Paipa - Not Just Hot Springs

We came to Paipa to find some hot springs. It is a locals tourist town and was recommended to us by several people. There are many hotels but no backpacker hostels. We actually do not see any other noticeably recognizable foreigners during our three days in Paipa though we do meet several Colombian tourists.

The city itself is quite small, but they do have a tourist office which gives a snazzy 60 page book in English and Spanish about Paipa's offerings. The hot springs are one of the main attractions of the region and the reason most people head to Paipa. The pools are 4 Km from the main plaza and a bus there costs 1000 pesos (US $0.52). These hot springs have been used for hundreds of years by the indigenous and then the Spanish. They count twenty different minerals as the water's medicinal components. Plus they reap benefits (health and financial) from the algae and thermal mud. 

The source water is always between 118 - 224 degrees F

Outside of the pools is the hot springs source in all its bubbling glory. From here the water is siphoned in two directions. The first is to a spa that charges 36,000 Colombian Pesos (US $18.95) for a six activity, two hour circuit. The second is a water park that consists of three pools some restaurants and a water slide. We pay 12,000 pesos per person (US $6.32) plus 6,000 more each for mud therapy treatments and 1,200 for the obligatory bathing cap.

The hot spring pools here are not very aesthetic. They are just cement swimming pools. We usually prefer soaking in a somewhat natural setting. The source water is too diluted and not so warm. It also has a strange shade of green from the algae. There are some restaurants and a bar. The water slide lands into a cold pool. Too cold actually because today is not warm at all while the sun has been hiding behind heavy clouds. After a deep green swim/soak we go get our thermal mud treatment. There is still no sun so we stand by the bubbling cauldron hoping that the steam will warm us up. It doesn't. We do however get a great hot spring shower in order to rinse off the mud.

Back in Paipa central, we are enjoying being in a small town where people just seem to be going about their business. There does not seem to be much nightlife, but we are here during a winter festival. We do a Christmas light tour in neighboring villages and catch a dance performance that spans history from a pre-Colombian interpretive dance that is more like a Vegas show at a casino that is about to be bulldozed to several wonderful traditional folkloric dances and then they finish with embarrassingly bad tango and hip-hop performances. Maybe just to prove to everyone that you should stick with what you know (ie. folkloric dancing). 

Yikes!

The next day we walk four kilometers to Hotel Hacienda del Salitre a former hacienda for some Spanish bigwigs. The grounds changed hands several times and in 1819 the hacienda hosted Simon Bolivar and his army for two nights during their campaign against the Spanish. Almost two hundred years later it is a working and expensive hotel. You can even stay in the same room as General Bolivar himself. Visitors are welcome to take a self-guided tour of the historic hacienda. The building is beautiful and the old interiors feel like you are sitting in history.

Our exquisite Paipa guidebook also has a short list of Paipa delicacies and we make an effort to try every one of them by stopping in lots of small shops and bakeries around town.

Almojabana (baked ball with cheese inside) with a sour rice drink
 (I lost the scrap paper with the name on it)

If you aren't one for traditional snacks you can stop by for some Simpsons ice cream. They did such a good job with their copyright infringement that one could almost believe that Paipa is a test market for a soon to be ice cream chain featuring the iconic cartoon family.

Doh!

Greetings from Paipa

Light My Spire - Boyaca, Colombia

In Colombia, if you want to know where to travel the best thing to do is ask Colombians. Every time we meet someone and tell them the general direction we are headed we get a short list of small towns and beautiful sights that we should visit in that particular area. These places are usually well off the gringo tourist trail and are sometimes even hard to find on the English version of Google.com.

This is exactly how we find ourselves in Paipa, Boyaca. And it is also exactly why we find ourselves doing the Ruta Navideña (Christmas Route) around the Boyaca region on December 21st. We have heard about this tour from several different Colombians. There are six routes to choose from and the buses leave around 6 PM, or when they get nine paying passengers. The tours stop at the main plazas of the tiny towns around Boyaca and we get between 20 minutes to an hour to soak up the lights and try local specialties. Our van is full early so we leave at 5:30 PM. We all get a festive, complimentary Blow Pop before heading off. Mika and I sit in front so we also get some good tidbits of information from the driver.


View Larger Map

Being quite cynical about the over-commercialization of Christmas in North America, I was a bit skeptical about how enjoyable this tour would be. I went into it with the attitude of "when in Rome...", but in the end it was really quite fun. We visited six tiny towns that we would have otherwise never considered going to (or would have never heard of). The towns' decorations ran the full spectrum from kitschy to classy.


Stop #1 - Santa Rosa   A town famous for giving Simon Bolivar* a white horse during his campaign against the Spanish. As the first stop on the tour, Santa Rosa is worrisome. Around the main plaza are strange three dimensional models of animal scenes, biblical and Santa related. Nothing is really lit well and it's all a bit goofy.

Green cathedral of Santa Rosa

A poor man's North Pole winter scene

 Stop #2 - Tobasia   Since we are driving on small dirt roads without much civilization between, the towns can be seen from some distance away. The tiny pueblo Tobasia is lit up with a white glow in the distance. At the main plaza there are some stalls selling food. The "capilla" was built by the Spanish over 400 years ago. "Capillas" - small churches - were built in towns to indoctrinate the indigenous communities to Catholicism. Around the plaza some children are playing hide and seek in one of those, "remember when it was safe for kids to run around after dark in ______ (insert name of large town or city)" moment.

In all of these towns the main church is the largest building so when all lit up they stand alone strongly against the pitch black sky without any light interference from other big buildings.

Capilla and food cart

A store on the main square

Stop #3 - Floresta   Floresta's lighting is much more psychedelic than the previous two towns. The buildings around the square are lit up with colorful interpretations of grape vines, a famous product of the area. To get the full true feeling of our experience try to imagine salsa music pumping loudly as you look at the next two images.

Stop #4 - Busbanza   This town really gave a half-hearted effort to their decorating (a lame duck mayor perhaps?). Or maybe Busbanza just happens to be the town between stops #3 and #5 so we pop by for a look. Our visit is saved by our nice chat with a family of women who came to the plaza this night wearing traditional dress and hand spinning wool.

Stop #5 - Corrales   Corrales is the advertised highlight of the tour and does not disappoint. We are given an hour here to wander around and to try their region-famous tamales. By this time at night it is starting to get cold because we are over 2000 m (6500 ft) above sea level so having an herbal tea (aromatica) laced with aguardiente (anise flavored alcohol) hits the spot.

View of Corrales from the hill

Tamalepalooza: Corrales' hearty tamales are stuffed with
garbanzo beans, pork, beef and (not or) chicken

Around Christmas kids dress up like demons and chase other kids trying to hit them
with plastic bottles. I did not quite understand our driver's explanation as to why they
do this, but the tradition remains strong in these small towns.   

Stop #6 - Nobsa   By the final spot it is around 10:30 PM. I am quite tired and it is very cold outside. Nobsa's main square has two open air tents with dioramas. One is strangely a scene of the film Shrek and the second is like It's a Small World for the Boyaca region. We do not want to wait in line and just sneak peaks from the outside. We stay warm by visiting the shops around selling artisan goods.

Nobsa's cathedral

It's a small town afterall

* Simon Bolivar is the great general who led Colombia, Bolivia, Ecuador, Venezuela and Panama to independence. A guide referred to him as the George Washington of South America.

Oil painting by Ricardo Acevedo Bernal