The next morning we flew to Cartagena, seeing below us the beautiful green mountain scenery of Colombia, places where we can't go in safety. Cartagena was nice and hot, back to what we were used to. A cheap taxi ride took us to our equally cheap but perfectly good hotel in a street called Media Luna. We called the shipping office here and arranged to get the landy out of its container the following week, look here for the lowdown.

The beach at Bocagrande...	...with plenty to look at

Exploring the colonial style city centre we were stunned by the sights walking around, just amazing. The following week was Semana Santa, Easter week, and Cartagena is the number one destination for Colombians. Every day the beach was packed with unreal dorises, every night the discos too, dancing to the sexy latin rhythms with just a little more clothing on.

Despite the apparent beauty of the city it is not without its dark side. Our hotel was at the far end of a street filled with a few similar hotels and many more very cheap hotel/brothels. Every day we'd run the 'gauntlet' of thieves, drug dealers, beggars and whores. Once during broad daylight a guy was a bit too insistent with his demands for money, showing his knife in one open hand, a quick sidestep was all that was needed to leave him floundering in the middle of the street. One evening we ran the gauntlet and were set upon by three guys, one running straight at T and immediately trying to stab him in the shoulder. Somehow he managed to fight him off and they all ran away empty handed. We went further down the road until we found a couple of armed soldiers and persuaded them to come back and search for the robbers. They weren't much use and the whores who'd seen it all weren't helping either. T took the opportunity to change his t-shirt which was a bit rumpled and off we went for our night on the town, returning by taxi this time! Fortunately the next day we found an apartment in the centre to spend the rest of our fruitless wait for the replacement digi camera and stereo head unit to arrive.

So here we are in Colombia, a country with serious problems, 17000 FARC guerillas, the ELN, the paramilitaries and the government army not having much success against them. A fifth of the workforce is out of a job too. The cities are relatively safe but locals use planes to travel between them. Every day the papers and TV show kidnappings, assassinations and road blocks where cars and buses have been burned out. 99% of the people we meet think we are mad for coming here, especially in a car, we're not too sure ourselves! We know that from here to Baranquilla, an hour or so along the coast, is safe. Beyond that to Venezuela, who knows? Its the least dangerous route of a very dangerous road network and its the shortest way out of here for us. We really wanted to see what Colombia was like, hopefully we'll be able to see the rest of it in more peaceful times but there seems to be no horizon for a resolution to the problems here.