Rafting and eating ants

Monday, February 7

If you want to learn Spanish like your life depends on it, try going rafting in one of the biggest canyons in the world, the Chicamocha River.

We had a driver pick us up promptly at 8 am and drive us for a little under an hour to a nearby town called San Gil. Here we got out and into a rafting van with our rafting guide, Christian, safety officer, Kevin, and organizer, Grace. We drove along the main road for a while, which is like highway 1 in CA (curvy as heck) and then they said it would be another 1.5 hour along a steeper, more windy, dirt road (hold on to your tetas). As we jostled along on the benches in the back of the van, Christian told us all about the area and the Chicamocha which means “silver thread under a full moon light” in the native language. Finally we arrived in a teeny tiny town called Jordan which had an old tiny bridge that used to be one of the only passages over the river. From here we got out the raft and began the real fun.

Christian explained every potential scenario of what could go wrong whilst rafting and he did so in Spanish. My Spanish is just good enough that I caught the gist of all the terrible possibilities but didn’t commit to memory all the commands and actions I was supposed to do. Luckily, Carl saw the terror in my eyes and comforted me that he used to guide the same class of rapids, about 3+. For my mother’s sake I’ll jump to the conclusion where everything was fine and we left the river with all our body parts and clothes. Actually the scariest part was the very first rapid where we went over a tiny waterfall. With my hands still shaking from the adrenaline the guide pulled the raft over and asked if we wanted to jump off a tall rock into the water. I thought he was joking but Carl was eager and out of the boat before I could make a sarcastic comment.

From there we encountered about 15 rapid sections total, with one called the blender where we spun around in a circle the whole way. Christian would shout, “adelante suave” or “adelante fuerte” meaning forward easy or forward strong. A few times he said “izquierda adelante, derecha atrás” meaning left forward and right backward. I was proud of my ability to hear, comprehend and act quickly. Carl still has some trouble with his left and right. The canyon was gorge-ous (haha) and apparently the second largest canyon in the world after the Grand Canyon. Christian pointed out different old rocks and trees and we did some bird watching but we were not as good at identifying without our Amazonian guide, Elvis.

Finally we reached a point where two rivers converge and we got out and hiked up a huge hill to where Grace had the van. She had also laid out a beautiful spread for lunch that included multiple types of grilled meat, yucca, guacamole, and…ants! We tried a little of everything and went back for seconds on the chorizo and ants.

Then they brought out the Aguardiente. This is a fermented drink from sugarcane, etc. (like schnapps). Christian explained that while the rapids were class 3, the road we had to drive to get back was considered class 5. He advised that we take a few shots so that if we happen to look over the edge, the alcohol would reduce our fear and anxiety. Well he was right across all fronts- the road was terrifying but we had a great time conversing and joking as Grace drove us, over boulder by boulder, up the hill. We changed hands again in a town called Villanueva and were driven back to our finca.

For dinner that night we went into town with the best Tuk Tuk driver, Cesar, who promised to pick us up at the end of the night too. We went to the house of a woman named Margarita. She had an old house in town with a huge garden and kitchen. She offers cooking classes and specializes in cooking native recipes and creating things with plants. She offered to show us how best to cook ants and served us a tasty dinner of ant arepas and ants sprinkled on cheese wrapped in some kind of leaf. She had us taste every version of ant- rare, medium rare, well done (the best), with salt, lemon, something spicy, yeast, and honey. She also had us sample her many dried goods – tons of dried fruit and who knows what else. She said she even dehydrated water…