The Bolton Blog: Cali, Colombia

Imagine traveling to a foreign country and being welcomed so warmly, so wholeheartedly and so lovingly by people you have never met before. That's what we experienced by the Mercado family during our recent trip to Cali, Colombia for Jason and Angela's wedding.

Upon arrival at the Cali airport on Tuesday, 27th September, we were greeted by Jason and Angela, who had also just arrived, and Angela's mom, Maila, while our luggage was whisked away by a friend of the family's to a van that would later take us to our hotel. Angela quickly spotted a woman selling mango cut into pieces and squirted with lime juice and sprinkled with salt and bought two for us all to taste - she says it's a "must-have" when she's home. We waited a couple hours for Mom and Norm's arrival, then loaded into the van to be driven down to the hotel.

Maila invited us over to her apartment, only a short 10-minute walk from the hotel, for breakfast Wednesday morning. Little did we know that we would be enjoying our breakfast on the balcony overlooking the mountains (yes, part of the Andes) and the country club we were staying at.

At breakfast we were introduced to Arepas - round disks of ground cornmeal, similar to a flour tortilla, but thicker. These can be eaten any time of the day. We had ours with butter, chuncks of chorizo and mild cubed cheese. Also new to us was Pan de Yuca (in the center of the table) - bread made of cassava starch and cheese - and Grenadia (the orange fruit on the plate in front), a externally beautiful orange fruit with a semi-hard peel and a gelatinous, grey pulp and black, crunchy seeds. The taste is similar to passion fruit.

Can you see why the Grenadia is also know as the "snot fruit"?

Maila gave us Macetas - decorated arrangement of candy, which is a longstanding tradition of Cali. On June 29, Cali celebrates Godchildren's Day, when godparents throughout the city customarily give their godchildren a Maceta. Elaborate sugar cane candies in the shape of birds, flowers and human figures, along with pinwheels, are affixed to a base of soft maguey wood. Being that June is already past, the Maila had these Macetas specially made for us.

After breakfast Maila, Angela, Mom and I drove to a flower store and then to a market in Cali to buy flowers for Angela's bouquet and the boutineers.

Wednesday afternoon Angela's brother and family arrived at Maila's apartment. Karen's Pizza was ordered and we ate in the shade down at pool behind the apartment building. The most unusual to us pizza was a plantain and bacon pizza... very good, but quite greasy.

As I've already mentioned, the hotel we stayed at is part of a country club. There were only 20 or so rooms, but they were very comfortable with huge beds and much-needed air conditioning.

Part of the 18-whole golf course and paddle boats on the lake

You never knew what animals... and bugs!... you'd see and hear around the hotel and the grounds. In addition, there were various beautiful birds flying around.

A large rat-like animal, but without the rat-like tail

Large iguana

Cute lizard trying to hide from us.

Nine of our group arrived Thursday evening on the same flight. The hungry and tired bunch were welcomed to the hotel with pizzas from Karen's Pizza.

Every morning we had breakfast at an outdoor cafe at the hotel. We helped ourselves to platefuls of possibly the best, most colorful and delicious fruit we've ever had: pineapple, mango, papaya, grenadila and watermelon. Freshly squeezed orange juice and various sweet and savory rolls were also available.

Friday morning couples trickled down from their rooms for breakfast. I'll introduce them:

Emily and Scott Armstrong - Scott is a friend of Jason's from high school, and we were in marching band together. Jeff and I really enjoyed getting to know Scott and Emily during the trip and look forward to their possible visit to the UK next Spring or Summer.