Paramo de Oceta

When we arrived in Mongui, we had two things we wanted to do - enjoy the small town chill and hike Paramo de Oceta which was supposed to be really beautiful. Obviously, we wanted to do it without a guide. We read in a couple of places that this is tricky because of the dispute between the authorities and the farmers, who fenced part of their land. The lady at the guest house confirmed it - "Paramo de Oceta - con guia". But the tours start at 8 a.m. and we knew that this is way too late to get the nice morning sun and avoid the stronges sun (or potential rain fall for that matter). However, after our first experience with Columbian hikes, we were unsure whether or not it is a good idea to try this one without a guide.

We decided to give it a go. After all, if we cannot do the hike, we can always turn back and try another day with a guide. We set off at 6 a.m. and the views were stunning. Mongui is at the altitude of 2900m so going just a bit up gives you an amazing view of the morning mist in the valleys.

The hike was really nice, with cool air along the way and a lot of wind on the top - first time we actually needed our down jackets.

We could not do the route we planned with the map as parts of the trail were indeed fenced off and we did not want to risk meeting an angry Colombian farmer - or his dogs!

However this only meant that we had to return the same way we came in. Before doing so, we had a could-not-be-more-hipster-even-if-we-tried lunch on the top.

After coming back, we asked at the tour agency what route they do and it seems they do exactly the same, so it turned out it we did not lose anything doing it on our own.