The land of plenty

There isn’t really anything we feel we've been deprived of since we arrived in Mitú...except maybe for fresh greens. Gabe and I keep a pretty healthy, well balanced diet that includes lots of fresh, green vegetables and we would like to go for a lighter meal once a day, like a big salad or a green smoothie, but Colombians are not into any of this hippy, new age, clean eats stuff. They’re all about animal protein. They can eat meat and eggs all day, every day, no problem. 

Jeanette preparing changua

Typical Colombian breakfast consists of fried eggs or pericos, which are eggs scrambled with tomato and onion. Those are usually accompanied by arepa (con o sin queso), a soft maize patty, and sometimes rice and beans with bacon. Top it off with fresh juice of mora, guanabana or maracuya, plus two cups of coffee and you have yourself a solid meal. 

Some times on weekends or special ocasions Colombians prepare changua for breakfast, a savoury milk soup cooked with a generous portion of onion and garlic, served with soaked bread, hard boiled egg and cilantro. It's an unusual combination, but it is very tasty. 





A lunch is not a lunch if it’s not a 4 course meal. It is the most important and most elaborate meal of the day. First a glass of cold preparado, a watered-down fruit juice, arrives at the table. Then soup as a starter. Rain or shine, whether it’s 25C or 45C outside, soup is being served and enjoyed. I love soup, and I endure it with the enthusiasm of a well acclimatized Mitú resident. Gabe and Luis just cringe as they watch me shovel the hot, deliciously prepared liquid into my mouth. After I’ve sweated out all the soup calories just by eating it, the main course arrives.

At Dona Isa's Omar Restarurant for best lunch in town

Usually a platter of meat stew or pan fried chicken, accompanied by rice, small salad of shredded white cabbage, onion and carrot, some cooked beans or lentils and a fried plantain. 
All muy, muy rico, and a mountain of it. A less imposing portion of jello, candied coconut or rice pudding finishes off the meal. 
Dinner is usually not as ceremonious, but equally satisfying. The number of small, family operated restaurants and the variety of food they serve is impressive for such a small town. We often grab a perfectly seasoned and tender BBQ chicken breasts at MacYuYu’s down the street from the hotel. Tarzan, the owner and grill master marinades them in a mix of onion, garlic and other spices for a day, then deep freezes each tenderized breast and pops it on the grill frozen, wrapped in aluminum foil. The moisture released from thawing gets tapped in the foil, steaming the chicken as it grills. It comes out flavourful and juicy. We always share the plate, which comes with a side of baby potatoes and an onion and tomato “salad”. 

The arepa joint

A corner shack, on the way to the airport, name of which we always forget, though we've asked a hundred times, is another place we frequent. There we gorge on toasted arepas filled with a mixture of gizzards and cheese, topped off with tomato and onion salsa and a quail egg. It’s a soggy mess of typically Colombian flavours that we “mmmm” and “ahhhhh” over every time. 

Another one of the favourites is a modest meal of morcilla and arepa dulce. Morcilla is a homemade blood sausage prepared by Dona Mercedes, who sells them from a street stall. It is unlike any other blood sausage I’ve ever had. It is mild but full flavoured with the recognizable taste of liver and a hint of curry that gives it a very distinct flare. 

After enjoying a few pieces of morcilla with a dollop of aji (a homemade hot sauce) we move up the street to another vendor to grab sweet arepas for dessert. These are soft and fluffy arepa patties filled with sweet, ricotta type cheese, flattened and toasted on an electric griddle. They are rich but not heavy tasting with a hint of tartness that comes through from the cheese. Just perfect. 

Morcilla frying with pork belly. It only looks like deep fried hell,
it actually tastes like heaven

Some days, when we we’re in the mood for something more familiar we head to Barassana for delightful thin crust pizza, always prepared with a South American twist of ingredients and spices. Or we stop by Holy Coffee for Italian style sandwiches, made with fine quality cold cuts and cheeses. Need I say more?

Enough about food, but since we’re talking about abundance you need to know that another thing there is no shortage of in Mitú is water. The town lays at the banks of a powerful and plentiful River Vaupes, which rips through the jungle with 10 knot currents in some places. It is still the main source of fresh water supply for many who live without town supplied running water. It is the place women meet in the morning to do laundry and children come to bathe at dusk. It is the freeway high school students take in dugout canoes to get across to and from the opposite shore, where the regional colegio is located. It is the back drop for afternoon strolls along its high banks. It is the artery that brings nourishment to the entire district of Vaupes. 

And then there is the rain. Mitú gets on average 210 days and 132 inches of rain every year, and when it rains it pours. The barrage comes frequently, announced by low laying cumulus that hover over sun scorched paved roads, promising relief from the heat. It hits fast and it hits hard, bombarding tin roofs with a resonating rap. 

The water drapes over eave drops in sheets of crystal clear water, splashing over dusty side walks and tardy pedestrians, seeking shelter under the overhangs just a moment too late. The city comes to a halt for half an hour or so, sometimes longer and locals know whether the rain will last or not from the cloud formation and their movement. If they expect it will rain on for a while the streets empty well in advance and stay that way. If they expect that it will come and go they huddle in shop doorways, chatting, taking the welcome break from their hot walk across town. 

Along the building walls and in the shelter of eavesdrops loiter the town’s secondary citizens, the ubiquitous street dogs. They roam the alleys in multitudes, meandering among food stalls, dividing their time between scoring a meal and, well, just scoring. Though underfed and dirty, most dogs look pretty content and are well treated by the locals, who simply leave them to their own bum sniffing devices.




One of these street dogs was lucky enough to have been adopted by our friend Marcela, the vet. Princesa was found about a year ago in really poor health and with an aggressive attitude. She was badly mistreated, malnourished, her skin and hair consumed by sarna, a kind of scabies caused by mites. Marcela took her in, treated her physical symptoms and trained her to become the fine lady pet that she is today. 

Princesa and her BF Caballero

Princesa has been spending a lot of time with us, jogging alongside on the river front trail, taking strolls through the town as we go on errands or accompanying us to the restaurants, confident she’ll get a generous helping of table scraps from everyone around. She always does. Princesa is a beautiful mud orange colour, the rich tone of earth that permeates everything in Mitú. She still is very much a street dog, who gets unapologetically territorial about her favourite restaurant at Los Paisas Hotel and spends most of her days roaming around her neighbourhood picking fights with other dogs, and rolling around in any smelly stuff she can find, real lady-like. She’s been a great source of entertainment these past weeks and we’re going to miss her heaps when we leave. 

From the Satellite Table

We've met a few remarkable people since arriving in Mitú, people who have been embraced by the community since their arrival here, and who have now embraced us in turn.
Luis, a Brazilian fellow who's been working in Mitú for a few months on a contract from a sister geo-survey company to the one Gabriel is contracted by, was the first one to welcome us. He picked us up from the airport and showed us around the uncomplicated network of this town's streets and businesses. Open hearted and polite, Luis makes friends easily and shares them eagerly. Through him we met Marcela and Jeanette.
Marcela is a vet and a Bogota native who transferred to the Amazon to work with the indigenous communities. No, I'm not trying to be offensive, just keep reading. Her help comes in form of rabies control, which is spread by Bloodsucking Fruit Bats and plagues the remote rural settlements. Marcela and a team of technicians travel, often by boat, into the individual villages in the district to administer vaccines to the people and poison to the bats. Her and the team capture any bats that had been feeding on a particular population and apply a small amount of poison to the nape, where they can't lick it off themselves, and allow them to carry the poison to their nesting place for others to consume. They know they're capturing repeat offender, because the same bats always come back to a location they have previously fed in. Once they discover a source of food they return night after night until their resource is depleted. When not in the field, Marcela takes care of city and farm animals at a clinic in town.
Jeannette is a Mitú girl through and through. Vividly coloured, woven head bands and playful braids in her raven black hair, and all. Her personality is as rich and lively as the surrounding jungle. She studied dentistry in Villavicencio and came back to her home town to practice. Cheerful and gregarious, Jeanette knows and is know by everyone in town.
By the grace of these ladies we also met Julio and his family, Diana and Luciana. Julio and Diana are  architects, who left behind prosperous careers in the big city of Bogota to return to their native Amazon. They said they grew tired of the grind and longed to return to the simple life they once knew. We liked them instantly. Julio and Diana invited us over for a BBQ at their spectacular jungle house that they've designed and constructed themselves. It grew slowly out of simple, sketched out plans that morphed and developed as the house itself did. The result is a unique wood and corrugated sheet metal structure that integrates the surrounding nature, and contrasts it at the same time.

View from the Satellite dining room to the forepeak
loft space at the front of the house

As we approached the house, a lofty A-frame roof line protruded right out of the ground, instantly forming angled walls for the space enclosed within. To us it looked like a forepeak of a boat and Julio confirmed that the front of the house is in fact designed after the bow of a ship. We like him even more now, he's a man after our own hearts. Walking to reach the main entrance door we were lead up onto steps made out of stacked and staggered disks of old cable spools. Together they form a mosaic of thick wooden disks, each one different, with its own imperfections. We were led inside into small, modest interior that opens right back up into the outdoors on the opposite side of the house. Like most homes in Mitú, Julio's house doesn't have glassed in windows, only netting to keep out the insects, giving the place continuous connection with the surrounding natural environment (minus the bugs, of course). 

Gabe and Luis making drinks
 with regional Agua Ardiente, an anise-flavoured liquor

Marcela, Jeanette and Luis at the
kitchen counter

Once on the other side of the house, I noticed that some of the walls are straight and some angle in or out, creating lots of dynamic lines for the eye to follow. Julio and Diana have done a great job giving this rustic dwelling lots of charm and functionality, it has everything they need to live comfortably without excess. The home is a statement against consumerism and it's evident through their use of discarded items. Like a bike wheel used in place of a round window or an old TVDirect satellite antenna that serves as a table base. 

Gabe supervising the grilling

A smaller antenna is used to form the bottom of an outdoor grill. The house is full of resourceful surprises, which we took in with delight.



After the tour of the house we got to cooking. Potatoes, guacamole, corn on the cub in husks and Cachama fish smoked in banana leaves. Yeah, they say Cachama, I say piranha.
See for yourself.

Cachama, rubbed with garlic, salt and lime juice

Julio stoking up the fire

Jeanette preparing guacamol

For long hours, after our feast, we talked at the Satellite table about the life and the people of Colombia. And by we talked I mean they talked, while I sat quietly trying to decipher the conversation, occasionally tugging at Gabe's sleeve to translate the most important bits to me. My Spanish is coming along and the fact that I know Portuguese helps, but I was still way out of my depths on that night. Julio is an eloquent speaker who is passionately involved with the indigenous communities around Mitú through a number of social projects. He lead the conversation with stories about magic of the land and its people, and about how he works to encourage them to go to College and University and play an active part in growing their country into a place they want and need it to be. Being vastly underdeveloped, this region truly is a land of opportunities and Julio hopes that those opportunities are not missed by the very people who rely on them the most; that the natives can find a way to build on their strengths, retain their land and resources and not get left behind by the modern world already encroaching on their own. 
Gabe and I can't help but grow more fond of this little oasis and its residents with each passing day. With only two weeks left in Mitú we're beginning to bring our focus to the next challenge, which is refitting our new boat, but we hope with all our hearts that the following contract term brings us back this way. There is much left to be discovered here and ways in which we can make ourselves of service to this community. 

No roads lead to Mitú

an island among a sea of green...

We’re in the middle of nowhere and in the centre of it all at once. Mitú is a small town in the Amazon Basin of South East Colombia. It is the capital city of the department of Vaupes, which these days acts as a hub for  government services, mainly transport and trade. Like most Amazonian villages, Mitú is anchored to a river, the life line of the community and the connecting link to the nearby settlements. There are no roads connecting Mitú with the rest of Colombia; remote and isolated, Mitú is only accessible by plane or portage via varying waters of the Vaupes River.

When we flew in here 4 weeks ago we arrived at a place that seemed an island among a sea of green canopy. Descending, as far as the eye could see, there was nothing but tree tops, undulating surface of emerald, sage and gold. 

The area is rich and full of life, equally in as outside of town. Mitú packs a lot of punch for being so small. With only 5000 residents in its urban core, it is constantly buzzing with activity. 

The predominantly hot days start early here, by 5:30 AM we’re woken up by the rising sun and the cacophony of the streets coming to life. First comes the chatter of birds, then the motorbikes, which are the main mode of transport for most, start zooming by. Shop owners can be heard opening storefronts in a thunderous clamour of their rollup screens. The hubbub only ceases midday and in the hours following lunch, when businesses close and the town winds down for siesta. After that it bursts with activity once again and remains so late into the evening. 

My favourite part of the day comes at sunset when the clay dusted streets begin to glow with the golden hue of the setting sun. Mitú rests on moist, red clay soil which seeps through as grout for the tiled roads, clings to building walls, telephone poles and tree trunks. In the afternoon sun everything around takes on a shade of orange, the effect intensified even more by the rust stained colour of tin roofs that dominate the skyline. I just love it.

Even though we’re so far removed from the rest of civilization, we haven’t wanted for anything while in Mitú. The little oasis is peppered with variety stores, cafes, service shops and restaurants serving great food. Hotel Los Paisas, where we’re staying, is well managed and provides us with clean, comfortable accommodations. There is little crime in Mitú, the residents are friendly, kind and hardworking people, and we’ve been made to feel very safe and very much at home in this foreign land.