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Friday, November 27, 2015

The odd statues at San Agustin, Colombia

Yesterday morning, we walked down to the main road and took the local bus to the archaeological park. It's only a 3 km walk, but we decided to take the 1,200 peso ($0.55 CAD) bus.

We had already paid the admission fee via the park passport we had bought during the tour yesterday.

When you enter the park, you have to sign a register saying where you are visiting from. I noticed that they had a sheet published and taped to the window showing October's statistics. I glanced at it and saw that only 7 Canadians had visited during the month of October. The most common was from Germany, at 66. Sorry, I don't remember any of the other figures!

The park starts with a visit to the museum, which opened in 2013. It explained that they know very little about the civilization that occupied this area between 2,000 and 5,000 years ago, nor why it disappeared.

Some of the statues on display in the museum.

Of course some of these tombs were looted during the late 1800's and early 1900's. Some of the statues have been found in Denmark and France and returned to the park. Obviously there are still some out there, and the park was looted again during Colombia's instability in the 1980's and 1990's. But again, most have been returned.

I can't imagine how someone stole one of these statues...they would weigh a ton!

They have a nice forest trail set up that displays 37 of the statues that have been recovered and they have no idea where they would have stood originally. First, we walked that trail. We were almost the only ones there and it was nice to enjoy both the jungle scenery and the statues themselves. There are no two statues the same!

We think this one is ready to go skiing!

This one is a woman holding a doll or child.

Ruth, on the forest trail.

This plant was growing on a tree way up high.

This beautiful flower was also way high up in the trees!

The main part of the park.

Some of the statues are huge...others quite small.

Many of the tombs were found with hug rocks covering them.

Ruth, having fun with the statues features.

Lots of exercise at this park!

And great views at the top of this hill.

And a few more statues. They must have buried some important people way up here!

So I had commented that there weren't very many people around. Usually, we had the park pretty much to ourselves. But at the top of this hill were a group of young women, and we got to talking to them. Turns out that they are university students in the city of Neiva, about 200 kms north of here. They are going to school to become teachers, and were out on a field trip themselves.

They were full of questions, wanting to know where we were from, and why we were visiting Colombia. Only one of them spoke a little bit of English. Then, they all wanted pictures with us. I think we posed for about 25 photos!

Not every day that Kevin gets to be in a photo with 17 beautiful women!

Today is another travel day for us. We're heading north about three hours to the city of Neiva and then a bus change for another hour to the town of Villavieja. Then, we're going to visit the desert. I bet you didn't know that Colombia has a desert!

Happy birthday to my beautiful wife Ruth today!

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24 comments:

  1. Happy Birthday Ruth!! I hope you have a great day today - you deserve it.

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    1. Thank you Cheapchick. It wasn't the most exciting birthday as we spent the day on the bus but it was still a good one! :-)

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  2. What a great way to celebrate Ruth's Birthday. Having too much fun.

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    1. Not sure that traveling on a bus for the whole day is a great way to celebrate a birthday but it isn't the worst way either.

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  3. Ruth! Have a great Happy Birthday!

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  4. Once again a beautiful tour....beautiful university students. Happy birthday Ruth.

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    1. It was so much fun interacting with the university students, they were all smiles and laughs.

      Thank you for the birthday wishes Rita.

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  5. The expressions on the statues are amazing. Some smiling, some grumpy, some with little expression. Hmmm, not much has changed in society over the thousands of years. :-)
    Stay safe. Hope the itch has faded.
    Happy B'day Ruth. You look as young as the university students!

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    Replies
    1. Yes, they were amazing. We never really thought about the whole society thing but it really is true.

      Kevin still has the itch and it drove him crazy yesterday on our bus ride but he thinks it may actually be a tiny bit better today. Fingers cross he is on the up swing.

      Thanks for the birthday wishes! And you are far to sweet with your comment. ;-)

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  6. Happy, happy birthday Ruth! Enjoy your day!

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  7. What a nice way to spend you birthday! Happy birthday from Shelagh too!

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    1. What we did on this post was actually from the day before my birthday, so this was actually a fun day. For my actual birthday we spent the day on a bus, not quite as exciting but still had a good day.

      Thanks for the birthday wishes from both you and Shelagh!

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  8. Happy birthday Ruth! You sure know how to celebrate. I wonder how many different countries you've been in on your birthday?

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    1. Thank you Emily! Actually it really hasn't been that many countries, I think it has only been 5 different countries.

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  9. Today's Globe and Mail had a article in the travel section about you. See link below
    http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/travel/canadian-couple-takes-to-the-open-road/article27517472/

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    Replies
    1. Thank you very much for the link. We knew that it was going happen we just weren't sure when until yesterday when Barbara the writer informed us about it.

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  10. Yep it looks like Ruth is feeling much better and had a great Bday...

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    1. Yes, I am back to normal now. Thank you for the birthday wishes.

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