We offered to take Felix out to thank him for all he’s done for us, namely giving us time to live together, but also providing advice on which towns to visit, which restaurants to try etc. He chose a small restaurant in Santa Elena, the town in the mountains to the west of Medellin, whose local farmers create the flower displays for Medellin’s biggest festival. He drove us up, and stopped to take this picture of us on the way back down. There was a strange man standing nearby, and on closer inspection, he seemed to be mentally challenged. He was wet and cold and apparently lost. Sandra and Felix talked to him, and found out he was from Santa Elena, so we loaded him into the car and drove back up the hill to the police station. On seeing him, they said, ‘oh, you again.’ It seems he frequently goes wandering.

Jonni, who stayed in the same place as Murray in Antigua, Guatemala, invited us to his birthday party, and we all went to play tejo, a sport commonly played in Colombia. It’s kind of like coits, but instead of throwing a ring onto a stick, you throw a heavy metal disc into a sloping square of clay, and get points according to how close you get to the centre. The most points are awarded for a ‘mecha’ or explosion when the disc hits one of the two small packs of gunpowder. As beginners, we played from the half-way line, and all of us did passably well. Afterwards, Jonni decided to try the full distance and I followed suit, not sure I could even throw that far. Amazingly, after a false start, I not only covered the distance, but hit the gunpowder sack too. Talk about beginner’s luck.

Sandra and I wanted to go on a bushwalk again, and invited Julian, who suggested a walk we failed to find once before. This time we would follow the directions and take the bus. Unfortunately, the bus wasn’t going all the way to the end of the line this day, so we couldn’t reach the starting point for the walk and ended up following some others onto a popular track. So popular, that we were just ahead of a group that were carrying their own ghetto blaster at full volume. Dropping back would only mean we’d catch up to them at some point, so Sandra stormed off to give them a piece of her mind. We came here to get away from the noise, she told them, getting angrier with each rebuttal that it was their nature too, until finally one of the party backed her up and they turned off the music. We then followed the trail peacefully until a large waterfall at the end where a few guys had set up a rope and were abseiling into the pond at the bottom. It looked like a lot of fun.

I was very impressed when Sandra slipped into the river at a point deeper than the height of her brand new boots. Rather than getting frustrated or complaining about the wet, she just laughed, put the other foot in and walked through the river for the rest of the day.

Feria de Flores is the biggest festival of the year in Medellin. On the last day, farmers from surrounding towns (particularly Santa Elena) create displays of flowers and carry them down the mountain and through the city. I didn’t brave the crowds for this display, but I caught a number of other activities and exhibits during the week long celebration. We started on Saturday afternoon by heading into the Stadium to see a concert that featured Marc Antony, who Sandra loves. I was surprised to see that men and women had to join different lines, which I thought might be so women could be searched by female police officers, but it seemed that only men were doing the searching, so I can’t explain it. I was very annoyed that they took my pens and bottle of water as some kind of security precaution, just as they confiscated belts from a number of others. We enjoyed the night, though most of the music was regaton and we left at 1am before Marc Antony had even appeared.

The next night we went to a smaller stage to see a number of performances by bands from the coastal region, which we enjoyed much more, and went again to that stage for a world music concert during the week. We’ll head to that stage again next year. I have to admit that I spent most of the night watching Sandra dancing rather than watching the stage.

Although we didn’t see the main procession, we did see a giant exhibit in the Santa Fe mall centre which came without the pain of standing around for hours, and was very impressive for the sheer number of beautiful flowers and the intricate arrangements. I think next year I’ll have to make an effort to get to the procession.

I was staying in a B&B owned by Marco and Ana since I arrived two months before. Marco threw a party for his birthday on the rooftop outside my room and Sandra was invited. It was a fun night with some salsa dancing, Colombian barbecue and even some silly costume pieces thrown in. It was my first chance to show off my gorgeous girlfriend to so many people and I loved it. Safe to say that she was a hit.