Yesterday I woke up early to meet Scott, Susan, and Bentley (BentleysBigAdventure) at the Catedral de Sal. The Salt Cathedral is an underground Roman Catholic church built within the tunnels of a salt mine 200 meters underground in a Halite mountain near the town of Zipaquirá, in Cundinamarca, Colombia. It was a chilly ride out of Bogota, but nice winding roads blended with exhilarating traffic woke me up fast and allowed me to enjoy the ride.
It took about an hour to reach my destination. I paid my 4k COP to park the bike and walked up to purchase a ticket (23k COP). When you enter the mine you walk down a Tron-like neon lit tunnel. From there you walk past 10'ish alcoves with different cross sculptures that have prayer alters scattered about. Further into the mine is the main cathedral area, which is really, really, incredibly impressive. It is absolutely MASSIVE and a true feat of engineering/architecture. It is beautiful and awe inspiring. I skipped out on my tour group and meandered through the tunnels alone. At one point I sat on a pew and stared at the cross in the main cathedral for almost an hour. It was mesmerizing, and I can only imagine a pretty special place to practice your worship/religion. It allowed me to think and I felt a sense of peace, so I stayed much longer than expected.
After enjoying the cathedral for some time, Susan, Scott, Bentley, and I headed to lunch in the small town below. After stuffing our faces with copious amounts of carne we set off for Bogota. We rode together essentially the entire way, but somehow got split up in the traffic madness of the big city. I rode over to their hotel area, but couldn't seem to find them. As I was waiting to see if they would show, a local guy walked up. I thought he would ask the typical questions, "how expensive? how big is the motor? how fast does it go?". However, he started speaking to me in perfect English. All he said was, "that's a nice ride. I ride motos too. I have to run to meet a friend, but you must ride out of the city to Choachi. The road is amazing!". As quick as he walked up, he was gone. Since I had nothing planned, I decided to heed his advice. I searched for Choachi in my GPS and found it easily. The road up and out of the city isn't the best, but once you get on the main road leading to Choachi, it is unreal! I rode all the way to Choachi with a HUGE smile pasted on my face. As I twisted and winded up to 11k feet, the scenery was stunning. I literally almost rode off the road several times because I couldn't take my eyes off the mesmerizing countryside. 
Once you clear 11,100 feet, you start to head downhill into Choachi. Just before the town there is a turnoff for Cascada la Chorrera. I took the left and blasted the dirt road for around 4 or 5 miles. I couldn't seem to find the route to the waterfall, but could see and hear it thundering in the distance. It was getting late, so I turned back and made my way into town. Choachi is a small colonial puebla with a typical plaza surrounding a beautiful church. I had a Coke and a bag of platano crisps and watched some kids kicking a soccer ball for a bit. There were zero other gringos around, which was a nice change from other places that I've been recently. Not that it's a bad thing to be around other tourists, but I felt like I escaped the beaten path when I arrived there. After finishing my snack I needed to get back quickly as the sun was starting to settle behind the mountains. I flipped the lid on my helmet, kicked the bike into gear, wheelied out of town, and flew back to Bogota. The road is amazing and it is very easy to treat it like a race course of sorts. I really enjoyed the (very) brisk ride home.
When I got back to the hotel I met up with Nina, Scott, Susan, and Jeffrey (RideForPeace) for dinner. I told them about the ride and showed them the pictures and Scott and Jeffrey were keen to do it today. I enjoyed it so much I was happy to play tour guide for them and ride it all over again. We left out today around 11am and rode all day. We rode the same route towards Choachi, but ended up finding the waterfall. Near the waterfall we ended up meeting a nice old man who had a random tienda near the entrance. He was 75 and has lived in the area for 45 years. He insisted that we sit with him and sample all of the typical foods that he and his wife prepare and sell. We filled out bellies with queso fresco, some sort of strawberry sugary fruit treat, his wife's amazing fresh yogurt, and several other specialties. He didn't seem to want any money, and enjoyed our laughs and company. We ended up tipping him pretty heavily and he was full of smiles. After exploring the area and falls for a bit we pointed our bikes towards Choachi for a late lunch. After stuffing our faces with carne (yet again) we decided to ride towards Ubaque and Fomeque. The goal was to make our way into Parque Nacional Chingaza for a loop north and then west back into Bogota. We got pretty far, but the road turned into gnarly dirt and didn't let up. We realized that it was getting late and there was no way we would complete the loop before sundown, so we turned around and headed back the way we came. Another day, another time for Chingaza...
I just made it home a little while ago and figured I'd throw up this report before Nina gets here. We have dinner date plans tonight. However, she just arrived so I better get moving. For now, enjoy several more pics from the past few days...
First few from the Salt Cathedral...
Second bunch from the ride into/around Choachi...
Catch everyone soon...
~ D
PS... Don't have time to proof this one, so sorry for any errors.
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