though I went before sleeping) and sticky salty dew covered my skin. I couldn't live on a beach...

The hike was cooler and that made time fly by. The morning was actually my favorite part of the trip as there were hardly any people out and I saw what felt like a plethora of animals on the trail as I crept through the park.