Post by buenopues on Mar 1, 2017 12:15:33 GMT -5
I made a return trip to Capurganá last week. It was my forth with the last in 2009. It is not an easy trip from Cali. There are still no prop planes that leave Alfonzo Bonilla and fly directly to Olaya Herrera, at least none my travel agent came across so we had to Fly to Rio Negro and take a cab to the airport in Medellin. That fare is $75.000 now. The bus would be cheaper but didn't bother looking into it. My agent likes to leave plenty of time in case of trancones or other misadventures between airports so had us leaving Cali at six am, at the counter at five. As there were no trancones we had to kill a couple of hours between flights. When I've done this before I've gone to the zoo which is very close to Olaya Herrera but this time it was raining hard so that was out.
On previous visits I stayed at Almar with log cabin style construction and certainly the nicest of the hotel options in Capurganá. It has changed hands and is now called Nautilus. There are evidently more because there were signs advertising one in Nuquí. Apart from the name not much has changed, the rooms and service the same as before.
The town has grown somewhat. There are quite a few more shops oriented to tourists and there is an impressive new school paid for by a foreign country though our carretilla driver didn't know which. The biggest difference was that in 2009 there were only about two motos in the village. This time there were scads as well as several three wheeled cargo motos and a big tractor.
On my previous visits I was always warned to be careful of sea urchins when swimming and to wear water shoes. Indeed there were many where ever there was a bit of rock. This time there was no mention of the risk and when snorkeling I didn't see any. I wonder what happened. I had also seen the yellow and black poison arrow frogs (Capurganá morph of Dendrobates aureate) which I'd photographed on a prior trip but none appeared where I'd found them before. I was hoping for better pictures.
And speaking go amphibians the Almar offered up toad racing on the beach one night of your visit which tourists and locals would bet on. My companion in 2009 was astonishingly good at picking the winning toad and won some pesos. That activity is gone now I suspect as a result of a more conscientious approach to the environment on the part of the hotel (very stressful for the toads).
On previous visits I stayed at Almar with log cabin style construction and certainly the nicest of the hotel options in Capurganá. It has changed hands and is now called Nautilus. There are evidently more because there were signs advertising one in Nuquí. Apart from the name not much has changed, the rooms and service the same as before.
The town has grown somewhat. There are quite a few more shops oriented to tourists and there is an impressive new school paid for by a foreign country though our carretilla driver didn't know which. The biggest difference was that in 2009 there were only about two motos in the village. This time there were scads as well as several three wheeled cargo motos and a big tractor.
On my previous visits I was always warned to be careful of sea urchins when swimming and to wear water shoes. Indeed there were many where ever there was a bit of rock. This time there was no mention of the risk and when snorkeling I didn't see any. I wonder what happened. I had also seen the yellow and black poison arrow frogs (Capurganá morph of Dendrobates aureate) which I'd photographed on a prior trip but none appeared where I'd found them before. I was hoping for better pictures.
And speaking go amphibians the Almar offered up toad racing on the beach one night of your visit which tourists and locals would bet on. My companion in 2009 was astonishingly good at picking the winning toad and won some pesos. That activity is gone now I suspect as a result of a more conscientious approach to the environment on the part of the hotel (very stressful for the toads).