And yet another bus

Well, my stay in Bucaramanga was short lived.

This afternoon, I checked out of the hostel and caught a bus from Bucramanga to a town two hours south called San Gil.

Originally, I had wanted to travel directly from Medellin to San Gil, but there were no direct routes. Bucaramanga was a nice city--with buildings, parks, and the like--but, perhaps a bit burnt out from the previous bus ride, I was all building-ed and park-ed out.

So, I took a day and a half to rejuvenate, watched some Criminal Minds and CSI Miami episodes, and moved on.

This particular bus ride was actually the most pleasant Ive had in Colombia for a number of reasons.

First, the buses in Colombia are usually fridigly cold--as I have certainly learned from experience--and this bus was mildly temperate, which was a nice change.

Second, the bus rides in Colombia are notoriously long, and this one took only two hours and change.

And third, since all of my other bus rides have been at night, everyone has been sleeping for the most part. Since this ride was during the day, I was able to strike up a conversation with the cute Colombian girl sitting next to me.

Since Im not 100% confident with my Spanish, I wasnt initially sure how to go about striking up up a conversation. But eventually I figured it out. I had my Spanish-English dictionary on my lap, and when I noticed her glance over at it, I turned to her and said, "Es mi biblia."

Its my bible.

That got things rolling.

Jenny is a 27-year old social worker, born and raised in Colombia, with dual citizenship in Venezuela--her father is from Venezuela, and her mother is Colombian. (Sadly, Torrenay, I didnt get a chance to ask her if she likes beer.) She was heading to a town three hours south of San Gil for work. Its actually a shame that we werent headed to the same place--or that we dont live in the same hemisphere--because she was smart, cute, and quite enjoyable to talk to.

Ah, well. I guess I found my self a new facebook friend.

My plan is to spend a few days here in San Gil before heading on to Bogota, my final destination. As the adventure sports capital of Colombia, I suppose Ill engage myself in some sort of adventure sport in the next day or so.

(Itll have to be a reasonably priced adventure sport, because the funds are running low.)