Determined to make up for the lack of activities the day beforewe headed out after making some quick breakfast. First stop: the grave of Pablo Escabar, which, as far as graves go, is nice enough but a fair 15 minute drive out of town to the graveyard which is in the industrial estate.
It's still popular with tourists, and I believe it has a Lonley Planet listening, but we were the only ones there at the time. If you know a little of the history its a great stop along the way.
With no taxi anymore, we headed out of the graveyard and caught a (very) local bus into the city central. Next stop was the Museo de Antioquía. Which features not only histortic and contemporary art, but the sculptures and paintings of the world renown artist Botero. Often nick named the Museo Gordo (translates to the 'Fat Museum') his round figures were only used to symbolise the circle (a representation of a cycle) which he saw in everything in the world around him.
Getting to the museum was not quite as simple as that, the bus dropped us in the commercial district of the city, and after trying to ask him for directions, a local man at the fruit stand near by over heard us, and offered to take us there. A little suspicious at first, the three of us felt we'd give it a shot, and soon enough we were walking down town getting a breif history on Medellin and the first of the Botero sculptures that can be found throughout the city.
We sound found ourselves in front of the museum and Eddy (our new local friend) explained a few more things about the city and its national buildings. We thanked him prefusely, and were expected to give him a little tip or something, but he simply wished us well and headed off himself.
It was great to see the 3 levels and the styles each of them contained, the 3rd was dedicated entirely to Botero. The picture above I quickley snapped after being told earlier no photography was permitted, but this I had to have.
Afterwards, we headed to the metro. This is the only metro in Colombia, and is a great way to travel above the city. Its fast, clean and reliable. Really puts Sydney trains into perspective. Our next stop was the Metro Cable - which is a purpose built cable car to lift passengers to the residencies in the steep side of the city. Its included in the price of the train ticket and you're free to get off at any one of the 3 stations at anytime. We took it right to the top and got a fantastic view over the entire city of Medellin.
A group of young school girls started giggling, and we soon realised how few tourists were coming up to this area. As usual Chivers was the first to be spotted, he's far taller than us and with blonde hair and a loud voice is quite obviously not local. They tried to talk to us thinking it was rather funny.
Very soon after we headed back down the metro cable to the main metro station and caught our train back to the suburb we were staying in 'Suramericana' to return to the Palm Trees Hostal.
Very soon after we headed back down the metro cable to the main metro station and caught our train back to the suburb we were staying in 'Suramericana' to return to the Palm Trees Hostal.
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