My Life. Your Entertainment.

Talk about being M.I.A. for so long! As most of you know, I moved to Australia in May to be a nanny for 3 fabulous little angels and I’m absolutely still doing so, although, my Aussie family went to the States for the summer holiday so for the past 5 weeks I’ve been in Colombia, South America visiting my family. Every single time I come here I always get so excited to be in this beautiful country.

There’s one thing in particular I would like to share with everyone; you haven't really been on a road trip until you've traveled through Colombia in a car. When I come to Colombia I stay in the capital, Bogota. My family has farm houses in different towns around the country and the only way to get to these towns is by car; the only way to get there by car is to go over the mountains that separate the towns. These mountains are the Andes. Ever since I was little I've been going on these roads trips with my family, most towns being 8-10 hours away from the other. Now, these trips are no "take a nap, wake up when you get there" trips… these are "keep your eyes open and look around you" trips.

No matter how many times I've taken trips to towns such as Pereira, Fusa, Melgar, Boyacá, or any other of the heaps of towns we've driven to, every time is like a new experience. You see different types of topography as you wind around the mountains. Tip: if you don't know at what altitude you're going through then you check to see what's growing around you; corn, potatoes, bananas, cocoa are grown at different altitudes. Another reason I mention to keep your eyes peeled is because these roads are really carved out of the side of a mountain. One wrong flinch and the only thing stopping you and your car from falling hundreds of feet into the rushing river below is that metal guard rail. Calming, hey?

I'd say the mountain roads are getting a bit better. They've started exploding holes through them and making 2+ mile long tunnels to avoid the dangerous parts of roads, such as steep mountain faces that become too soft causing rock slides to occur. But, it's not all anxiety, it's also beauty. In one day you can feel all four seasons. One morning you might leave a town, drive to the very tip top of a mountain and, literally, be in a cloud. Once you're out of the cloud and head back down the mountain you find a place to stop for lunch, usually at some small, family-owned restaurant built on the side of a mountain. You then make your way down the mountain and back into the hot weather, into your final destination. When you have a family as large and loving as mine, it's not about how many cars for how many people we have, it's we will take two cars and whoever wants to go hops in. Oh, that car only holds four? Nah, 6 plus luggage - we're good to go!

Next subject, my favorite subject, FOOD! Colombia has seriously some of the best eats ever; the meat, the veggies, the fruits, all of it. The following are my tops:

Arepas! It’s flat bread made from cornmeal but kind of more like a thick pancake than bread. Cooked on a fire stove started with sticks and leaves, you can add cheese and salt to these yummy snacks.

Lechona! This is pork. What you do is carefully take out all the meat, cook it adding some corn, peas and other stuffings; clean out the dead pig and bake it so it’s pretty and golden. You then stuff the cooked pork back into the baked pig’s body for decoration purposes. When you’re ready for a plate of yummy pork, it’s spooned right out from where it came from.

Bocadillo and Queso! Bocadillo is a square piece of guava snack that you enjoy with this delish cheese called Doble Crema.

Cuca! It's a soft Ginger bread baked in Colombia that is simply delish on its own and even better when dipped in hot chocolate or coffee. Yum! Fun fact: Cuca is also Colombian slang for a woman's Pikachu. Hungry?

Regular Old Steak and Potatoes! You can’t get meat anywhere else like you do in Colombia. Absolutely tasty! On top? Aji. Special spicy peppers grown here make for a great salsa. When you mix the spicy seeds from the peppers with cilantro, green onions, garlic, vinegar and water there really isn’t much of anything you won’t put it on!