Bogota is a big city. In fact, only NYC and Mexico City are larger to the north. Today we hoped to go by bus from Bogota to the small town of Villa de Leyva, about 100 miles away. First we asked the hotel to get a taxi for us to go to the bus terminal. This trip took about half an hour in heavy traffic. At the bus terminal, (no one spoke English) we fumbled with our Spanish enough to find the bus company (among dozens) that left next for Villa, bought two tickets and then waited an hour before we boarded the bus. It took another hour to get out of Bogota and into the countryside. We bought a "direct" ticket. That simply meant that we did not change buses to our destination. But the bus stopped frequently to pick up or let off passengers, stretching the 100 mile trip into 4-1/2 hours.
The destination was worth the slow ride. Villa is a quaint little colonial town (maybe 6000 souls) with cobblestone streets, white-washed buildings and red tile roofs. It serves as a get-away community for Bogotanos. It has tons of restaurants serving all kinds of food, from Thai and French to vegetarian. The food in Colombia has been outstanding so far. No hot, peppery dishes. Lots of potato, corn and soups.
As we arrived, the clouds gathered and rain started. We ducked into a restaurant with live guitar music and ordered...you guessed it, our second bowl of ajiaco accompanied by Colombian beer. We eventually got a taxi to take us to our lodging about 3 miles out of town. We were pleasantly surprised by Casona San Nicolas, a large home/ranch converted to guest rooms.
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