Melgar: Vacationing in the Plains of Colombia
During the 1970’s we lived in Bogota the capital of Colombia where most foreign families lived. My father worked in the textile trade as a contract engineer for the weaving machines. We lived in the foreign/rich section called Las Villas Del Norte which means the Northern Villas. We were surrounded by paid security guards who patrolled the streets to protect us from harm. To get away from this temporary, my father would take my mother, my brother, and myself to Melgar.
Melgar is a three to four hour trip down into the plains of Colombia from the mountains. As we traveled Dad would always put on his favorite Neil Diamond tapes to listen as he drove. We always left on a Friday afternoon. One of the most interesting parts of the drive was the going underneath what was known as the “Devil’s Nose”. This was a rock shaped like a witch’s nose that jutted out over the highway. We would always hold our breaths as we went under it.
Melgar is very humid and very tropical. It was a small city surrounded by many villas known as “Fincas”. These villas had usually a kitchen, two or three bedrooms, a bathroom and a living room patio. The joy of these villas was the swimming pool. We would spend hours just swimming in the pool. It was peaceful. Usually some other families who my parents knew would join us in the surrounding villas and we would get together with them to laze around and congregate. We kids would swim until it was dinnertime.
At dinnertime we would drive to the center of town. There was a great restaurant owned by a Frenchman who had the best steak dinners. There would be French music playing and the food was great. After dinner we would go shopping for sweets and marbles to take back to the villa. When we got back we would swim some more and then to bed. We would sleep with just a coverlet or sheet since there was no air-condition unit in the villa.
In the morning we would get up and eat breakfast and do some more swimming or playing until it was time for lunch. My parents would go with their friends and us to a sports bar however the only sport playing was live. It was called Tejo. You have a mound of clay with a target standing by the mound. In the clay mound sticking up were small triangle-shaped sticks of dynamite. The object of this exciting game was to toss a round shaped iron pellet at the mound hoping to blow the mound to bits and mark the target as well. The foreigners thought this was a great game. Of course my mother had us at least 50 yards away from this explosive game. I felt sorry for the poor guy who had to pack the mound up again with clay and more dynamite. After this we would go back to the villa for more swimming and playing.
Sunday was the cleanup day where we would help clean up and have one more swim and then drive back to Bogota. Again we would listen to Neil Diamond tapes and travel back up to the foot of the mountains and to our security guards. I do have fond memories of Colombia but our weekend visits to Melgar were the best and I will always remember them.
