The Crew Assembles
It started with a voice note from Saskia at three in the morning. "Roo, mate. I'm booking us a van. Colombia. Five days. Tell the others." No preamble, no "how does this sound"—just Saskia being Saskia, which is to say completely unhinged in the most reliable way possible.
By the next morning, five of us had committed to absolute madness: Saskia (adventure junkie, perpetually tan), Delphine (photographer who somehow makes broken things look beautiful), Maz (the only person among us with actual savings), Reuben (me, eternal flip-flop casualty), and Jamie, a Scottish lad we'd met in a hostel in Bogotá who agreed to come along despite knowing none of us.
We rented a beat-up Toyota van that smelled like previous travellers' bad decisions and started in Medellín. The plan was loose. The reality would be chaos.
Day One: The Neighbourhoods That Made Us Rethink Everything
Medellin's changed since its dark days, but plenty of tourists show up expecting a theme park of redemption. We wanted the actual story.
Roo (that's me) booked us onto the Comuna 4 Walking Tour Medellín Comuna 4 Walking Tour Medellin, and mate, it was nothing like I expected. Our guide, Carlos, grew up there—actually lived it, didn't just study it for a gig. He took us through narrow streets where murals weren't Instagram props but genuine community voice. People had reclaimed their neighbourhood from decades of being erased by everyone else's fear. The energy was real. No performance. Just locals saying, "This is ours, and we're telling it." Walking those streets with five of us joking nervously, trying to be respectful and probably failing half the time, somehow made it stick more. You can't make light of everything when you're actually standing there.
That evening, Delphine convinced us to do the Private Tour Comuna 13 with Cable Car Ride Private Tour Comuna 13 with Cable Car Ride the next morning. "It's touristy, yeah," she said, "but the cable car ride alone is mental." She was right. The private van meant we weren't crushed against seventy other tourists, and when we rode the cable car over the hillside, actually seeing how people navigate those slopes daily, it hit differently. The neighbourhood's become famous for its street art and transformation story—and yes, that means tour groups—but there's something real underneath the Instagram feeds. The van let us chat with our driver about what's actually changed versus what's just been polished for cameras.
Day Two: Wildlife, Sweat, and Completely Legitimate Panic
We drove to Cartagena the next afternoon (six hours of cramped van nonsense, everyone's music taste clashing, Jamie singing Scottish folk songs we didn't ask for). Delphine had booked the Howling Trail Hike The Howling Trail Hike for the following morning, and none of us fully understood what we'd signed up for.
Eight hours. Tropical Dry Forest. Cotton Top Tamarins—these tiny, white-topped monkeys found nowhere else on Earth. The guide said it was an "moderate" hike. The guide was either a liar or superhuman.
Two hours in, Maz's knees were screaming. Saskia was still grinning like a maniac. Delphine had her camera on everything (the tamarins were absurdly cute, to be fair). Jamie kept asking if we were "nearly there yet" in the most genuine, broken way. And me? I'd lost both flip-flops by hour three—which, given my track record, was actually ahead of schedule.
But here's the thing: when you're absolutely wrecked, dying in actual humidity, feet blistered beyond recognition, and you round a corner to see these tiny, endangered primates doing their thing in the canopy, completely unbothered by five sweaty idiots staring up at them—something shifts. You can't Instagram desperation and genuine wildlife. It's just you, your mates, and the forest reminding you how small you are.
We collapsed back at the hotel around seven p.m. Nobody talked. Just showered and ordered about four litres of water each.
Day Three: The Rock, The Town, The Actual Flight
Guatapé is one of those places that's become a box to tick. Pink colonial buildings, a massive rock you climb, lots of selfie sticks. We almost skipped it.
Then Saskia mentioned the Private Guatapé & Paragliding: Epic Views & Thrills Private Guatapé & Paragliding: Epic Views & Thrills tour, and suddenly everyone was interested again. The private setup meant we weren't shuffled through the town like cattle. We got picked up from El Poblado, driven through the actual countryside instead of just seeing photos of it, climbed El Peñol—the famous rock—and watched the view actually open up.
But the paragliding. Christ.
Saskia went first because of course she did. One minute she's waving goodbye from the cliff edge, the next she's a speck above the lake, and all of us are losing our minds. When she landed, she was shaking but wouldn't stop grinning. Delphine went next, then Jamie, then Maz. I was last—always am—and spent my entire approach to the edge convincing myself this was a fine idea.
It wasn't. It was terrifying. It was also the most alive I've felt in months.
We landed back in town, bought far too many beers, and just sat by the water talking about nothing important until the sun made the lake turn gold.
Day Four: Learning Respect From People Who Actually Know Things
Maz had secretly booked the Coffee & Chocolate Private Tour in Medellin: Genuine Experience Coffee & Chocolate Private Tour in Medellin: Genuine Experience for our last full day. An hour outside the city, two working farms—one cacao, one coffee—run by actual families who'd been doing this for generations.
There's a massive difference between learning how chocolate is made and standing in a cacao field while someone's grandmother explains the soil, the seasons, the market that keeps crushing them. Same with coffee. The farms weren't tourist operations dressed up; they were real people trying to make a living while we lobbed questions at them.
One farmer, Roberto, gave Delphine a hard time about photographing before asking permission. "You take picture, you take little bit of us," he said. Wasn't mean—just matter-of-fact. She asked before every shot after that.
We processed our own chocolate by hand. It was harder than it looked. We understood, finally, why it costs what it costs.
The Return and the Actual Point
Five days isn't enough time to really know a place. We were tourists—thoughtless sometimes, respectful sometimes, utterly clueless most of the time. But something about doing it together, as complete misfits, meant we actually showed up instead of just passing through.
Driving back to Bogotá, wedged in the van again with Jamie's folk songs and everyone's bad takes on Colombian politics, I realised the best travel isn't about maximising experiences. It's about being present enough that the people you're with and the places you visit actually stay in your head after the filters fade.
Also, I bought three new pairs of flip-flops. Lost two by Bogotá airport. Some things are just guaranteed.
