9/21: Bogota's Beautiful Botanic Gardens

After our fabulous but long morning graffiti tour, we needed some sustenance and popped into a small café where we ordered flaky, warmed ham and cheese croissants that only cost .50 each and were served on pretty china plates, too - what a find! That was just what we needed before haling a taxi for only $5 to the Botanic Gardens, a twenty-minute ride away. We only hoped that the gardens would be far more beautiful than the ones in Medellin had been. The entry fee was only $4 a person but that was more than the usual cost because there was an extensive Orchid Exhibition. 

Just inside the entrance were these lovely red flowers that were almost as soft as cotton balls.

Gardens staff explained the orchid varieties in each tent to the many interested patrons. 

I loved this color combination.

Many of the plants were for sale. If we could have kept them safely in our bags for the rest of our long trip, if we could have brought them through Customs into the US AND if there might have been a snowball's chance they would have grown in our garden at home, I would have loved to buy them. Lots of if's, though! 

The three, lovely poinsettia plants were less than $7!

Seeing this massive leaf on the ground made us both look up and see the tree it had come from.

I wish you could have been there to see us both craning our heads and try and take photos of the tree that weren't either too dark or too light! What a hoot in hindsight but that won't mean I at least won't keep trying to get the best shots I can next time.

One of the few English-language signs was this one in the fruit tree arbor. I thought it should be the motto for all gardeners: "The fruits are the gift for those who will spread the seeds. "

I guess it must have been the wrong season for fruit trees as we didn't see any blooms or fruit but these flowers were so pretty.

Neither of us could remember ever seeing more than a token number of vegetables growing before in any botanic gardens.

These looked like broccoli but were far leafier.

Gloria: Whenever I see calla lilies, I always think of you!

There were more people in the Rose Garden than any other area of the gardens we’d seen so far.

These roses were like me, past their prime!

This was the first of this shade of orange rose I remember seeing. It was a tad too psychedelic for my taste.

I don't ever remember seeing solar panels in a botanic garden before but, seeing these, I wondered why they weren't in every garden.

Armed guards or police officers roamed the garden paths to make sure the visitors were safe. They were a fact of life particularly wherever groups of people gathered all over the country.

What a brilliant idea having cups of water available to ward against dehydration.

The palm tree was the national tree of Colombia so it was only natural that the city's botanic gardens had a lovely Palm Garden. Their trunks reach about 190 feet into the air!

It was cute seeing drawn bricks on a pathway. If I were a lot younger, I would have felt like jumping from one to another like hopscotch but those days are behind me. We’ve seen lots of bricks that people pay to have their names inscribed but not ones with drawings on them. 

 

I think we must have saved the best for last as we next found the Fern Garden which was an exquisite oasis. Walking around the small pond and seeing the waterfalls was a perfect way to end our stroll around Bogota's Botanic Garden.

Bogota's pretty botanical gardens were a beautiful place to  escape the traffic and find nature right in the middle of the city.

We got another taxi back to our hotel close to 5 after Steven ate a hot dog from a vendor outside the gardens. We’d been cautioned not to even think about waiving down a taxi in the street unless we were with a local before coming to Colombia because of the so-called Millionaire Ride. That's when a taxi driver swings by to pick up well-armed accomplices who then rob you, possibly drug you, and almost certainly take you to multiple ATMs to forcibly withdraw large sums of money!

Reading that was scary, certainly, but it's not our travel style to let fear dictate what we do and how we do it. But we did appreciate it when the driver made sure to lock our doors for our safety. 

We'd loved our time in Bogota, especially the fabulous Museo del Oro, probably the best walking tours we've taken anywhere, exploring historic La Candelaria, the exquisite churches and our adventurous day trip to magical Laguna Guatavita. But all good things must come to an end and no doubt there were more charming places for us still to discover.

Next post: The colonial city of Villa de Leyva.

Posted on October 2nd, 2017, from Cuenca, Ecuador.