Day 337 – 366: ONE YEAR!!

April 21 – May 20, 2025

We departed Fairbanks, Alaska on May 20th, 2024 on our bicycles with the hope of reaching Ushuaia, Argentina – essentially riding from the top of North America to the bottom of South America. One year in we have pedaled almost 10,000 miles and traveled through 10 countries. It has been a dream come true – long term, long distance travel. We are filled with immense gratitude for the wonderful people we have met/reconnected with along the way who have fed our stomachs and souls. Also thankful for everyone who have come along on this journey with us by reading this blog, our social media posts and have encouraged us on this dream. Dream. Plan. Jump!

In this segment we travel through the spectacular country of Colombia from Cartegena to Cali. Thus far Colombia has amazed us with is fantastic infrastructure (great roads & shoulders!), cleanliness and hospitable people.

• Day 337 – Cartagena to Malagana (Colombia) – 51k cycling/349m climbing
• Day 338 – Malagana to Tolu – 96k/311m 
• Day 339 – Tolu to Cerete – 91k/302m
• Day 340 – Cerete to Planeta Rica – 71k/405m
• Day 341 – Planeta Rica to Caucasia – 66k/327m
• Day 342 – Caucasia to Taraza – 63k/421m
• Day 343 – Taraza to Valdivia – 62k/1178m
• Day 344 – Valdivia to Yarumal – 37k/1550m
• Day 345 – Layover @ Yarumal
• Day 346 – Yarumal to Santa Rosa de Osos – 46k/977m
• Day 347 – Santa Rosa de Osos to Medellin – 78k/775m
• Day 348 to 352 – Side Trip to North Carolina, USA
• Day 353 to 356 – Layover @ Medellin, Colombia
• Day 357 – Medellin to La Pintada – 78k/1253m
• Day 358 – La Pintada to (9k past) Irra – 72k/745m
• Day 359 – Irra to Santa Rosa de Cabal – 50k/1321m
• Day 360 – Layover @ Santa Rosa
• Day 361 – Santa Rosa to Salento – 49k/1245m
• Day 362 – Layover @ Salento
• Day 363 – Salento to La Paila (truck stop) – 79k/552m
• Day 364 – La Paila to Buga – 58k/262m
• Day 365 – Buga to Cali 66k/218m
• Day 366 – Layover @ Cali

Total trip distance: 9,647 miles (15,531 km)
Total trip climbing: 443,679 feet 
Countries: USA, Canada, Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia
Number of chains used to date: 10 (5 for each bike) we try to change chains about every 1,500 miles

We departed Cartagena, Colombia, following almost two weeks off the bicycles after taking a sailboat from Panama staying in Cartagena through Semana Santa (Holy Week) and began working our way across Colombia with our first major stop being Medellin, Colombia, about 10 cycling days away. Since it had been a while since we’d ridden we started out slow with 50k (30 miles) – our hinnies and muscles were feeling it! We made one last stop at the Caribbean in the town of Tolu and then over the next several days we rode through the “Llandra de Caribe” (Caribbean coastal plain) and the “La Mojana” an inland river delta.

Taraza, Colombia – an unexpected curfew

Our last stop before begining the climb into the Andes was in the town of Taraza. We pedaled in and found a hotel and listened to the crowd across from our hotel cheering futbol (soccer) on TV – totally normal activities for a small town. After a day of cycling we are typically ravenous and have dinner quite early – Taraza was no different. We walked to the town square and searched for a restaurant paying no mind to several military/police patrolling. While having dinner a woman came to our table and asked if we had a place to stay – “yes, we did already thank you”. We didn’t exactly understand what she was saying but she mentioned “seis” (six) multiple times and we thought she was talking about the morning.

After dinner, while we were walking back to our hotel we noticed the entire town shutting down and going home for the night – it was a Saturday at 6pm so this seemed a bit off. When we arrived back at the hotel we asked the receptionist and he indicted there was a curfew and said “policia” and then held his fingers like a gun to his head. Now we were putting all the pieces together…but it wasn’t until after some online sleuthing we realized that we were in the heart of an armed rebel & police conflict area. The history is the armed rebels make their money with growing the plants necessary for cocaine and the government has killed these plants with arial pesticide sprays. Then the armed rebels began illegal gold mining operations, several of which we had cycled by. Well, it turns out, just two days prior to our arrival a police office was shot and killed – hence the curfew. It was eerie – the streets went from the typical hustle and bustle of a Latin American town to eerily quiet.

Climbing into the Andes

We’d spent the last two months essentially in the (hot and humid) coastal plain regions and now we were headed into the Andes. In just two days we climbed to 8,000 feet elevation and boy were our legs and lungs feeling it! On the first day we climbed to the town of Valdivia (elevation 1,100 feet) and then onto Yarumal (elevation 7,800 feet). We stayed in Yarumal for a much needed rest day.

Side trip to North Carolina, USA

While taking a rain & rest day in Yarumal, Colombia we spoke with Dustin’s brother about his family’s plans for the weekend – they were doing “nothing”. Haha it’s never “nothing” as they have a small farm and there’s always something to be done. It would be a perfect time for us to pop in and get some snuggles from our dog, Katy, if the tickets were reasonable. They were! It was a Tuesday night and we booked flights out of Medellin, Colombia for early Friday morning. We still had two days of cycling to get to Medellin and usually we like to build in a couple “buffer days” just incase anything goes wrong. This time we didn’t have any safety days built in but we were so close to Medellin we figured we could somehow catch a lift, if needed.

We pedaled the two days to Medellin, checked into the AirBnB we had booked for 10 nights (five of which only our bikes & gear would be staying there) and flew the next morning to Raleigh, North Carolina, USA. Arriving we were completely exhausted but it was soooo worth it to see Katy’s reaction and to see the part of the family we hadn’t seen since last August – 8 months ago!

There was an ulterior motive for the last minute trip to North Carolina we’re just not quite ready to share it yet – don’t worry it’s nothing bad. Most likely we’ll share details in the next blog post 🙂

Medellin

We flew back to Medellin, without a hitch, arrived back at our AirBnB to find our bicycles and gear untouched – whew! Now we had a few days to explore Colombia’s second largest city. Part of this next section describes arriving in Medellin (pre-USA trip) and part of it is after we returned to Colombia from the USA.

Medellin, Colombia is a cycling powerhouse – actually the entire country seems to encourage bicycle riding. It has been amazing! Colombia professional cyclists have made a very good showing in the Tour de France, even winning it in 2019. Almost every town we have visited has a very good bicycle shop with quality bikes & parts. Well, Medellin is considered the best city in Colombia for riding bikes and wow did we see this in action when we arrived. We pedaled into Medellin on Thursday, May 1st, a labor holiday, and many of the streets were closed to auto traffic and only open to bicycles. We encountered bicyclists *everywhere*.

After being gone to the US for a super short 5 days and arriving back in Medellin we were able to take in some of the sights. We walked to Botero square in Centro to see famous artwork. Medellin born Fernando Botero is known for playful, plump sculptures.

We also decided to get haircuts in Medellin – Dustin’s hair was a bit out of control and the ponytail wasn’t doing him any favors so Patricia convinced him to chop it off! Barbers have been everywhere in Latin America and no appointment is necessary so we walked in, waited 10 minutes, showed pictures of what we wanted and done!

We also took the time in Medellin to replace some wearing bicycle parts – there were soooo many bicycle shops and often they were clustered in the same area. So we stopped into one shop and asked for a specific part – they didn’t have it but they said “if you can wait 10 minutes we’ll get it”. All the different bicycle shops seem to work collectively to get the customers what they need. We were able to get quality parts and very specific parts that we haven’t seen in other places.

On our last tourist day in Medellin we visited the famous Comuna 13 – at one time this was a very dangerous area of the city because it was built in the undesirable steep western slope of the city it was known for drug trafficking and paramilitaries. Now Comuna 13 has become a tourist attraction for its graffiti art and break dancing, while benefiting from successful social programming.

Back in the saddle…

We departed Medellin, Colombia on a Sunday morning when bicyclists are out in droves, traffic is low, and many streets are pedestrian only. It is so nice to be pedaling among fellow enthusiasts although we feel bad when our Spanish skills are not able to understand or respond to their questions. There are often cyclists who have better English than our Spanish and we are able to answer their questions and they can translate for others. Patricia has become fairly adept at describing our trip in Spanish 🙂

We stopped for two nights in the touristy town of Salento, Colombia (pop < 10,000). This village sits at 6,200 feet in the Andes mountains and is famous for its location with 360 degree views, peaceful nature, and coffee farms.

From Salento we spent the next three days making our way toward Colombia’s third largest city, Cali. Along the way we spent the night at a truck stop with a hotel & restaurant and then visited the pilgrim town of Buga for a look at the Basílica del Señor de los Milagros (“Lord of the Miracles” in English).

So far Colombia has amazed us with its bicycling culture, amazing people and beauty. We’re excited to continue the bicycle journey through the rest of Colombia as we make our way toward Ecuador. If you haven’t done so already, you can subscribe to receive an email when we update the blog – there is a form at the bottom of this page (and every page!). You must confirm your subscription by clicking on the email sent to you (and sometimes this confirmation email goes to junk).

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