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Colombia: Villages near Armenia for retirement:
Trip report for Quindio.
My girlfriend and I arrived in Pereira last week for a few days and liked it but agreed it´s too big for us. We prefer a village but within one hour of the city. We decided to spend a week around Armenia, Quindio.
On Friday we took a 45 minute bus ride from Pereira, Risaralda terminal to Alcala which is near Quimbaya, Alcala is in the state of Valle del Cauca.
Our experience in Valle del Cauca near Cali was that it was hot and dry, but Alcala is perched up on a small mountain with cooler air. We were only there for a few hours and found it to be friendly enough but not very appealing as a place to stay.
In the afternoon we took a 15 minute bus ride to Quimbaya in Quindio department to spend the night. Quimbaya is a nice pueblo, bigger than Alcala and has a central park that has a lot more activities and there were plenty of little bars and restuarants spread around the square and the nearby side streets.
We had dinner in a little family restaurant and it was good, costing 10,000 pesos each for bandeja paisa which is fried pork fat chicharron, pork sausage chorizo, fried egg, brown beans, white rice, tiny salad, fried plantain, sliced avocado. It came with a really good bowl of vegetable soup and a delicious mango juice. The meal was delicious but definitely not a weight watchers delight.
After dinner we wandered around the park and watched the kids playing on the several little cars and trampoline and what not .Very festive atmosphere. Then we found a bar not too crowded that was playing old time music and we had a couple beers and enjoyed watching the couples and families having a good time.
We spent Saturday night in Quimbaya in a hotel about 5 blocks off the square. Our room had wifi, a double bed, a circular fan and light in the ceiling, a balcony and a bathroom with hot water. Cost was 50,000 for the two of us. It was on a quiet street so we slept well. I could definitely see a possible future retirement in Quimbaya. Its small enough to be cozy but big enough to have some interesting things to do and the several people we asked about apartments or houses for rent said there were some to look at but we didn´t go look at any of them.
After breakfast on Sunday we caught a 20 minute bus ride to Filandia. I was pretty excited to visit Filandia after all the write ups on this forum. When we got there I was surprised to see its a tiny little village perched on the crown of a small mountain. I can really see why some people are arguing there are only a thousand or so people living in the village.
The little central park is small but nice and there are bars and bakeries and mom and pop restaurants. We walked around a while to get a feel for it but didn´t feel anything special. We stopped at a hotel two blocks off the square to find out a room for two was 100,000 pesos. It looked clean but we decided there really wasn´t enough of interest to keep us in Filandia overnight so we went back to the park to find a restaurant for lunch.
Most of the restaurants we saw were just a few tables with a sparse menu. About a block off the park we found a nice mom and pop restaurant with a decent looking menu. The restaurant is in a old family house with tables in the living room where we sat with a window view of the street.
I saw trout on the menu and ordered that, my girlfriend ordered a fried chicken fillet. I was pretty disappointed because the trout was planked and fried. It tasted similar to her fried chicken filet. The meal included soup and a tiny salad and rice and a small glass of watery juice. Cost 30,000 for the two of us and not very good.
We hung out in the park for a couple hours chatting with passers by. Everyone was friendly but nobody knew of any houses or apartments for rent. Its pretty easy to get bored in Filandia so we went to the bus stop at the corner of the park and boarded a ratty little bus to go to Circasia which is on the way to Armenia. We thought we would check out Circasia for a couple hours then go on to Armenia for the night.
When we got to Circasia we were surprised to see its a very pretty village and about the same size as Quimbaya. There are several things of interest in Circasia so we decided to spend the night, but wound up actually spending two nights. The hotel was clean and quiet with hot water and wifi and cost 50,000 per night for the two of us. The central park is very nice, much bigger than Filandia but not as big and festive as Quimbaya. There are lots of little restaurants and bars and discos. There is a church under construction because the old one burned down. We went for evening mass and enjoyed it. I´m not catholic but my girlfriend is and she said it was a nice mass. I followed most of it, my spanish is intermediate so I got the gist of it. Because I was the only gringo lots of people stopped to chat with us and made us feel welcome.
We had a really good dinner in a family restaurant a block off the square. No more trout for me, I ordered beef filet and my girlfriend had pork fillet. The meal was very tasty and cost 20,000 for the two.
Everything in Quimbaya and Circasia seems to be much less expensive than Filandia. We spent Monday enjoying Circasia and saw a couple nice apartments for rent and some people told us there are casa fincas for rent around Circasia. I could definitely see retiring there.
On Tuesday morning we caught the bus to go to Salento but we had to first get off as the bus entered Armenia then wait for a different bus going to Salento. The ride to Salento was very pretty through the valley with plenty of nice vistas and climbing up the mountains. Along the way we crossed a really nice looking river and I wandered if they do float tubing or kayak rentals. It looked like it would be fun to float through the valley. There were also horse stables offering trail rides but we weren´t in a mood for that. Maybe go back another time to do it.
Salento is a good sized village with a central park that is pretty dismal because its small and is being repaired. Most of the activity is along a main street that goes about 4 blocks from the park to the base of a high stairs that leads to an overlook with fantastic vistas. It really was worth the climb up the stairs. The main street is crowded with little restaurants and souvenir shops, some offering junk and others offering decent merchandise. All the buildings on that main street are brightly painted and the atmosphere is very touristy.
We had lunch in one of the little restaurants and it was typical Colombian lunch, meat, beans, rice, tiny salad and watery juice. Cost 14,000 for the two of us. After about 3 hours we had seen all we cared to see so we caught the bus back to Armenia.
I want to go back and spend more time in Circasia and my second choice would be Quimbaya. I think either would be an excellent place to retire. Definitely not Filandia or Salento, both are too small, too expensive and too touristy. Nice to visit for a day but thats all.
I also want to visit Seville and Caicidonia in Valle del Cauca. They are pueblos in the coffee region about three hours from Cali but only an hour from Armenia, up in the mountains.
Colombia: Can you drink the water in Colombia:
Chlorine itself is a major problem in water supplies. Its purpose is to kill bacteria, and that is exactly what it does, in the water supply and in digestive tract. The bacteria in the human digestive tract are what breaks down the food particles and makes the nutrients available to the body. If the bacteria are killed by over-chlorination of the water supply then the intestines will be essentially dead, unable to dissolve or digest food, thus leaving the person under-nourished.
If the body is alternating between loose stools and constipation, that is a sign of a digestive tract suffering from under-population of the correct bacteria or over-population of incorrect bacteria.
Chlorine is very bad for humans at normal strengths in water supplies, but if you can smell it in your drinking water that is deadly.
Contaminants from things such as engine oil and antifreeze and paint thinner that are carcinogenic are not removed by the various water treatment methods common in a third world water treatment plant. Mostly the third world water treatment plants just use large paper or ceramic filters to remove the organic particles, then chlorinate the rest in an effort to kill all bacteria, both good and bad.
UV does very little to kill bacteria in water that has organic particles, because the UV light does not reach all sides of the organic particle.
Colombia: Sabaneta out of control?:
Wow, a friend just sent me photos of the skyline in Sabaneta, just south of Medellin. Sabaneta was one of my favorite small cities to retire when I visited there in 2013. Now, it looks like high rise towers are going up like popcorn all over the place. Wow, population growth out of control, yes?
Colombia: Cartagena:
hola Boca, i have a question about Cartagena. I visited there for christmas and new years in 2010 and liked it a lot. The family I was staying with showed me around Cartagena and nearby Barranquilla and Santa Marta. In Cartagena I remember seeing a huge high rise tower that had been abandoned because it bent about half way up. I looked in Google just now and it says that structure was torn down in 2007, but I swear I did see it in 2010. Do you know anything about it? or is there a second structure that I´m thinking about?
Colombia: Moving to Barranquilla:
I only spent a week in Hawaii, but I was definitely impressed by the high price of pretty much everything, so I´m sure you are looking forward to the lower cost of living in Colombia.
Barranquilla was on my list of must see places in Colombia, too, but I am wondering why you chose it for retirement? It´s hot, no beaches except an hour and half distant in either Santa Marta or Cartagena. No expat community. Has some decent restaurants, particularly the Mexican place in Buena Vista, and Archies.
It´s a city, with amenities, but I didn´t find it very friendly, and there are deuce and a halfs patrolling the streets at night with a full squad of heavily armed police in each truck and escort moto police, so apparently its a dangerous city to boot.
I stayed there four weeks and needed air conditioning every night to sleep, which really annoys me because I´m a light sleeper and every time the a/c would click on to cool it would wake me up. I didn´t get a full nights sleep the whole month I was there.
I was there in 2010 and rented a two bedroom two bath apartment in a gated community, fully furnished for about 800,000 pesos per month including utilities, wifi and the gate attendant/porteria. The same apartment sans furniture would have rented for about half that at that time, surely much more now. I found the apartment through the local classifieds, nowadays I´d look on airbnb for a place to stay.
I had to jog early in the morning and late afternoon/early evening because the daytime weather is just plain hot.
I was in cargo shorts and tee shirt sweating my asss off and I watched workmen pick axing or plastering or whatever and they were wearing long sleeve shirts over tee shirts. Wow, my comfort level is waaaay different from theirs.
In most Colombian cities it is routine to see guys with bad teeth out scavenging the trash drop offs each day on the sidewalk. They carry large canvas or cloth bags about the size of a baby elephant full of cans and bottles and anything worth salvaging. There was this one guy in Barranquilla though that was going one better than that. He had a tiny burro about the size of a full grown St. Bernard pulling a little flat bed card with a former refrigerator carton strapped upright on the bed and he was going along very carefully recycling whatever had value. The burro was well trained and moved around on voice commands, stopping when needed and turning as needed and generally looking pretty bored and slightly embarrassed at his predicament. I was impressed with the professionalism of it.
One day on my early morning jog I saw a 10 wheel truck broke down in the main road leading through the neighborhood. Traffic was backed up for blocks trying to squeeze two lanes into one. At noon I went to the Buena Vista indoor mall to go shopping, and the truck was jacked up, dual wheels laying to the side and the broken axle pieces were laying in the ditch and two guys were working hurriedly to install the new axle while two lanes of traffic passed at a snail´s pace.
On my evening jog the truck was gone and no trace of it ever having been there. I marveled at the self-sufficiency. In a US city this would have been a full court press with State Patrol, local police, one or possibly two tow trucks, to get the offending vehicle towed off the highway and free up traffic. Here, it was just another day in the hood.
One thing I will say for Barranquilla, and Please, I don´t mean this to be sexist in any way, but the number of attractive women in Barranquilla is astounding. Way off the charts compared to some of the other cities I´ve visited in Colombia. Since you already have a partner that´s not going to influence your thinking, I´m sure. but, for me, it was the highlight of my month there, and possibly the single reason I might choose to go there again.
Colombia: TAX OR NO TAX?:
I agree, there has been an outlandish amount of mis-information on these forums abut the world wide income tax or whatever its called. Generally, if you are middle income and pay taxes in your home country you will not be double taxed in Colombia. It really only applies to high rollers of which I am not one.
I have annual income near 18,000 and when I asked an immigration attorney in Medellin he was very sure I would not have to pay taxes in Colombia.
Colombia: Medellin vs. Cali: Internet, Food Items, Transportation:
I´ve spent enough time in both these cities to form my own opinion, and in answer to your direct questions there is very little difference in them as far as internet speed, shopping options, transportation. Medellin probably is more ¨modern¨ and a little more ¨progressive¨ but both are still third world cities compared to similar size cities in the US.
As for Internet, I´m in a very small city a few hours from Cali and have 10mb and for the past three months have had not one moment of interrupted service.
Medellin of course has that super slick train and the cable cars which pretty much outshines the badly-in-need-of-repairs megabus system in Cali.
Medellin has about 3,000,000 people, of whom a few dozen are gringos. Cali has about 1,000,000 people of whom maybe a couple dozen are gringos. Quite frankly, in a couple weeks each in both these cities I didn´t see another gringo,. Although I have read accounts of huge numbers of them hanging out and trying to pick up Latina teeny boppers in the main park in Poblado in Medellin. I didn´t see anything like that while I was there, though.
The big difference in my opinion is the weather. Consider Medellin climate as being similar to Washington DC in early May whereas Cali is more like Atlanta in late August.
Organic and non-GMO is not really a thing here in Colombia as far as I can tell. I´ve not seen it advertised anywhere and nobody mentions it at all. When I ask they just look puzzled.
For most of my adult life I was an organic gardener in the US before retirement so take these comments in that context. For the most part, vegetables and fruits at a good farmers market in the US will far outshine the stuff available here. I have been terribly disappointed that a country like Colombia with this rich soil, abundant rain and abundant sunshine and with willing and inexpensive labor, produces such inferior fruits and vegetables.
Fruits and vegetables here are especially bad because they have not been bred up to produce sweet, good tasting fruits and vegetables.
Bananas are often woody and starchy, oranges are terrible, payapa is okay but not very sweet, strawberries aren´t worth buying because they are picked while still green, same with cantaloupe and watermelon.
Combine that with harvest and storage methods that are devilishly designed to bruise and damage produce. Everything is picked green, handled harshly and shoveled into unrefrigerated bins where it starts rotting immediately.
Things we take for granted in the US, like ripe grapes, fresh blueberries, sweet and juicy oranges and grapefruit, fresh asparagus, fresh basil, are simply not available here. Although one time I did find hydroponic basal at La Catorce, and last week I found asparagus at Price Smart.
Bagels and real Philadelphia cream cheese at Price Smart, too. and organic coconut oil.
There is a Price Smart in both Medellin and Cali, similar to Costco but not a huge selection, except for candy and chips, four whole aisles devoted to those.
Colombia: Colombian Boyfriend:
girlfriend is novia
fiancee or engaged is comprometida
wife is esposa
It is commonplace to call someone Mi Amor (my love) or Mi Cielo (my sky) or cariño (sweetheart) even from the first date.
Calling someone your future wife after a month is certainly in line with the culture.
Colombia: New city near Cartagena:
Here´s an interesting article in The Economist about a new 100,000 population city being constructed 7 miles from Cartagena. Very interesting concepts.
https://www.1843magazine.com/design/the-daily/a-city-to-grow-into
Colombia: Dental implants:
Has anyone had dental implants here in Colombia? What is the approximate cost? Thanks in advance.
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