Colombia honeymoon | On Your Bike - Lonely Planet Forum

ONLINE

Sun, 03 Nov 2013 23:40:12 +0000

Hi all,

We're planning a 3-week cycle tour of Colombia, arriving in Bogota on December 20th and departing from Cartagena on January 10th.

We'd love to hear from cyclists who've traveled recently through Colombia about the best routes, bike type, safety and accommodations. In particular we have these questions:

1) We can take mountain bikes or road bikes, either is fine for us. But the more important matter is that we want to avoid traffic as much as possible without going so far into the jungle that we are unsafe. So, any thoughts on routes, starting from Bogota? We know we won't have time to cycle the whole distance, and in fact we'd be fine with taking a round-about "dirt road" route anywhere in Colombia and just getting a bus/train/flight to Cartagena at the end. Mostly, we want to be on beautiful, safe, quiet roads.

2) Tents or hotels? We would prefer to travel light and enjoy Colombian hospitality, but if we venture off on back roads will we need to camp? Is camping safe?

Thanks in advance for your ideas! We're excited and eager to pull our honeymoon cycle-tour plan together!

Cara and Gary

Edited by: downtowngb

ONLINE

Tue, 05 Nov 2013 20:51:55 +0000

I took a bus north out of Bogota to Tunja, then rode my bike over to Villa de Leyva. That's a nice area. Then I rode the dirt backroads up to San Gil, picking the interesting routes along the way. I generally followed the routes of the highways but took the dirt roads crisscrossig instead, which are beautiful. The highways are narrow and busy so you want to avoid them. There is a road guide that has all the little roads on it that's good. But be warned, there are no flat roads in this area, what looks like a short ride could turn into a major slog.

Also the Zona Cafetera around Medellin is nice too, I rode that. Salento is interesting.

I did that 5 years ago and Boyaca and Cundinamarca were safe, I don't know what the conditions are today. Go to the Platypus Hostel in Bogota and they are the best source of info for where is safe or not.

Camping was tricky because it seems every square inch is behind barbed fences for cattle grazing, it's not easy to find quiet places out of the way on flat ground. I like camping so I'd bring my gear. A Tarptent Moment should sleep 2 if needed (it will be tight) and isn't very big on the bike. Plus I always like to sleep in my tent in hotels anyways just to keep the bedbugs away.

Edited by: stromaroma