Bogota

Greetings from Bogota Colombia!


We arrived on Thursday around 1:00

It was a long flight down because of the layover in Vancouver but the first class seats to Toronto and the executive first class “pod’s” to Bogota made it more than tolerable. We didn’t get into Toronto until 12:30 in the morning and we were up again at 5:00 to catch our 8:00 flight to Bogota but there’s nothing like a fold lat bed, an attentive flight attendant and linens and silverware to make it all worthwhile!

We’re staying at a small boutique hotel in the heart of the colonial city centre:
http://www.abadiacolonial.com/en/index.htm It’s within walking distance to most of the major attractions and it’s very comfortable.

Yesterday we met with members of Gestando, an organization that supports and mentors new start up businesses, similar to our Community Futures but on a larger/national scale. They’ve partnered with CCA to support rural start up cooperatives as part of CCA’s mandate to fight poverty through cooperative development and I paid a courtesy call because of my involvement with CCA in Mongolia.

We were picked up at our hotel at 7:30 (Rosi was soooo impressed this was how we started our “vacation”) and we had presentations and a meeting with Gestando until around 10:00. From there we spent the day with an interpreter and a rep from Gestando and we visited three different credit unions and a cooperative bank. Senior representatives from each organization gave us tours and presentations and I learned a lot of valuable lessons I can take back to share with my peers.

Today we can officially start being tourists! Lonely Planet in hand we plan on visiting the national gold museum and the Botero national gallery and tomorrow we’ll visit the national military museum and a couple of must see art galleries. In the evenings we’ll walk around the main city square and take in the sights and the general vibe of Bogota.

Adios mi amigos

Dale and Rosi