Denmark: Vikings & Lego

On Halloween night 2018 we travelled midway through the week to arrive early morning in Billund, Denmark, home of Lego and heartland of the Vikings. We were greeted on the bus journey from Billund to nearby Vejle (humorously pronounced "vile") by a bird of prey sitting on a fencepost. Travel in this part of Denmark was easy but pricey. Our bus ride was easy due to the prevalence of English-speakers, so we knew where to alight. We had to wait a few hours for the key to our guesthouse and so made our way up to the iconic white chalk Dutch gallery windmill overlooking the town.

Vejle windmill

Halloween pumpkins

The mill had burnt down a few times since it was built in 1890 and since 1960 had only been good for a Vejle landmark. The windmill museum opened on time, as things do in this part of the world, and the caretaker volunteer made it abundantly clear he knew nothing about the history of the windmill at all. Regardless, the mill held all manner of old and interesting milling equipment from across the ages. In the basement was an art exhibit by Mai-Britt Schultz that we both enjoyed. From the top of the windmill it was possible to see across Denmark's largest gorge called Grejsdalen, but thanks to the booming economy, a large number of buildings that have sprung up had long-since eclipsed any views of the fjord.

Vejle is from the Old Danish meaning ford. During the last ice age, a glacier carved out the fjord and the valley in which Vejle is found. The valley holds the Vejle river across which the Vikings built the short-lived Ravning Bridge - a 760 metre oak bridge which held the record for Denmark's longest bridge until 1935. People have been living in this area at least since 1100, although the bridge has been dated from as little as 980. During the middle ages Vejle was a market town mostly trading with present-day Germany, and it wasn't until industrialisation that Vejle really came into its own and entered a boom.

We made our way down the steep slope to the town's large art museum. There had been plenty of investment in the area, with a new local park that many people were enjoying under the blue October skies, art installations around the museum and the uncovering and cleanup of the underground Grejs river which formed newly created pretty canals across the whole town. The Vejle Art Museum had three stand out exhibits: an exhibition of 50 Rembrandts, artwork from the Danish Golden Age, and a temporary exhibit dedicated to satirists and satirical cartoons. The cartoon exhibit dealt with many historical events, but the large focus was on Syria, Trump and Brexit.

Satire exhibition at the Vejle Art Museum

After moving our bags into the excellent Siesta Vejle Guesthouse, we made our way to the cultural center. The first exhibit showcased Vejle as the "Manchester of Denmark" with its cotton mill, rope-making factory and iron foundry. Cotton was first spun in Vejle in 1892 and became famous for its high quality until 2000. One of the biggest employers at the turn of the century was C. M. Hess, whose iron foundry made very intricate and detailed iron stoves, windows, enamelled bathtubs, and shipping equipment. They even built the 1930's grinding equipment which we saw in the windmill. Many of the workers suffered hearing loss and health problems during this era, and many of the factories burnt down and were replaced.

Cotton reels

In the boomtime of Vejle, many people would visit either the local nightclub Moulin Rouge, modelled after the famous cabaret club in Paris, or the Lido cinema built in the 1950s. When we visited Vejle it was merely famous for its harbour, shopping and iconic windmill.

A new exhibit at the cultural center (whilst construction work went on in its traditional home of St. Nicolai Church) was the Haraldskaer woman. A so-called "bog-body", this female corpse was found in a bog in Jutland. Possibly strangled, she was found naked, although a leather cloak and some other possessions were found alongside her. Scans showed a preserved tongue, brain and intestines, and tests showed she came from Northern Jutland circa 490 BCE. In a poll taken by the museum the majority of participatns said they believed the woman had been sacrificed. No-one really knows what happened though - murder seems likely. This was one of the best preserved bog bodies found in Europe. Others had been destroyed by the action of uncovering them, and even the Haraldskaer woman lost her hair when they pulled her out. Archaeologists have better techniques to deal with these bodies now. and they are a fascinating piece of iron age history.

The final exhibit held numerous priceless ancient artefacts, mostly from from the Viking-era, although some artefacts dated back to Roman times. At the back of the centre we found a huge workshop space for artists and craftspeople jam-packed with very diverse pieces.

Iron Age artefacts

Huge Halloween pumpkin

Colin with stuffed jackets and burgers

We walked back into town and had food at Bones, a ribs and BBQ place. All the shops were decorated for Halloween. We had a small sleep back at our new guesthouse before we headed out quite late to our Halloween event, called Dystopia - the main reason we came to Denmark in the first place.

Dystopia is slightly outside of town so we took a cab. We arrived nervously. The event we were going to was a scary Halloween "extreme" experience, and the waiver we had to sign told us we would be manhandled, we should be in good physical and mental condition and that our clothes would likely be ruined. They were not lying.

Men dressed up as armed guards greeted our taxi, but as our taxi driver was unaware of what the event entailed she stepped on the gas and quickly sped past. We tried explaining what was happening to her, but she just kept muttering "stupid people, stupid people" under her breathe - she was a proper old battleaxe.

Dystopia

Us being attacked at Dystopia haunted house

Us finally leaving the Dystopia haunted house

After registering at the entrance to the building we were quickly thrown into the Dystopia experience by being chloroformed and taken by force into a waiting room area where the horrific game began. The narrative for the night was we were to enter the house of "mother", a strange sentient being who promised to welcome us to her bosom and offered to show us a utopian existence. Of course, for a horror night, it would not be quite as simple as this. We were doused in cold water, thrown down into muddy puddles of water, forced to eat maggots, slapped across the face, and Francesca was even forced to electrocute me! Not for the feint hearted! Our clothes cut off of us by some scary women with scissors. Francesca was dunked in dirty blood-filled water. The whole experience lasted about 45 minutes, and at the end we were chased out of this house of horrors by a maniac wielding a chainsaw. I would recommend it to people who could handle it, but I don't think I will be doing anything like that again.

The next day, the 1st November 2018, we had a long lie in after a hard week of work, early morning flight, and all the craziness from the previous day. We decided to go sight-seeing in the morning, so we first headed across the road to look at an old kiln that was enclosed in a new protective building. The kiln probably dates back to 1355 when a Dominican friary was built on the site and it was used to make monk's bricks. The site was excavated in 1923 which has revealed that three successive kilns were built on the site over the centuries.

A quick interlude in the big shopping mall rewarded us with some wienerbrod - this is similar to what we would know as a Danish. There are many different types though - with custard, jam, icing - donut shapes, bun shapes and even a biscuit sandwich. Deliciously sugary.

Wienerbrod

We then walked to the St. Nicolai Church, which was a Romanesque Lutheran church, the construction was still going on when we arrived. Outside was a statue of Anders Vedel, a Danish priest and historian from the 16th century who translated the Gesta Danorum, which is a patriotic collection of books that document Nordic sagas and Viking stories.

One of the things we missed by the church being out of action was the 23 alcoves that contained 23 skulls. Legend said that these skulls belonged to Polish robbers who were executed and put on display as a deterrent, but no-one really knew who the heads belonged to.

Next up was a visit to the Ecolarium; a science museum dedicated to sustainability. A recent fire had closed part of the museum, and to their credit the museum had dedicated an exhibition to the fire, showcasing some of the damaged objects and showing pictures of the ones that were irretrievably lost. Documentation and the digitisation of all artefacts should be the duty of any good museum.

Burnt wolf

Luckily, the animals that the museum kept were unharmed. These included a hive of honeybees, a dozen or so rats with their cute rat babies and numerous fishes and other plants and animals that were found at the bottom of the fjord. The fish tank was full of sole, plaice and smaller fish like the painted goby. A chart showed us that the fjord was full of brackish water (20% salinity), which eventually flowed out to the North Sea and North Atlantic.

Plaice

The next room was dedicated to the vast woodland area around Vejle and showcased all the woodland animals. There was a small sluice which demonstrated how water in the natural environment has been utilised. A small exhibit showed how much water is used for different household appliances, including a toilet, and then a pretend sewer pipe sent us down (past the real rats) to a simulator that simulated us being flushed down the toilet.

Upstairs there were interactive experiments and interesting information boards about energy and climate change. Denmark has been suffering lots of flooding in recent years, and with higher water levels and temperatures, this trend looked set to continue.

A piece on the origin of oil and coal was very interesting - plant residue drifted down into the lakes and transformed into peat, and then brown coal. The pressure over time turns the brown coal into normal coal and then hard coal (anthracite). In the sea a similar thing would happen but with organism waste turning into oil.

In 1985 protestors ended the usage of nuclear power in Denmark, even though it was in Danish Greenland that uranium was first discovered in 1956. A Danish physicist called Niels Bohr was the chief scientist. In recent times there has been a growing movement by Danish scientists to reverse public opinion on nuclear, and to start using thorium in new nuclear reactors. Thorium has a smaller half-life than uranium, and the newer reactors use liquid salt reactors which do not melt down (think Chernobyl).

After the musuem we walked through the rest of the town to the harbour and the fjord. There was some really nice architecture in the docks, including the Fjordenhus and the Bolgen (the Wave). These award-winning buildings are now Vejle landmarks just as much as the ever-present iconic windmill.

Fjordenhus

On our third day in Denmark we decided to finish looking around the town in Vejle in the morning before heading to nearby Jelling on the train. On the way to get the train, we encountered many interesting art installations in the pedestrian street. This had been newly paved with Chinese granite  slabs with Jelling runes on them.  On the trip down to Jelling we saw white-tailed eagles, an owl, a deer and a herd of really fluffy cows all from the train.

Jelling was a very important historical town in Danish history. The site covered a huge area which would have been enclosed by a large wooden fence. Two large burial mounds (north and south) sat within this UNESCO world heritage site, alongside a church and a large stone ship. The large stone ship was from around the 9th century and formed a large fleet of ships that have been found all across Europe, either acting as burial sites, ceremonial spaces or perhaps even as symbolic ships that represented religious stories.

In the church grounds were two large runestones, one raised by King Gorm and the other by his son King Harald Bluetooth. King Gorm was Denmark's first recognised ruler, most probably only of the mainland called Jutland, and he created the smaller (and older) of the two runestones. This runestone is a memorial to Gorm's wife, has the first mention of the country of Denmark, and is therefore considered Denmark's birth certificate. The second and larger runestone was created by Harald Bluetooth and speaks to the unification of Denmark and Norway under Harald Bluetooth into one Christian country. Christ is clearly depicted on the runestone, with the declaration that all Danes are now Christian.

Harald Bluetooth's runestone: birth certificate of Denmark

ᚼᛅᚱᛅᛚᛏᚱ ᛬ ᚴᚢᚾᚢᚴᛦ ᛬ ᛒᛅᚦ ᛬ ᚴᛅᚢᚱᚢᛅ ᚴᚢᛒᛚ ᛬ ᚦᛅᚢᛋᛁ ᛬ ᛅᚠᛏ ᛬ ᚴᚢᚱᛘ ᚠᛅᚦᚢᚱ ᛋᛁᚾ ᛅᚢᚴ ᛅᚠᛏ ᛬ ᚦᚭᚢᚱᚢᛁ ᛬ ᛘᚢᚦᚢᚱ ᛬ ᛋᛁᚾᛅ ᛬ ᛋᛅ ᚼᛅᚱᛅᛚᛏᚱ (᛬) ᛁᛅᛋ ᛬ ᛋᚭᛦ ᛫ ᚢᛅᚾ ᛫ ᛏᛅᚾᛘᛅᚢᚱᚴ

haraltr : kunukʀ : baþ : kaurua kubl : þausi : aft : kurm faþur sin auk aft : þąurui : muþur : sina : sa haraltr (:) ias : sąʀ * uan * tanmaurk

tanmaurk = Denmark

Christianity first took hold in Europe in Armenia and Georgia in the 4th century. By the 7th century most of Europe, including England was Christian, and by the time of Charlemagne in the 10th century, the clear message was convert or die. As the Islamic empire waned, Harald felt that he was under so much pressure that he decided to make the leap and he took the Danish people with him.

After coming to power, Harald kept the Norwegians in check for 30 years. As his greatest adversary was Otto the Great of the Holy Roman Empire, it seems taking the Danish and Norwegian people into a Christian future was quite a shrewd move on Harald's part.

After coming to power, Harald kept the Norwegians in check for 30 years. As his greatest adversary was Otto the Great of the Holy Roman Empire, it seems taking the Danish and Norwegian people into a Christian future was quite a shrewd move on Harald's part.

The runestone is such an important part of Danish history that it is included on Danish passports. Harald Bluetooth even gave his name over to the famous wireless technology. Jim Kardach from Intel created and named the Bluetooth technology in 1997 because he admired Harald so much. The Bluetooth logo is an amalgum of the runes for H and B.

We had a wonderful meal of Smørrebrød at the local inn. This dish consists of several pieces of butter-covered rye bread with different types of fish, meat and vegetables on it. Ours had salmon, egg, Danish bacon and even caviar. Delicious.

Smorrebrod

The Jelling site was a wonderful day trip, and the museum was extremely informative about the period, and especially about Viking life at the time. Some of the artefacts found in the mounds and elsewhere were also presented, like Viking swords and a rather cool silver cup found buried in the South mound.

Silver Viking cup

Francesca with her name written in runes

On Saturday 3rd we left Vejle and travelled to Billund, also known as the home of Lego. Our first stop was the Lego House - a four-zone fun-packed adventure where we got to play with lots of Lego. Everything was made of Lego, including little robots we could control and play games with. We got to make our own Lego characters, order food at the restaurant using Lego shapes, and go through the Lego museum which outlined the history of the Kristiansen family who conceived of Lego and made the company into what it is today. Just as the Viking bloodline formed the foundation, the Lego bloodline have certainly contributed, quite literally, to the building blocks of the country of Denmark.

Ole Kirk Kristiansen started a toy company in Billund in the early 20th century with quality as his mantra. After the Great Depression of the 1930s he reinvented this toy business as Lego which, in Danish, means "play well". It is entirely coincidental that in Latin it also means "I put together", and Ole died in 1958 probably without ever knowing this fact.

We found that fires were a theme on this trip (the factories, the windmill, the science museum), and the Lego workshop was no different. After a fire burnt down the whole thing in 1942, the family moved away from the wooden and metal toys that they made. Ole's son Godtfred had come on board and revitalised the family business. He saw opportunities to reuse materials (when the yo-yo trend died out, he used the surplus toys as wheels on wooden vehicles that they made), and he was the one who took the company into plastics.

Det bedste er ikke for godt was the Lego motto. It means "only the best is good enough". The Kristiansen's made the customer their focus from the offset, and this has been the company focus ever since. Other than the fires and the introduction of Godtfred into the company, there were several key turning points that the company has had to take it to a multi-billion dollar international corporation. These were the introduction of the plastic injection-moulding machine by Ole, the development of the Lego brick itself (using pipes within the brick creates pressure that holds the bricks more firmly together), the move (in the 1960s away from metals and wood to plastic). Lego went further and have coupled in people's minds the Lego product with the concept of child development through play. Kjeld Kristiansen, Godtfred's son, became the president and CEO of the company, and he ushered Lego into the modern era forming Lego Education and Lego Mindstorms - the first a system which helped target different Lego at different age groups, and the latter a partnership with MIT to get children and students programming robotics using Lego products.

We learnt that licensing agreements with movies such as Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings did not go very well for Lego, because as the franchises ended, sales downturned. These mistakes cost Kjeld the helm, and in 2001, amid falling sales and heavy competition from other newer digital technologies, Jorgen Vig Knudstorp takes over. Knudstorp is stil currently a chairman at Lego, and the first non-family member to run the company. He took the companies profits in 2016 from $6+ billion to almost $38 billion, and seemed to be the driving force behind the ideas of characters and movies that were soley Lego owned, like Lego Ninjago.

The final part of the Lego House was a nostalgic walk through the Lego collections of past to present. I recognised a large number of Lego sets, particulary from the early 1980s which was nice, but also quite disconcerting. Lego House is definitely worth a visit, and you should plan a whole day for it if you visit.

The first big Lego product, the town map

Lego diorama

Lego Tyranosaurus

The next day was our final day in Denmark for this visit, and we had tickets to visit Legoland. Legoland is the theme park opened by Godtfred Kristiansen in 1968. We arrived at the very start of the day (this was the last day Legoland would be open in the year before it closed fro Christmas) and didn't leave until way after dark. It took us all day, but we got to see all the different rides in all the different sections or zones of the theme park.

Legoland have a great scheme called "show consideration" which gives priority (via a wristband) to people with hidden disabilities or difficulties. A very worthwhile scheme for people with mental health issues.

The list of rides and attractions we enoyed were as follows:

Lego Canoe - our first log flume ride together.

Viking River Splash - our second water ride together, this one launched us down an even steeper water slide.

Ninjago ride and laser maze - the laser maze was a lot of fun - we had to dodge the laser beams in a hallway and get to the end against the clock.

Flying Eagle - Francesca went solo on this medium sized roller coaster.

Polar X-plorer - Francesca rode this fast roller coaster three times!

Ice Pilots School - this indoor ride was unique. Francesca programmed the moves this simulating roller coaster made, then got strapped in to a cage attached to a large mechanical arm, and it did all the moves, throwing her around all over the place!

Looking at the Gentoo Penguins

The Dragon - we both rode this mild-mannered roller coaster - about as much as I could take though

The Temple

Ghost - The Haunted House

Pirate Boats

Mini Boats

Lego Safari - a ride around loads of life-sized safari animals (made from Lego, of course)

Lego Top - an up in the air slow-spinning top which gives views all over the whole site
Lego Mini World - lots of towns, buildings and waterways made from Lego. An amazing site, especially the small Lego boats that went through a working lock system.

Sealand Atlantis

A Farewell To South America

When guidebooks unhelpfully overhype attractions, they certainly don't pull any punches when it comes to South America. The irritating and meaningless phrases "a tale of contrasts" or "a country of extremes" are thrown around mercilessly in a bid to passionately sell books, rather than dispassionately review and inform.

So what makes South America so "extreme"? Is it the FARC guerrillas of Colombia - now emerging from their jungle coca fields with bloody noses and white flags - or the much-maligned slumdog goose-egg owners of Rio's famous favelas? Is it the infuriating mounds of burning trash seen on EVERY journey taken by land from the frozen landscapes of Tierra del Fuego, to the gaping mouth of the Amazon River at crime-ridden Belem city? Or is it perhaps the unnecessarily white-knuckled journeys travelers are forced to undertake, as their untrained public transport drivers overtake, inconsiderate at best, extremely dangerous at worst?

Paradox can be found anywhere, and in every annoying or inhuman situation can be found hope and morality. Just as India should not be painted as a nation of rapists, it would be remiss to write off South America as a landmass of terrorists and criminals, although enough of them did come here as Spanish Conquistadors or German Nazis.

It's true that third world countries often contribute their fair share of litter to the countryside, but the South American ones also have a long tradition of protecting large swathes of their incredibly beautiful natural world - from Argentina's Lake District to Bolivia's high desert plains, through Peru's dense cloud forests. National Parks are some of South America's best kept secrets and best weapons of environmental self-defense, and without them, you can kiss goodbye to some of the most incredible places we have on Earth (Galapagos being an obvious stand-out).

The driving standards here, however, are just poor. No paradox, no joke, no positive feel good factor to be found - someone should take these fuckers off the roads until they are schooled in the usage of the three simple levers and a steering wheel. I won't miss the commonplace car accidents we have seen, especially the unforgettable ones.

Attitudes here are stereotypically and infuriatingly Latin. No-one really gives a shit about anything or anyone outside of their immediate family. While this seems to be a belief held by the older generation about all succeeding generations, even in the West, here it is given a particular credence by people who seem to be willing to bend over and take lateness, rudeness, laziness and many more, much worse, anti-social behaviors.

"Well, you are in Peru!", says one traveler, clearly ignoring the fact that not only did no-one solicit her vacuous opinion, but that she is apologizing for someone else's rudeness, whilst trying to justify it, somehow, by indicating ALL Peruvians are rude, and why did I not come to the same bigoted conclusion and just expect that Peruvians would be rude in the first place?

Now this might seem like some traveling backpacker trying to be important, looking so knowledgeable about the country she is in, justifying her own existence by sticking her nose in other people's business, but this attitude demonstrates just how far the termites have spread in terms of papering over the cracks of the cultural anti-social behaviors of third world countries like Peru, Bolivia and Brazil.

Self-confessed liars, cheaters and blaggers abound here. You don't hear English people saying that we are a nation of conmen - repressed shopkeepers, perhaps, but not conmen. Or the Swiss alluding to the fact that you have to be careful of them, because they will themselves cheat you out of whatever is in your pockets. In South America however, people will happily tell you that their fellow countrymen are complicit in all manner of wrongdoings, haha, how funny, etc. Sounds stupid right? Insignificant?

Well it would be were it not for the fact that this cultural attitude helps maintain a status quo of criminality across all sections of society. Whether it is the extrajudicial police death squads of Brazil, illegal loggers exterminating indigenous tribespeople in Peru, extreme violence against women almost everywhere, and much more besides. "Well, you are in Peru!". Now, THAT is starting to sound a little stupid, right? What a cop-out.

Most of the ex-pats we encountered in the 9 countries we visited were cop-outs - only a few were working for a better life. The cultural 'easy-life', lazy attitude found in South America is appealing to people running away from the problems of Western life - real difficulties such as holding down a job and not getting arrested, and washing yourself with soap. With people like this flooding the region for decades, it's easy to see why countries like Ecuador are beginning to lock-down their tourist visas making it more difficult to travel. This doesn't benefit South America at all. Rather, from what we have seen, tourism is a major driving force behind better environmental awareness, archaeological preservation and a better education for local people through a wider worldview.

Much has been written about the corruption rife in South American pseudo-socialist governments, mostly stemming from the same 'can't change, won't change' attitude of the same stripe mentioned above. "Yes our police are corrupt. Yes our government is corrupt." What are you gonna do about it? Not much, but not nothing either - it's not all bad news. The riots in Brazil have forced politicians to at least listen more intently to the people, if not make the wholesale changes that are needed. Meanwhile, Chilean voters sent a clear message to end Patagonian water exploitation and pollution by effectively ending plans for several large water dams which would have displaced people and wildlife, caused widespread environmental damage and succeeded in enriching only the top political players on the Dark Side of Chile's politics. These plans were stopped and so there is hope.

With a little more progress of the kind seen in Chile's new energy policies, Ecuador's National Parks protection, and Colombia's engagement of terrorist factions into the political process, then we might see a South America that Bolivar and San Martin might have been proud of.

We saw many interesting and effective projects set up by Latinos and ex-pats alike, designed as forces for positive change. From green urban planning in Buenos Aires to Jaguar conservation in Bolivia and self-built hydroelectric systems in remote Ecuador. It seems that for now, without an en masse cultural change, these ideas will have to serve to stem the tide of destruction that has already changed South America forever. These are all ideas the West can support and learn from.

With glaciers disappearing, access to various sites being curtailed up the Yin Yang (ostensibly due to high tourist numbers) and prices rising all the time, now seems like the best time to see the continent. Leave it too late and you will miss out! Or so it seems. The real paradox is, the more responsible tourists who go, the better protected it all is, because more often than not, the custodians of the interesting and important sites in South America are simple and uneducated people who inherited the land from their ancestors. These people are some of the least equipped and least motivated to look after their own backyards, and unless we show them that what they have is valuable, and that they shouldn't fuck with it too much, it will all be gone.

If South Americans will just get up off their macho asses and do away with the ridiculous belief that they are the center of the universe (a problem compounded by sexism and religion), then the world might, just might, see a future where we won't have to describe South America as the land where the Giant Anteater and the Jaguar USED to roam. Or the land where ancient pre-Colombian statues USED to stand - and what better response would that be to the asshole Islamists who would destroy mankind's history in order to write their own version of the truth and therefore literally get away with murder.

While these pressing issues ARE an immediate concern, they are not all-encompassing. After 25 months and 17 days on the continent, we saw so many unexpected and incredible sights that will come back for more. We will come back not to solve South American problems, but in spite of them. There is so much to do and see and learn here that it would be madness not to. The continent really did confound expectations, and whatever you think you know about South America - it's probably bullshit.

South America scored highly on historic cultural interest, natural beauty and wildlife and the sheer range of things to do, especially in Argentina. The best countries by far were Ecuador and Argentina (where we now have good friends).

We are glad to be leaving, but more glad to be coming home, even if after two years we are a little nervous to be doing so. Enough mountains, jungles and deserts for now, but like I said, we will be back.

Adios y hasta luego

Final Destination: Bogota

We arrived in Colombia’s capital on the 11th March 2015, and almost immediately noticed on the news stations that the Colombian terror organization called FARC were joining the peace process after decades trying to reach were we had finally gotten to. It was good to see that the journey to their destination, Bogota, was now going to be a peaceful one, and it was fitting that our peaceful journey would end here at the same time. Unfortunately for us, first impressions of the city were not so good. Bogota looks as polluted as Quito, with as much poverty as Rio. Maybe FARC will be able to help clean it up from within the system.

We only had one night in the town, and we decided to spend it at Hard Rock Cafe so we could buy a pin for Francesca’s uncle. Our hotel was difficult to find and the cab drivers were as untrustworthy as their reputation indicated. Still, we had fun on our night out, and it was a nice farewell to South America.

We left our hotel in the morning with bad WiFi, which seemed fitting somehow, and we were taxied to the airport by the hotel receptionist. Watching Bogota’s streets fall away behind us made us feel a little apprehensive about our future, but also excited to be going home. We longed for a little stability and routine, both of which we only saw glimpses of in Buenos Aires and Cusco. Bogota certainly did not look like a good place to spend much time, but we knew we would be back. Our next trip will include Bogota, as we have not seen any of it yet, really.

A final irony was that we discovered, when back in Florida at Francesca’s Mum’s place, that we had left our HDD and underwater camera at this last hotel. Funnily enough, they actually admitted to finding it in our room, and helped arrange for it to be returned to us! Phew! We have it back now, which was totally unexpected after all the crumholes we stayed in. So a shout goes out to the Hotel Aces del Dorado. See you later, Bogota!

San Agustin Archaeological Park

We headed on a 7:00 AM bus back to the white city of Popayan on March 8th. Though it took us 5 hours to get back, we wanted to push on and make it to the city of San Agustin, another 5 hours or so in the opposite direction down a horrible rocky road that was bumpy and took forever. The region around San Agustin was the source of Columbia’s five major rivers – the Patia, Putumayo, Cauca, Caqueta, and the Magdalena. The area is also home to the mountains from where this water comes from such as the Paramo de las Papas, Paramo de Guanacas, the Coconucos, the Pan de Azucar, and the Nevado del Huila.

The scenery was fantastic – we were literally driving through cloud forest on either side, passing coffee and banana plantations as well – two of the most common export crops from the region. At one point just after our lunch stop, we came across a military base. The Columbian authorities made us all get out of the van and searched some of the passengers for drugs and weapons. They went into the van and looked through a couple of the bags as well. It was an annoying diversion as we were ready to get to San Agustin, and when we climbed back onto the van we faced another hour or so of bumpy roads. Once we arrived at the turnoff for San Agustin, Colin and I got out of the van and were transferred into an included taxi to make the final few kilometers uphill to the city. San Agustin, Columbia is a fantastically beautiful area!

Our taxi dropped us off in town (after trying to shuffle us to some of their own hostels) and I stopped with the bags to have a soda while Colin found and internet café and booked us in to a nice place for our last few days on our 2 year trip.   

This nice placed ended up being Hostal Huaka-yo, a hotel (with affordable prices, however) owned by Cesar, a friendly Columbian we met on our final day at the hotel. Cesar lives in the United States with his American wife, and he was so cheery and helpful, a delight to be around – and his new hotel has the same atmosphere. We were uncertain about the hotel at first – the WIFI was out and we seemed a little out of town – but the internet (which actually came by radio and there had been a fire in the box, so no blame there) was working the very next morning, our room and bed were absolutely massive, the food was delicious, and the location just a short walk from the park was unbeatable. The hotel arranged all of the offered (and well-priced) tours for us as well, and we ended up seeing everything possible in San Agustin in the 3 days we had there without any trouble or hassles whatsoever. Very unique for South America, and much appreciated in our final days!

On the morning of March 9th, Colin and I had a couple of hours in the morning to explore the main San Agustin Archaeological park, which is the largest pre-Columbian collection of large burial mounds and stone funerary monuments of ancient chiefdom rulers. The 20 religious funeral mounds in the park sometimes included stone sarcophagi, stone corridors, stone columns, and more than 200 stone statues (most from the Regional Classic Period of 1 CE to 900 CE) of tomb guards, powerful warriors or shaman, supernatural beings, or anthropomorphic gods. They were created by the San Agustin society, a north Andean culture which occupied part of the upper Magdalena River between the 1st and 8th centuries CE. The fact that such an ancient society built these religious displays indicates a strong belief in the importance of religious (and likely political, as main political leaders were buried here) ceremonial activities. Overall, the entire San Agustin complex contains more than 600 stone statues guarding and displayed around 40 burial mounds. 

We walked into the park and bought our tickets, then headed over to a map to see how big the park was. The park included Mesita A, Mesita B, Mesita C, La Estación, Alto de Lavapatas and Fuente de Lavapatas – which is a stone bed carved with religiously significant symbols, onto which a steady stream of water flows. Mesita A and C are the two oldest and the two largest of the sites. 

The first place we visited was Mesita D, a small collection of funerary statues in an area which was used for ceremonial purposes.

After a quick look at Mesita D we headed into the forest to see a collection of 39 larger statues known as the Bosque de la Estatuas. These various statues of deities, warriors, and shamans were placed in the forest for display purposes only, as they were originally recovered from looted and destroyed funeral mounds all around San Agustin.

Colin and I left the forest of statues and headed towards one of the biggest sections of the part called Mesita A. ‘Mesita’ comes from the term ‘little table,’ so named because the stone slabs above many of the funeral mounds form a table-like structure over the buried body. This area used to be occupied by people 2000 years ago who built several dwellings on the land between 300 BCE and 1 CE. After this period, the area was converted into a burial site. In Mesita A, two funerary mounds were found which had been created during the Regional Classic Period of 300 CE to 800 CE. Three of the larger structures were tombs of elite individuals and some reached up to 4 meters in height and 10 meters in diameter. These tombs show evidence of secondary burial (bones placed in an urn after a primary earth burial, accompanied by ceramics and metal objects), which was common in pre-Hispanic societies and very similar to what was found at Tierradentro.

The next group, Mesita C, showed 15 different stone statues and forty-nine different tombs. Radiocarbon dating shows these tombs date from 1 CE to 900 CE, and many of the statues alongside the tombs are decorated with elaborate jewelry, including earrings, nose rings, along with musical instruments. 

As we walked through the cloud forest, heading closer to the Fuente de Lavapatas (the Lavapatas fountain) we noticed a frog carved into a rock, with its head pointing towards the direction of the fountain. Some archeologists believe this may have been an ancient indication that the fountain was near – and of its direction.

We continued and reached the Fuente de Lavapatas, which was discovered in 1937 by Ernesto Gumis. This fountain has also been dated from the Regional Classical Period (1 CE to 900 CE) and contained multiple canals and pools, as well as carvings of humans, reptiles, and amphibians. There were numerous carvings of snakes, which symbolize water. Unfortunately, many of the carvings have suffered damage over the last couple of decades and archeologists are running an investigation into the source of the damage.

It was a long walk up to the next site from the fountain, which was called Alto de Lavapatas. This site had a great view of the surrounding nature, and has been used since 3300 BCE (radiocarbon dated from an ancient hearth) as a domestic area and burial ground – most crucially during the Lower Formative Period (1000 BCE to 1 CE) and the Recent Period (900CE to 1500 CE.) On the site eleven pit-like tombs made from stone slabs were found, which quite possibly could have been a children’s burial ground. One of the most interesting statues at this site is the restored piece called the “Double Self” (by archeologist Konrad Preuss) which has been said to be a standing warrior combining animal and human (male) features. The piece has been placed back where it was originally found.

 

Colin and I climbed back down the hill to explore Mesita B, the next section. Within this area was one of the largest known statues which had two opposed bodies, each ending in heads, separated by a double central line. The upper body had a trapezoidal shaped headdress and is holding the legs of a child. The lower body has a round eyed human face marked by feline fangs and an adornment on its forehead.

 

There was also a large head of a statue (the rest is missing) which had a brown line along its cheeks – indicating that part of the statue was uncovered before its excavation. The upper part of this statue’s headdress has six figures arranged in step-like fashion.

 

At the end of the park was a small museum which showed us additional statues, along with photos of statues we had seen and how they were used as decoration for the town square, or as the foundation of people’s homes. The museum led us through a timeline of the site, starting with the Pre-Ceramic Period of 4000 BCE to 1000 BCE. Archeologist have only found evidence of fire, wild fruit consumption, and the basalt stone tools these nomadic individuals left behind. From the Formative Period of 1000 BCE until 1 CE, people began to establish permanent homes that were organized into small farming communities which cultivated maize near the main rivers. During this time there was not much stone carving, but building in wood taking place, and we have found their basic pottery in simple vertical-shaft tombs. 

The Regional Classic Period of 1 CE to 900 CE period had an increase in both population, lithic art, and the society’s links with outsiders. People concentrated around the tombs and funerary centers which formed villages that some archeologists believe could serve as small political units led by high ranking people. This concentration of people led to political leaders gaining more power, and as a result some huge, complex religious stone monuments and reliefs were created.   

Finally, the Recent Period of 900 CE to 1530 CE shows while the people occupied the same places and agricultural techniques seemed to have improved (terracing and the manioc crop were introduced), the building of large tombs and stone monuments slows down and eventually stops. Pottery styles change, and cultural seems to shift to a less complex social structure. This regression occurs between 1000 CE and 1350 CE, and is possibly due to an occupation of the region by the warrior Yalcones people or the Andakis people, the latter who came down from the Upper Caqueta river basin of the Amazon region. The descendants of these groups were conquered by the Spanish in the 17th century.

 

One interesting point the museum made was regarding the numerous pieces of ceramics found at the site. The literature said that archeologists have a split opinion about these ceramics: Gerardo Reichel-Dolmatoff conducted research in the 1960’s and ended up believing that three different cultures occupied the area, each with their own separate style. This contrasted with archeologist Luis Duque Gomez, who believed one culture occupied the area and simply evolved their style over time through contact with other cultures. In any case, the ceramics found at San Agustin do have a variety. There are some from the Regional Classic Period which are typically tall jars or bowls which have a tripod structure, and are decorated with red paint and incisions. During the Formative Period, there were large plates and pots created, many decorated with geometric patterns such as rows of dots. And pottery from the Recent Period has been found to be very smooth, decorated with red painted lines, dots or fingerprint impressions, along with painted figures.

 

After the museum we headed back to the hotel for lunch. A short while later (as it began raining – but we were given ponchos!) we headed out on horses to see some more sites around town. The horses were really cute (though one of the poor things shoes fell off!) The first place he brought us to was called El Tablon – a group of four statues a few miles away from town. The carvings were very impressive, especially with their anthropomorphic features such as jaguar teeth.

Next we took the horses to the site of La Chaquira. We walked past coffee plantations, and headed down a bunch of stairs to see some beautiful waterfalls and a fantastic view into the gorge where the Rio Magdalena ran through. There were loads of birds flying all around the mountains in front of us, and the place just looked picture post-card perfect. We turned to where we had just walked to see images of divinities carved into the rock face of the mountain.

We took the horses next to the twin sites of El Purutal and La Pelota, which were quite near each other. El Purutal was some more brilliantly preserved, but now plain in color, stone statues. La Pelota dates from the 6th century, and was one of our favorites. The male and female statues at the site were very colorful, with their original pigment still showing. Our guide brought us over to a tree and showed us how it was one of the sources of natural pigment used by the statue’s creators. Unfortunately the statues were vandalized recently, having been painted over to brighten their colors.

On the 10th of March Colin and I were collected from our hotel for our jeep tour. The jeep tour was taking us to a few of the further away locations in the park, such as the Alto de los Idolos. Our first destination was the Estrecho del Magdalena. We took a few photos at the top, then climbed down the very slippery rocks to the bottom where we could feel the spray from the river. 

Our next jeep stop was a little museum called Obando. The site contained some 30 underground tombs, 8 of which were available to enter, and a display of the excavated pottery found in them. There were a few displays I enjoyed on local plants and crops. The museum also had some colorful murals on display showing some of the Spanish vs. Indigenous history.

After the museum we took the jeep uphill towards the next statue locations. Because it had been raining so heavily, the truck got completely stuck in the mud. Our driver didn’t know what he was doing and ended up taking OFF the 4 wheel drive before trying to gun it up the mountain. A few of the cars behind us managed to get themselves stuck in the mud as well and we ended up having to wait for more than two hours until they managed to get the car free. We got so bored we walked up the road and explored a local sugar cane factory. Once we got back in the car and started going again we were all starving, and gobbled up our food once we got to the lunch stop.

After lunch we headed inside the Alto De Los Idols and started quickly exploring the extensive site. Within the site were artificial platforms, drainage ditches, and funerary monuments. Some of the volcanic stone monuments on this site were more than 4 meters tall, and sat outside the stone tombs set up on the site. As we explored the site we came across statues in an area of Mesita A and an area of Mesita B. Both of these hills had tops flattened by the pre-Hispanic occupants, who connected the two resulting plateaus at the same level. The statues we came across in these areas were created between 1 CE and 900 CE, though the space has been occupied from 1000 BCE to 1530 CE. Again the funerary pieces found indicated the area was the political center of a chiefdom. The first statue we encountered was massive. The statue had been found buried 1/3 in the ground, guarding a tomb at its feet which was decorated with yellow, red, and black circles.  

 

Behind this statue was Mesita A, which had numerous stone graves where obsidian and ceramic fragments have been found. There were quite a few large pieces here as well, some which still had colorful paint on them. 

 

 

 

To the east we found Mesita B, which contained two graves. Both graves contained stone statues of crocodiles with teeth and clawed feet, and had remains of charcoal found in them. 

 

We jumped back into the van and half an hour later we arrived at the Alto de las Piedras, another funeral site, but one which had been severely damaged by looting. Here we found some stone graves which contained braided gold wires with polished green beads, along with 85 individual small gold beads and 10 square sheets of gold. There was another statue very similar to the one we saw at Alto De Lavapatas, but much better preserved. This statue was of a male human with jaguar teeth and a second human/animal figure on his back wearing a headdress on his head and back. The tomb where this statue was found was decorated in a geometric motif of black on a red background. Another statue we saw had a tomb with red and yellow paint, and one of the final statue was possibly that of a pregnant woman decorated with a headdress and necklace and black, yellow, and red painted geometric designs.   

Since we were delayed quite a lot with the mud, our original plans of going to the Salto de Bordones waterfall were scrapped. We ended up going to a different, but equally beautiful, waterfall called the Salto del Mortiño on the way back into town. We got to take some fantastic photos of the parakeets flying into the waterfall, home for the evening and eager to get into their stone crevasse homes behind the protective water shield.

Once we were back in town, Colin and I booked our bus ticket to Bogota for the next morning. A taxi back and dinner waited for us – and one last night in San Agustin! And the countdown to leave Columbia…

Francesca