BARICHARA!

After lost of tries, finally we managed to go to Barichara! - a town that by many people is called "the most beautiful one" of Colombia! Javier, myself and two other friends were the group with the mandate to find out if all the comments heard were true.

Barichara is an authentic old world colonial town in the north east of Colombia, in a department called Santander. It is a very pleasant place to walk around and we stayed probably in the best place ever: COGOLLO CANEY. Seriously, if you ever plan to go to this zone of Colombia, make sure you stay there.

Even if officially recognized as a B&B, Cogollo Caney also responds to the concept of a family hostel, which means nothing else than staying in a house (that looks and works as a house, a residence) where also the family members live. Now, in the case of Cogollo Caney we are talking of a big, spacious house with so many different environments, that at moments one might think that it´s certainly a hotel. However the fact that there are only 4 rooms in the whole house and the close interaction with the family members, few employees that work there and even the pets (a dog and a parrot), brings you back to the feeling of just being visiting friends over the weekend. The other fantastic fact of having stayed there, is that the house is built in the traditidional architecture and with the traditional construction materials of Barichara: sand and wood. The house itself has won several architecture prices, and beyond that, the house is administered and decorated probably the best people in Colombia to do it: the owners (and family parents) are an architect and a interior designer. Here you can even take a look at the foundation that the owner has to educate around this type of ancient construction techniques. Finally another small detail that captured our heart was having ceiling-less bathrooms! I know it sounds weird, but taking a shower in a space without a roof, all decorated with plants and still having delicious hot water and a classy decoration, is probably one of the coolest things I´ve done.

Seems that the experience at the family hostel was more impressive than the visit to the town itself, right? Well, I can´t deny without COGOLLO CANEY the Barichara experience wouldn´t have been the same, but of course the trip went beyond that. Barichara and some of the other towns around in the department of Santander and known for being great places for adventure sports/also known as extreme sports (paragliding, jumps into dark caves, boggie driving, well and thousand other crazy things …!). Sad news is that we played it safe and did not do anything extreme … instead we went for walks around the town, for buying handcrafts, for a admiring wonderful landscapes as the one we found at the Parque Nacional del Chicamocha and for eating! eating! and eating! typical dishes of the region as Cabrito con Pepitoria (motton) and all kinds of random fast food…!

Again this is one of this posts (and trips!) where no matter how many pictures you show and stuff you write, it won´t describe the magic of the place. In those cases all you can do is endorsing to friends Barichara as a very nice destination to experience adventure, romance, relax and a special hospitality as only few places can offer.