Keen on Medellin — Your Travel Blog Sucks

My mom came to visit the first week of Medellin and everyone liked her more than me.

We had planned a romantic vacation to San Andres together, one of the most beautiful places with water that I've ever been to. We also tested her boundaries by getting her to jump off a mountain.

This week I:

welcomed my mom to Medellin! It was so nice to see her, though it had only been a few months since Mexico.

She literally FLEW IN! Jk. More about this photo later in the post.

went to our welcome event at Brewhouse, where we drank beer and were supposed to go to dinner, but Sami lured my mother in with more beer, so we stayed longer, didn't eat, and ended up just going to bed. *Shrug* Fun night though!
left the next morning for our romantic getaway to San Andres! We stayed in a hotel on the water but it was in a bit of a weird area. Though I normally prefer staying outside of the touristy places, this was a little inconvenient. Still, we made the best of it. We were within walking distance to the beach, lined with beach clubs and coconut + rum stands, so I was obviously okay with this. We ate some amazing ceviche and drank out of fresh coconuts. MMMMMM.

hung out at the square the next day and laid on the beach and did nothing and it was amazing. (no pics, hence the "doing nothing" part). But we did eat some ceviche, which was weirdly not what I expected. It was ight.

checked out another island that was a quick boat ride away only to discover Los Siete Colores - the seven colors - of the ocean. I've never seen such vivid and different shades of blue! We hung out on the island drinking beer and talking to this Colombian family who was super nice. We also got to see the marshes, where apparently people live - it was creepy, and the guy who was driving our boat called out some weird sound, in which we heard a response from the wooded, wet area. Nope nope nope.

had dinner at the square, where the service was crappy and the food was ok. Also did more beach time!

took multiple boat rides, obvi.

had some food at this awesome tiny restaurant. We hated the tourist stuff and kept trying to find the "local" stuff. We found it. Go here if you're in San Andres!

Forgot to take a pic of the food because I suck.

got back suuuuper late Friday night, and then woke up suuuuuper early Saturday morning, for good reason: I had to go waterfall repelling in the Colombian jungle. Casual. This Remote Year track event was one of the most fun and scariest ones to date. We took an hour car ride to the jungle, hiked for about an hour and a half, and finally made it to this ridiculously large waterfall, where we were strapped in and would just hop down it. No big deal. Just a waterfall. It was insanely scary and difficult and slippery and such an adrenaline rush and now I wanna do it again. Click through to basically see me climb down! WOO!

Had a beer at Victoria Regia, an awesome (pretty) spot for cocktails, live music, and a post-waterfall drank. Probs could do some work here too.

went to the most ridiculous bar/restaurant/show? ever. Dulce Jesus Mio is a combination of comedy, your grandparent's old Christmas lights, and old Looney Tunes statues that were probably thrown away a long time ago. A show starts off the night (all in Spanish) that includes a lot of weird dancing and costumes. Then, after everyone is all lubed up on aguardiente, they play club music and everyone dances on chairs and tables (or was that just me?). It was a fun night.

Also, Carlos (my friend from high school who was visiting family in Medellin) came! He visited while we were in Spain too, so he knew a bunch of the remotes already, which was nice. But, yet again, I lost him to some random people at the end of the night. A girl (who I assume thought that we were dating or something) drunkenly came up to me as I was about to go tell him that I was leaving and said,

"I'm taking DALLAS home with ME."

as if 1. Carlos' name was Dallas because he was from Dallas, and 2. that I was stealing her man or something. I laughed and walked over to tell Carlos and he laughed and then got in a car with 8 people and went to some random strip of clubs. Such is a night in Colombia. Anywho...the next morning...

woke up early to go paragliding, which had been planned for a few days. My mom and Carlos were both supposed to come. We all made it (a little late, mind you) and got in a van where we drove 45 minutes up a giant mountain...only to be very disappointed by a plethora of clouds. The visibility was shit, and while the guide gave us a little hope to "try and wait it out", we ordered a 'chocolate caliente' (aka watery chocolate - pro tip: always get it con leche.) and sat. 20 minutes later, the guide shook his head and said that it wasn't safe to go today. Which really sucked, considering that 1. most of us were hungover, 2. we had already planned around work to do this today, and 3. we just wasted a good few hours of our morning. We arrived back to rain, which was a bummer, but Carlos, my mom, Morgan, and myself hightailed it to our other favorite Sunday past time: BRUNCH.
drank away our feelings with bottomless mimosas and some delicious brunch food at Botanika Lounge. Also pro tip: Great wifi, tons of outlets, great cocktails and coffee, and all around a good place to work.
took my mom to Heard From, an underground-ish bar/lounge that plays house music and serves cheap drinks on Sunday. Clearly a lot of the people here hadn't been to bed from the night before, but it was really fun. A bunch of remotes were there and of course my mom just chilled the whole time and it was great. Afterwards we grabbed Indian take out and me, mom and Morgan watched a movie and went to bed.
woke up the NEXT morning to a text super early saying that paragliding was ON AGAIN! With my lack of a real schedule, we high-tailed it to meet the group and it ended up being a BEAUTIFUL day. Mom was v proud of herself, and I was too. We jumped off a mountain together and lived to tell the tale (thanks, social media!). Oh yeah, Carlos came too!

came home, I worked a bit while Carlos and mom got lunch, and that night went to TEJO! I know I've talked about tejo before so I won't explain it again, but mom joined in and was better than me and pretty much carried the team. It was a blast.

went home, worked some of the next day, and attended Remote Year Passover, which was great. If you've read this post, you'll know that I took a side trip to Poland (my grandfather's birthplace) and Germany and visited a Auschwitz; I'm a bit obsessed with the WWII era since he was a holocaust survivor. Anywho, Jenna and a few other RY Jews organized Passover, and my mom was able to come! I haven't been to a Passover since my grandpa died (and we only really did it when I was younger) so this was a nice reminder of him in our lives, as well as a fun night getting to know some new faces of RY staff, etc.

said bye to mom and a fun week and a half. We did so much while she was here and it was such a treat.

This was more of a 1.5 week post, but a recap nonetheless. Also, yet again, I'm trying to catch up on the stuff that I want to remember and document and all of that good stuff. But I'm also trying to write things quicker - like a day or two after they happen - so that's taking a bit of time.